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In addition to Yellen, Antony Blinken, Biden’s candidate for secretary of state, revealed the clients he advised through WestExec Advisors, the consulting firm he co-founded with other alumni of the Obama administration. These clients included investment giant Blackstone, Bank of America, Facebook, Uber, McKinsey & Company, Japanese conglomerate SoftBank, pharmaceutical company Gilead, investment bank Lazard, Boeing, AT&T, Royal Bank of Canada, LinkedIn and the venerable Sotheby’s. Auction house.
The disclosures opened up WestExec’s tightly-held client list, which the company had previously refused to disclose. WestExec paid Blinken nearly $ 1.2 million over the past two years, according to the record, with another estimated $ 250,000 to $ 500,000 owed for his work this year.
Blinken has entered into a condition sheet to sell its stake in WestExec, which is valued between $ 500,000 and $ 1 million, according to the disclosure. It also plans to sell its stake in WestExec Ventures, a sister venture capital firm, according to the filing. Its stake in WestExec Ventures is valued between $ 1 million and $ 5 million.
Biden’s choice to be director of national intelligence, Avril Haines, was also a principal and consultant at WestExec. Haines reported $ 180,000 in “consulting fees” from Palantir, a data mining company that has had government contracts with agencies like Immigration and US Customs. The Silicon Valley-based company was founded by Peter Thiel, a prominent pro-Trump conservative in the tech world.
Haines’ biography at the Brookings Institute, where she was a senior non-resident researcher, bragged about her work with Palantir until this summer, when she began advising the Biden campaign, The Intercept first reported.
A transition official said Haines was “primarily focused on [Palantir’s] diversity and inclusion efforts, especially by increasing gender diversity ”and that she“ mentored some of the remarkable young women in the company and suggested ways in which the company could promote diversity and inclusion. “
Yellen’s corporate profits could create more thorny problems. Along with her disclosure, Yellen pledged to approach Treasury ethics lawyers to “seek written permission to personally and substantially participate in any particular matter” involving a company from which she received compensation the previous year.
Yellen last agreed to Citi’s speaking fees in October 2020, for example, which means she would have to consult with the department. ethics lawyers until October 2021.
While Yellen has mostly garnered praise from progressives to date, its millions of dollars in revenue from the big banks is likely to spark questions about its proximity to Wall Street. Hillary Clinton faced a political comeback from the left during the 2016 campaign for the money earned from Wall Street speeches after leaving the State Department.
A spokesperson for Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Who criticized the “revolving door” between government officials and business, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The progressive senator from Massachusetts previously called Yellen an “exceptional choice.”
The transition official defended Yellen’s speaking costs. “Take a look at his law enforcement record – he’s not someone who shoots when it comes to bad actors or bad behavior,” the official said. “You can expect it to bring the same high ethical standards and the same philosophy of rigorous enforcement to the Treasury.”
Victoria Guida contributed to this report.
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