By Daniel Lippman and Caitlin Oprysko

Presented by Humane Society Legislative Fund

With help from Josh Gerstein

FARA FRIDAY: A clash of Biden-world attorneys and a former top Republican fundraising official is playing out in a D.C. federal court. In a highly unusual legal fight, former top Trump fundraiser Elliott Broidy, whose emails were allegedly hacked by the Gulf state of Qatar and generated a number of embarrassing stories back in 2018, has accused several law firms of engaging in a “brazen coverup” by concealing evidence — including Qatar’s attorneys at Covington & Burling, who also happen to have close ties to President Joe Biden.

— For the past five years, Broidy’s lawsuit against Qatari agents has been grinding through the court system. But the defection last month of one of the defendants, former Qatari lobbyist Joseph Allaham, has jolted the case.

— According to court filings from Broidy’s attorneys over the past month, Allaham has handed over numerous emails and other documents to Broidy, including sensitive internal communications that Broidy’s attorneys claimed in a Sept. 15 filing prove Covington engineered a “far-reaching conspiracy” to conceal crucial evidence and allegedly to violate a court order.

— Perhaps the most explosive allegation is that Covington had altered some of Allaham’s “answers [to Broidy in discovery] regarding the hack-and-smear itself from ‘admitted’ to ‘denied.’”

— Arent Fox, which represented Allaham, replied in a subsequent filing that Covington had merely provided suggestions about Allaham’s draft responses, after which Arent Fox edited the draft responses to ensure their accuracy and that he had agreed that it was “appropriate to change his admission to a denial.” “Arent Fox has never been directed by Qatar or its counsel to alter its discovery responses or document productions, and would never have blindly followed such directions had they been given,” the firm said.

— Covington is a major player among Washington’s politically-focused law firms, as one of the top vendors for the DNC, and its heavy-hitter partners include former Attorney General Eric Holder.

— Covington is also the law firm of record for Biden’s vice presidential archives, with its three trustees all being Covington partners. One of those trustees, Robert Lenhard, served as the lead outside counsel for the Biden 2020 campaign. Another is Dana Remus, who served as general counsel of the Biden campaign and then became his first White House counsel.

— When Broidy submitted the first few documents from Allaham in late August, along with a signed declaration in which Allaham stated that Qatar would not allow his attorneys to produce to Broidy any discovery “that would reveal the involvement of Qatar and/or its agents in the hack-and-smear campaign targeting Broidy,” U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich responded almost immediately, saying the same day that she had “concerns” that some of the filings submitted by Covington on behalf of Qatar “may be false or materially misleading.”

— In a reply brief a few days later, Covington sought to respond to the court’s concerns, saying the judge was missing key parts of Allaham’s previously sworn statements.

— The recent legal fireworks coincided with the lead Covington attorney on the case resigning this summer. Los Angeles-based Mitch Kamin, who is a friend of second gentleman Doug Emhoff and a former Biden campaign bundler, had been Qatar’s lead counsel since the Broidy litigation began back in 2018.

— Shortly after Broidy’s lawyers launched their current offensive by subpoenaing Covington in late June, Kamin withdrew from the case and left Covington. Last month, he became the in-house general counsel for a new museum backed by George Lucas set to open in 2025.

— In a court filing last Friday, Covington called Broidy’s new evidence “unremarkable”and denied that there was “any misconduct on the part of Qatar or its counsel.” The filing continued: “As soon as one rationale is shot down, Broidy invents another that is equally baseless and inflammatory.” Covington declined to comment, and other parties in the suit did not respond to requests for comment.

TGIF and welcome to PI, where our thoughts are with the family, friends, staff and colleagues of Sen. Dianne Feinstein. Send tips: [email protected]. And be sure to follow me on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter: @caitlinoprysko.

A message from Humane Society Legislative Fund:

A monumental threat is facing American farmers. The “Ending Agricultural Trade Suppression” (EATS) Act, H.R. 4417/S. 2019—or any version of it—could have devastating consequences for farmers by picking winners and losers in the marketplace and benefiting foreign-owned conglomerates. Take Action: Tell Congress not to poison the Farm Bill with the EATS Act or anything like it. https://hslf.org/farmers

GOLD PURVEYORS GRAPPLE WITH MENENDEZ SPOTLIGHT: Purveyors of precious metals such as Gold and silver have found themselves in the spotlight following the federal corruption charges brought last week against Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), his wife and three businesspeople, in which prosecutors allege that the senator accepted gold bars as payment for bribes. (Menendez has denied the charges and pleaded not guilty on Wednesday.)

