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Social Democrats Hired US Lobby Firm
* Ruling Social Democrat Party paid a public affairs firm in Washington to facilitate meetings between party chief Liviu Dragnea and top US officials, according to a disclosure filing published by the US Justice Department, balkaninsight.com informs.
Ruling Social Democrat Party, PSD, hired a lobbying firm in Washington to facilitate meetings between party chief Liviu Dragnea and top US officials, according to documents published on the US Justice Department website.
According to the disclosure filing, submitted under the Foreign Agents Registration Act, which also includes correspondence, the party hired Madison & Company LLC in late April 2017 to facilitate meetings between Dragnea and US Vice-President Mike Pence, House Speaker Paul Ryan and also arrange political, media and academic meetings.
“These meetings will include CNN and other high impact elite media,” the document shows.
According to emails contained in the filing, the firm’s president, Al Madison, corresponded with Gheorghe Dimitrescu, a former Romanian consul in New York and Strasbourg and currently an advisor to the deputy head of the lower Chamber, Florin Iordache.
In the email exchange, Dimitrescu says the meetings with Pence and Ryan are of great importance to the Romanian Social Democrats and that it does not matter whether they happen in the United States or elsewhere.
According to the documents, the public affairs firm began to provide its services to the party from June 22, 2017. The disclosure was filed on October 24, 2017.
According to the firm’s website, besides the Romanian government, its clients include the governments of Albania, Pakistan, Turkey and Venezuela.
Dragnea told journalists on Friday that he did not know anything about the contract or about whether other party members had information about it.
“I read the information in the morning and I called the party, very surprised; I thought maybe someone in the party knows something about it. The PSD has no contract with any such firm and never paid a dime. Still, 100,000 dollars is a small amount of money to me, isn’t it? The PSD has no contract. I checked in the morning. It doesn’t exist,” he told journalists.
Dragnea was in the US for President Donald Trump’s inauguration, including a donor dinner on the eve of the inauguration. The Social Democrat chief posted pictures from the dinner on Facebook showing him and Romania's then Prime Minister, Sorin Grindeanu, speaking to Trump.
Romania's President, Klaus Iohannis, was the first Balkan leader to visit President Trump in June 2017, following intense efforts made by the Romanian embassy in Washington.
Dragnea: PSD never paid any money to any US company for arranging him meetings with US officials
Social Democratic Party (PSD) leader Liviu Dragnea on Friday stated that his party never paid any money to any US company for arranging him meetings with US officials. Asked whether PSD paid 100,000 US dollars to a company from USA for arranging him a meeting with US officials, Dragnea said that he has already checked with the party and there was no "such deal."
"I have also read that article this morning and I called the party to check, for I was very much surprised, but I thought that maybe someone had some kind of idea. But PSD has never concluded any contract with any company of the sort, less paid any money. (...) And also, 100,000 is a small amount for me, isn't it? PSD has no such agreement with any company of the sort and it didn't pay any money to any company," said Dragnea at the Parliament Palace.
Asked whether he knew Gheorghe Dimitrescu, adviser to Florin Iordache, Dragnea said that he didn't. "I checked with the party and he isn't," he specified. Asked if he intended to pay a visit to the US in the next interval, the PSD leader said: "I have no intention to, but if I receive an invitation and I am allowed to go, I will gladly do it." He also added that Florin Iordache has never told him that he was preparing a visit to the US for him.