Ryan Meets Casino Mogul and Major G.O.P. Donor
Source: NYT
Ryan Meets Casino Mogul and Major G.O.P. Donor
By TRIP GABRIEL and NICHOLAS CONFESSORE
Published: August 14, 2012
LAS VEGAS — Four days after his announcement as Mitt Romney’s running mate, Representative Paul D. Ryan was not in Florida talking Medicare with elderly voters or in drought-ridden Iowa talking about a farm bill. He traveled to the Venetian hotel here for a meeting hosted by Sheldon Adelson, the billionaire casino mogul who has pledged to spend as much as $100 million this year to defeat President Obama.
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Mr. Adelson has already contributed more money to defeat Mr. Obama than anyone: over $50 million has gone to the 2012 campaign, including $10 million to a “super PAC” backing Mr. Romney and $10 million to Crossroads GPS, which has run millions of dollars of advertisements against Mr. Obama.
In keeping with Mr. Adelson’s penchant for staying below the radar, Romney aides refused to say who attended the meeting with Mr. Ryan, though the location (a private room at one of Mr. Adelson’s hotels) and leaks from the Romney camp left little doubt. And in keeping with laws that prohibit elected officials from explicitly asking donors for super PAC money, aides to Mr. Romney insisted before the event that the meeting was not a fund-raiser.
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But a closer connection with Mr. Adelson also holds risks for Mr. Ryan and the Republican ticket. Mr. Adelson’s casino empire, which has made him a billionaire, is the subject of a federal investigation into whether his company, Las Vegas Sands, bribed Chinese officials to help him expand into the mainland. Mr. Adelson’s company has denied any wrongdoing and has attributed the accusations to a disgruntled former executive.
Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/15/us/politics/paul-ryan-meets-sheldon-adelson-in-las-vegas.html
Scrutiny for Casino Mogul’s Frontman in China
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Mr. Yang arranged meetings for Mr. Adelson with senior Chinese officials; acted as a frontman on several ambitious projects for Mr. Adelson’s company, the Las Vegas Sands Corporation; and intervened on the Sands’s behalf with Chinese regulators. Mr. Yang even had his daughter take Mr. Adelson’s wife, Miriam, shopping when she was in Beijing.
“Adelson and I had a good relationship,” Mr. Yang said in a recent interview in Hong Kong. “He should thank me.”
Mr. Yang joined the Sands in 2007 as the company worked to protect its interests in Macau, where its gambling revenues were mushrooming, and pressed ahead with plans for a resort in mainland China. Boasting of ties to the People’s Liberation Army and China’s security apparatus, Mr. Yang was hired for his guanxi, that mixture of relationships and favors that is critical to opening doors in China, according to former executives.
But today, Mr. Yang, along with tens of millions of dollars in payments the Sands made through him in China, is a focus of a wide-ranging federal investigation into potential bribery of foreign officials and other matters in China and Macau, according to people with direct knowledge of the inquiries.
The investigations are unfolding as Mr. Adelson has become an increasing presence in this year’s presidential election, contributing at least $35 million to Republican groups. On Tuesday, Mitt Romney’s running mate, Representative Paul D. Ryan, is to appear at a fund-raiser at the Sands’s Venetian casino in Las Vegas; Mr. Adelson is likely to attend, a person close to him said.
more: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/14/us/politics/sheldon-adelsons-dealings-in-china-are-under-investigation.html?ref=politics
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