— But gold merchants are trying to make lemonade out of the attention, quick to highlight that, while corruption is bad, in keeping gold bars, Menendez did have a point. “According to one investing expert, investing in gold and other precious metals is a sagacious step against market instability that most Americans should make now (albeit not through bribes),” the PR firm RLM Public Relations wrote in an email to reporters this week, offering up one precious metals executive to explain why.

— “I think this Menendez story has kind of got some people interested more, maybe, in metals — people asking, you know, why did he take a bribe in precious metals,” that executive, Genesis Gold Group CEO Jonathan Rose, told PI. He compared the rubbernecking effect to when reports surfaced that supermodel Gisele Bundchen was asking to be paid in euros rather than U.S. dollars, though her manager denied them at the time.

— Still, while Rose said the month of September “has kind of been gangbusters” for sales of gold, one-off news stories like the allegations against Menendez are “not really the driving force” for much of his firm’s clientele.

— “I just think in terms of … what gold stands for, it’s a storage of wealth,” he said. But the allure of owning gold doesn’t seem to hurt either: “If you’ve ever held a gold coin or gold bar in your hand, it kind of answers a lot of [those] questions without even talking,” he noted. “The attractiveness of gold has always been there.”

— More influential on the gold market, Rose and another industry executive said, have been the pervasive economic turbulence and inflation, coupled with the bank collapses of this spring.

— “We have seen an uptick [in] demand this week as a result of a market pullback in precious metals prices,” Stefan Gleason, president of Money Metals Exchange, said in an email, which followed higher demand in the spring. “The twin threats of bank failures and inflation provided two good reasons to pull money out of the bank to hold savings in physical gold and silver instead.”

— “We don’t think this incident will have any impact on the gold market itself,” he told PI of the attention being paid to gold bars in the Menendez indictment. But, he added, “it’s indeed noteworthy that even Sen. Menendez and his wife seem to value payments in gold more than payments in U.S. dollars. They’ve noticed, like so many Americans, that the Federal Reserve Note dollar is being devalued at an accelerated rate, thanks to massive deficit spending and debt monetization by America’s politicians and central bankers.”

THE SHOW MUST GO ON: Despite the criminal charges and “calls for his resignation from more than half of his Senate Democratic colleagues,” CNN’s Manu Raju reports “donors can still hit the links and dine with” Menendez and his chief of staff at a Ritz-Carlton in Puerto Rico next month.

— “On Thursday, just as Menendez went behind closed doors to inform Senate Democrats he would not resign and proclaimed his innocence, a representative with the New Jersey Democrat’s leadership PAC wrote to donors that the event was still on, according to a copy of the invitation obtained by CNN.”

— “The message confirmed that the mid-October retreat, hosted by the New Millennium PAC, was still happening ‘in light of recent events.’ As part of the two-day event: A Friday evening welcome reception with Menendez at the Ritz, followed by a Saturday morning golf outing with the senator on the East Course, a championship-level course with views of the ocean and lush greens and fairways. There’s lunch with the senator’s chief of staff that day followed by a farewell reception with the senator in the evening.”

A message from Humane Society Legislative Fund:

HOW THINGS ARE GOING FOR THE CLUB: “A well-funded group of anti-Trump conservatives has sent its donors a remarkably candid memo that reveals how resilient former President Donald J. Trump has been against millions of dollars of negative ads the group deployed against him in two early-voting states,” Axios’ Jonathan Swan reports.

— “The political action committee, called Win It Back, has close ties to the influential fiscally conservative group Club for Growth. It has already spent more than $4 million trying to lower Mr. Trump’s support among Republican voters in Iowa and nearly $2 million more trying to damage him in South Carolina.”

— “But in the memo — dated Thursday and obtained by The New York Times — the head of Win It Back PAC, David McIntosh, acknowledges to donors that after extensive testing of more than 40 anti-Trump television ads, ‘all attempts to undermine his conservative credentials on specific issues were ineffective.’”

