Allen’s resignation from Brookings, a prominent think tank in Washington, D.C., comes after a court case leaked last week, publicly available on a nonprofit legal investigation site, showed that the FBI had seized Allen’s electronic communications. . The FBI’s search warrant for the lawsuit, which appeared to have been posted on the Internet by mistake, accused Allen of violating overseas lobbying laws and failing to provide an email about the lobbying effort. Allen has denied that he is pressuring Qatar. The Associated Press first reported the testimony.
The probe into Allen’s communications with Trump administration officials, including former national security adviser HR McMaster, following Qatar’s diplomatic cut-off by its Gulf rivals in 2017. The investigation is the Justice Department’s latest effort. to crack down on foreign pressure violations under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA).
In previous statements, Allen’s spokesman Bo Phillips said that “the retired general’s efforts in relation to Qatar in 2017 were to protect the interests of the United States and the military personnel stationed in Qatar.” Phillips added that Allen “received no reward for his efforts.”
The Brookings Institution in a statement on Sunday thanked Allen for “his contribution to Brookings, including his leadership in successfully guiding the foundation during the pandemic, as well as his many years of service and sacrifice for our country.”
The FBI investigative warrant, dated April, alleges that Allen was recruited in 2017 to travel to Qatar while the country faced blockade by other Gulf states that had accused Qatar of supporting extremism. Allen, who was a senior associate at Brookings at the time, worked with businessman Imaad Zuberi, who pleaded guilty to violating foreign lobbying laws in 2019, and the former US ambassador to Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates. Richard Olson, who pleaded guilty to foreign lobbying charges earlier this month.
The trio traveled to Doha, Qatar, and Allen demanded a $ 20,000 “engagement talk” fee, according to the court. Federal investigators say it is unclear whether Zuberi paid the fee or other compensation to Allen.
Federal investigators claim in the search warrant that Allen adopted a “false version of events” in a 2020 FBI interview about why he was hired to meet with Qatari officials. Investigators also accused Allen of failing to deliver emails following a summons related to his work in Qatar.
The warrant also alleges that Allen, Olson and Zumbery appeared to have violated foreign law lobbying by “trying to influence US government officials on behalf of Qatar” without registering with FARA. Federal investigators said there was “substantial evidence that these FARA violations were intentional.”
The search warrant included an email sent by Allen from his Brookings account to McMaster in June 2017, stating that Qatar was seeking the White House or State Department to send a message calling for a peaceful resolution of the diplomatic dispute. The FBI wrote in the search warrant that McMaster said in a voluntary interview that Allen “did not reveal to him that he was motivated by Zuberi and Olson, who were involved in a lobbying and public relations campaign on behalf of Qatar.”
