7/24/2019 Magnolia Complaint - Exhibit 44
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Mike Honda took trip to Turkey on iffy group's dime
By Josh [email protected] Jose Mercury
News
Posted:Fri Oct 30 16:35:28 MDT 2015
Congressman Mike Honda is among a group of lawmakers who
accepted trips from organizations secretly funded by a Turkish
religious movement inapparent violation of House rules and possibly
federal law, USA Today has reported.
An article published online Thursday evening said that Honda,
D-San Jose, took a 2013 trip to Turkey and that the Pacifica
Institute picked the $5,675 taThe institute had certified to the
House Ethics Committee that it had been designated it as a
501(c)(3) nonprofit charitable group by the IRS, but the agehas no
record of such a designation, the newspaper said.
The Ethics Committee approved the trip on Aug. 14, 2013, and
Honda went to Turkey that year from Aug. 20 to 28.
"The congressman, quite simply, took a trip approved by the
House," Honda spokeswoman Lauren Smith said in an email Friday.
"Note that this was alsafter trips taken by other members and staff
that were also approved."
The House Ethics Committee currently is investigating Honda --
but not for his travel. The probe is focused on allegations that
his campaign and his officblurred or crossed their lines in
violation of House rules or federal law.
Honda is currentlyfending off a second consecutive challenge
from fellow Democrat Ro Khanna as he seeks a ninth term in 2016.
And Khanna has madthe alleged ethical violations a major campaign
issue.
On a form filed with the Ethics Committee a month before his
2013 trip, Honda wrote that "this trip will inform my work on the
Appropriations Committee providing a better understanding of
bilateral relations between the U.S. and Turkey regarding economic
trade, security, and regional stability."
Honda checked a box on that form saying he was unaware "of any
registered federal lobbyists or foreign agents involved in
planning, organizing,requesting, and/or arranging the trip."
USA Today reported that a 2008 cable from the U.S. embassy in
Turkey, released by the online whistleblower clearinghouse
Wikileaks, describes thePacifica Institute as a "sister
organization" of a Turkish-based group called the
Bosphorus-Atlantic Association of Cultural Cooperation and
Friendship,known by its Turkish initials BAKIAD.
BAKIAD secretly funded the Turkish leg of a trip to Azerbaijan
taken by 10 other members of Congress who took 32 staffers in May
2013, according to areport filed this month by the Office of
Congressional Ethics. That trip was sponsored by groups connected
to a worldwide moderate Islamic movement by a religious scholar
named Fethullah Glen, who has been accused by the Turkish
government of attempting a coup in that country, USA Todayreported.
Turkish leaders have asked the United States to extradite Glen from
a remote compound in rural Pennsylvania where he has lived for 20
yea
USA Today identified 214 congressional trips sponsored by Glen
organizations that seem to have been improperly disclosed, with
similar itineraries thaincluded visits to the same historical
sites, and meetings with Glenist journalists, lawmakers and
business associations.
Honda was among dozens of House members, including others from
the Bay Area, who signed a February 2015 letter urging U.S.
Secretary of State JoKerry to help secure the release of Glenist
journalists who had been arrested by the Turkish government.
Mahmut Altun, the Pacifica Institute's Northern California
director, signed and filed forms with the Ethics Committee before
Honda's trip in which he said organization was a charitable
nonprofit and that the trip would not be financed by any foreign
agents.
Altun, reached by phone Friday, said he was driving and couldn't
talk, and then hung up. He didn't respond to an emailed
inquiry.
The Pacific Institute's website indicates it has offices in
Sunnyvale -- at the Tasman Drive address that Altun listed on the
Ethics Committee forms -- as was in Los Angeles, Orange County, San
Diego; the East Bay, Burlingame, the San Fernando Valley, Salt Lake
City, Portland, Oregon, and Boise, Idaho.
Hari Sevugan, spokesman for Khanna's campaign, said Friday that
there are "serious questions raised by these new revelations into
how Mike Honda uhis office which the congressman will have to
publicly answer."
"What is disturbing is that ethics violations and federal
investigations are becoming a pattern with Congressman Honda
overshadowing everything else,Sevugan said. "This is further
evidence for the need for a fresh start in Washington with
leadership that can focus on our common priorities, like
educatioand an economy that works for everyone, rather than on ties
to narrow special interests."
Josh Richman covers politics. Follow him at
Twitter.com/Josh_Richman . Read the Political Blotter at
IBAbuzz.com/politics .
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Exhibit 44, Page 1 of 1
