(PatrioticPost.com)- After it was reported last week that investigators had sufficient evidence that he violated FARA laws by illegally lobbying on behalf of Qatar, Brookings Institute President John Allen announced on Sunday that he was retiring from the left-leaning, Qatar-linked think tank.
Retired Marine General Allen announced his resignation just days after the Associated Press reported that court filings revealed that the FBI had seized Allen’s electronic data as part of its probe into his lobbying efforts.
The day after the AP report was released, the Brookings Institute put Allen on administrative leave.
The FBI is investigating Allen for working behind the scenes to assist Qatar’s US lobbying efforts in June 2017. According to the Associated Press, an affidavit from an FBI agent in support of a search warrant said there was “substantial evidence” that Allen knowingly broke the foreign lobbying law, made false statements, and withheld evidence from investigators.
Allen allegedly traveled to Qatar to meet with the Kingdom’s top government officials, offering them advice on how to influence US policy. He also lobbied on behalf of Qatar to lawmakers and top White House officials.
Qatar’s influence operations are on par with those conducted by the Communist Chinese Party. Money flows from the oil-rich kingdom into US think tanks, universities, news outlets, foundations, and politicians.
The Brookings Institute has been long criticized for its deep ties to the Qatari government, which has donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to the left-leaning think tank. In 2014, Qatar pledged $15 million to build a satellite campus for Brookings in Doha.
According to investigators, Allen was secretly lobbying on behalf of Qatar alongside Pakistani-American businessman Imaad Zuberi, who was sentenced to 12 years for falsifying records related to his foreign lobbying efforts in September 2021.
Richard Olson, Barack Obama’s Ambassador to both Pakistan and the UAE, also recently pleaded guilty to illegally lobbying on behalf of Qatar.
In 2019, filmmaker Mike Cernovich produced a short documentary on Qatar’s ongoing influence operations called “Blood Money: How Qatar Bought Off The Entire D.C. Establishment.”
Watch Cernovich’s film HERE.
