Accused Terrorist Is Big GOP Donor
By Justin Rood
ABC News
The National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC)
won't say what it plans to do with thousands of dollars
in campaign donations it received from an accused terror
financier.
Abdul Tawala Ibn Ali Alishtari gave $15,250 to the NRCC
since 2002, according to FEC records published on the Web
site opensecrets.org.
On Friday, Alishtari pled not guilty to funding terrorism
and other crimes, including financial fraud.
The NRCC is the main political group dedicated to helping
the Republican party win seats in the U.S. House of
Representatives. Reached Monday morning for comment, an
NRCC spokeswoman declined to discuss the matter on the
record.
The indictment against Alishtari unsealed in Manhattan
federal court Friday charges him with providing material
support to terrorists by transferring $152,000 between
banks to allegedly be used to purchase night-vision
goggles and other equipment needed for a terrorist
training camp.
Alishtari, aka Michael Mixon, was paid for his efforts to
collect and transfer the funds, which included $25,000
sent from a bank in New York to a bank in Montreal, Canada,
the indictment alleges.
Police and FBI agents arrested Alishtari in New York City
on Friday. A day earlier, agents raided his Ardsley, N.Y.
home, according to the "Lower Hudson Journal News." When
a reporter for the paper reached a woman claiming to be
Alishtari's wife on Friday and informed her of the charges,
she cried and said he was innocent, the paper reported.
The NRCC would not confirm it had received donations from
Mr. Alishtari, or that he had received numerous awards
from the organization, as is claimed by an online list of
personal accomplishments that appears to have been posted
by Mr. Alishtari.
The list says he was made a life member of the NRCC's
"Inner Circle" and was named New York State Businessman
of the Year by the group in 2003 and 2004.
The NRCC "Businessperson of the Year" fundraising campaign,
which gave such "awards" to at least 1,900 GOP donors, has
been derided as a telemarketing scam by political watchdogs.
The online list also claims Alishtari was appointed to the
president's "USNRCC White House Business Advisory Group."
An archived Web site for one of Alishtari's companies,
GlobalProtector.net, claims it had demonstrated a "Web
filter" technology for officials at the Department of
Defense's Miami, Fla.-based Southern Command (SouthCom),
which coordinates U.S. military operations in Central
and South America and the Caribbean and oversees the
controversial Guantanamo Bay detention facility.
SouthCom spokesman Steve Lucas would not confirm or deny
any contacts between Alishtari and officials there.
SouthCom personnel he spoke with said SouthCom does not
use the company's software, and could not rule out the
possibility they had received a sales pitch from him or
another company representative.
A database of unclassified federal contracts at
FedSpending.org does not show SouthCom or any other
government branch awarded business to Alishtari's
company.
A call to the telephone number which had been listed on
GlobalProtector's site connects to a recorded message
offering the caller to "spark up your days and nights"
by calling a 1-800 phone chat line.