Welcome to Pay Dirt—exclusive reporting and research from The Daily Beast’s Lachlan Markay on corruption, campaign finance, and influence-peddling in the nation’s capital. For Beast Inside members only.
A scandal-plagued Republican fundraiser enlisted, and paid for, the services of a veteran U.S. diplomat with deep connections in Washington’s foreign-policy intelligentsia as the fundraiser used his Trump administration connections to advance interests aligned with Gulf monarchies.
Ambassador Dennis Ross, a Middle East policy expert who served in senior diplomatic posts in the Obama, Clinton, and George H.W. Bush administrations, was paid at least $10,000 in early 2018 by Elliott Broidy, then a finance co-chair of the Republican National Committee. Ross confirmed the arrangement to PAY DIRT in an interview Wednesday evening, and said he did not know at the time that Broidy was running an influence campaign designed to steer U.S. policy in the Middle East.
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“He had approached me… to see if I would join a group of outside advisers who he had asked to consult and give him advice and think about how to approach what was going on in the region. So I said OK,” Ross recalled.
A Broidy spokesman also confirmed the consulting agreement. “For decades, Elliott Broidy has proudly supported public educational efforts to thwart Islamic extremism, strengthen U.S. national security, and defend America’s closest ally in the Middle East,” the spokesman wrote. “To this end, Mr. Broidy supported the Washington Institute over the years, and in this case had a short-term consulting agreement with Ambassador Dennis Ross. This agreement came to an end after the Qataris hacked Mr. Broidy’s emails and launched an unprecedented smear campaign to stifle his First Amendment rights because of his work to educate the public about the support that Qatar and Al Jazeera provide to terrorist groups, such as Hamas and Hezbollah.”
Ross spent decades in the top echelons of the U.S. foreign-policy apparatus, most recently as a senior official in President Obama’s National Security Council. He previously spearheaded efforts by Presidents Clinton and Bush to negotiate Israeli-Palestinian peace deals. Ross is now a senior scholar at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a think tank focusing on U.S. policy in the Middle East.
Ross said he ended his agreement with Broidy and returned the money he’d been paid after The New York Times reported in March 2018 that Broidy had allegedly been running a multimillion-dollar public-relations and advocacy campaign designed to shift U.S. foreign policy in a direction more favorable to the interests of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, where Broidy was seeking lucrative contracts for his private security company.
Documents obtained by PAY DIRT indicate that Ross didn’t just provide advice; he also kept Broidy in the loop about his public writings on matters of professional interest to Broidy, who in turn suggested avenues for intensifying pressure on his perceived political adversaries, with Ross’ assistance.
In January 2018, Ross emailed Broidy to alert him to an op-ed he planned to place in The Hill. “I wanted to let you know that I have done a piece that touches on Iran, Qatar and al Jazeera,” Ross wrote. “I think you will find it interesting.”
“That’s Great. Please also think of others we can ask to write op eds,” Broidy told Ross. “I’m anxious to launch against in a serious way against al Jezeera [sic]... Thank you for your focus and attention to these important matters.”
“As discussed,” Broidy added, “you may invoice me at $10k.”
Two days later, The Hill published Ross’ op-ed. “Saudi Arabia is engaged in a national transformation project in which we have a high stake in its success,” he wrote. “And whatever Saudi clerics may have done in the past, they are no longer spreading an intolerant, violent ideology that justifies terror against non-believers. One cannot say that about Qatar.”
Ross told Broidy in their January 2018 email exchange that he had “a few people in mind” to author like-minded op-eds, and added, “Like me they will only write what they believe.” But he told PAY DIRT that he never did refer other potential writers to Broidy. “In the end it didn’t feel right to me, so I didn’t do it,” he said.
The Washington Institute said Ross’ arrangement with Broidy did not appear to run afoul of the group’s ethical guidelines. “The Institute strictly prohibits its fellows from taking or advocating a policy position in exchange for remuneration under any circumstances,” a spokesperson told PAY DIRT. “The Institute has no reason to believe that Ambassador Ross acted in contradiction to this policy.”
Ross’ involvement, even unwittingly, in Broidy’s alleged influence operation illuminates a previously unknown node in the GOP fundraiser’s extensive network of Washington contacts that he brought to bear early in the Trump administration.
It also shows how D.C. powerbrokers can enlist influential voices in Washington to advance murky interests in ways that are hidden from public view—and even, occasionally, from the very people involved.
