Author: Robert Schmad, Washington Examiner

Saudi Arabia is spending millions of dollars each month paying its foreign agents to interface with members of the media and lawmakers to secure influence in Washington, enjoying considerable success in doing so, a Washington Examiner review of public records has found. From private sit-downs with members of Congress and their senior staff to op-eds…

EXCLUSIVE — A Justice Department database documenting political operations carried out by foreign agents was updated Thursday morning after sitting dormant since September 2024 following a Washington Examiner inquiry. On Wednesday, the Washington Examiner reached out to the Department of Justice to request information on when the agency’s “Foreign Principal Political Activities” dashboard would be…

Amazon is dispatching lobbyists to statehouses around the country in a fight against legislation that could see states ordering fewer goods from China, raising vague but strong objections to the bills, flooding legislators with dubious amendments to bog down the process, and straining their relationships with lawmakers. “I’ve gone to Amazon and their lobbyists and…

The pharmaceutical industry, which is well known for its well-resourced lobbying campaigns, has a lesser-known tactic for influencing policy: bankrolling ostensibly independent nonprofit organizations to push industry talking points in Washington and across the nation. One of the strongest examples of this dynamic is found in the National Community Pharmacists Association. The NCPA receives hundreds…

Left-of-center charitable foundations that spend hundreds of millions of dollars every year to promote projects that ostensibly have to do with human rights hold massive financial interests in corporations linked to the Chinese Communist Party — an entity that has been accused of widespread human rights abuses. A Washington Examiner analysis of 2023 tax disclosures…

On Thursday, the Senate Commerce Committee invited Microsoft President Brad Smith to discuss ways the United States could “beat China in the [artificial intelligence] race.” Microsoft, however, has a history of partnering with Pentagon-designated “Chinese military companies,” training talent that eventually filters into pro-Chinese Communist Party enterprises, engaging in censorship on behalf of Beijing, and…

Bill Gates’s philanthropy holds tens of millions of dollars’ worth of stock in corporations the Department of Defense designated as “Chinese military companies,” according to a Washington Examiner analysis of tax records. The Gates Foundation Trust, the nonprofit organization responsible for managing the endowment of the Microsoft co-founder’s foundation, held nearly $60 million in equity…

White House adviser Elon Musk, two major U.S. banks, and a major law firm have all maintained or strengthened business relationships with a Chinese battery manufacturer that Defense Department officials believe is a participant in the Chinese Communist Party’s military-industrial complex and that analysts have flagged for patent irregularities. Those relationships have continued against the…

Federal campaign finance records show that on June 30, 2024, billionaire Michael Bloomberg cut a $19 million check to help reelect former President Joe Biden. Roughly a month later, the Biden administration proposed a regulation affecting the entire financial industry, which Bloomberg had long pushed for. The regulation in question would establish Bloomberg LP’s Financial Instrument Global Identifier as the…

Newly obtained donor records revealed that hundreds of thousands of dollars have flowed from entities linked to the Chinese government into the coffers of the University of California, Berkeley, one of the most prestigious public institutions in the nation. Members of the Chinese Communist Party, a sanctioned Chinese research university, and Chinese state-owned enterprises have…