SPOTTED at a Professional Non-Profit Theater Coalition briefing on the state of the American theater industry organized by Arnold & Porter, per a tipster: Lin-Manuel Miranda and Phylicia Rashad, Sens. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Peter Welch (D-Vt.) and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), and Jessica Monahan, Vincent Brown, Drew Benzaia and Lucas Gorak of Arnold & Porter.

— And at a 12th anniversary party for S-3 Group held at Smoke & Mirrors, per a tipster: Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.), Reps. Marc Veasey (D-Texas), Morgan McGarvey (D-Ky.), David Valadao (R-Calif.), Dan Newhouse (R-Wash.) and Jake LaTurner (R-Kan.), David Marin of Viatris, Adam Huftalen of Merck, Jeff Shockey of Raytheon, Colton Hotary of LG, Eric Gascho and Jennifer Dexter of National Health Council, Sarah Rittling of First Five Years Fund, Alex Maggos of Standard Industries, Chris Herndon of Meta, Robert Yeakel and Carrianna Kuruvilla of DoorDash, Jacque Mosely of Nelnet, Martin Doern of Xcel, Adam Peterman and Dana Gray of T-Mobile, Drew Feltz and Nikki Burns of LEGO, Missy Kurek of mKz Strategies, Robert Henline of Vita Inclinata, Kate Renz of Pitney Bowes, Kori Keller of the National Association of Letter Carriers, Elizabeth Baker of the Air Line Pilots Association, Annika Olsen of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association and Victor Yang of National Asian Pacific Center on Aging.

— Tizzy Brown is joining the federal affairs team at Uber to oversee national partnerships. She was previously senior director of the Global Women’s Innovation Network.

— Jessica Post is stepping down as president of the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee after seven years. Executive director Heather Williams will serve as interim president.

— The American Cleaning Institute hired Ana Fraisse as manager of sustainability engagement. She was previously an engagement manager for strategic initiatives at Pyxera Global.

— Melissa Bellin is now principal adviser for K-12 education in the Office of Legislation and Congressional Affairs at the Department of Education. She most recently was senior policy adviser at the Learning Policy Institute.

— The Niskanen Center is adding David Jimenez as government affairs manager for social policy and Zachary Norris as senior staff attorney.

— Roy Loewenstein is now a director at Bryson Gillette. He most recently was press secretary at the Education Department and is a Jon Tester alum.

— Quarles & Brady has named James Aquilina and Hans Riede co-managing partners of the firm’s Washington office. Aquilina is the D.C. office chair of the intellectual property practice group and Ried is the D.C. office chair of the labor and employment practice group.

— Yvette Rose is now deputy executive director in the FAA’s Office of Rulemaking. She previously was senior vice president for the Cargo Airline Association.

— Aneesa McMillan is now communications director at Giffords. She previously was deputy executive director at Priorities USA.

— EPRI has brought on Carole Plowfield, Fatimah Rickert and Ivy Lyn as government and external relations senior advisers. Plowfield was most recently clean energy strategy manager at the American Public Power Association, Rickert was external affairs representative at Dominion Energy and Lyn was director of state regulatory affairs at the Edison Electric Institute.

— Christian Flinn is joining the Carbon Capture Coalition as public policy manager. He most recently served as a policy associate at the Plant Based Foods Association.

— Thomas Jensen has joined Holcim to lead advocacy efforts related to the company’s building envelope manufacturing operations. He most recently was vice president of government affairs at truck autonomous vehicles developer TuSimple, which followed a 32-year career at UPS.

A message from Humane Society Legislative Fund:

Some politicians have hatched a radical scheme which could destroy states' rights and eliminate hundreds of laws that preserve our farms, safeguard our food, and protect our animals.

The “Ending Agricultural Trade Suppression” (EATS) Act, H.R. 4417/S. 2019—or any version of it—could have devastating consequences for family farmers. By threatening hundreds of state and local laws and undermining states’ rights, EATS empowers Congress and the federal government to pick winners and losers in the marketplace. This could disproportionately hurt family farms and benefit certain large producers, some of which are foreign-owned.

The EATS Act, H.R. 4417/S. 2019 is a huge federal overreach that would be disastrous for American farmers, and they need your help to make sure it's not included in this year's Farm Bill.

Take Action: Tell Congress not to poison the Farm Bill with the EATS Act or anything like it.
https://hslf.org/farmers

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