Top executives at Goldman Sachs banned the investment firm’s employees from making private political donations to Donald Trump’s campaign for president, even as it appears to allow employees to donate to Hillary Clinton.
The new policy, effective on September 1, informs all partners of the firm that they can no longer send campaign donations Trump’s way. The memo claims that the new rule is meant to shield employees from charges of pay-to-play corruption, Fortune magazine reports.
The memo mentions donations to “any federal candidate who is a sitting state or local official.” This would apply to Trump’s vice presidential running mate, Indiana Governor Mike Pence. Indeed, the memo specifically mentions the “Trump/Pence ticket” as an example of a prohibited recipient of donations.
On the other hand, the Clinton/Kaine campaign is not mentioned, despite Clinton’s VP candidate, Tim Kaine, being a U.S. senator from Virginia.
Goldman Sachs’ CEO, Lloyd Blankfein, has been a major Hillary Clinton booster, going back at least as far as her 2008 presidential campaign against then-candidate Barack Obama. A search of OpenSecrets.org records shows at least one recent $2,700 donation to Hillary Clinton’s campaign.
Blankfein has also spent his money liberally with the Clintons to build a close relationship with the woman who would be president, even helping to float her son-in-law’s doomed hedge fund. But shoring up Chelsea Clinton’s husband’s floundering hedge fund is far from the only money Blankfein has poured into Clinton, Incorporated.
Goldman Sachs and Blankfein have showered Bill and Hillary Clinton with cash. As The Intercept reported, since 2010, Blankfein “paid Hillary Clinton $675,000 in personal speaking fees, paid Bill Clinton $1,550,000 in personal speaking fees, and donated between $250,000 and $500,000 to the Clinton Foundation.”
By other reports, Goldman Sachs employees have donated a whopping $711,490 to Clinton’s campaigns since she first ran to be the U.S. senator from New York.
Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston or email the author at igcolonel@hotmail.com.
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