WASHINGTON – John McCain's chief foreign policy adviser and his business partner lobbied the senator or his staff on 49 occasions in a 3½-year span while being paid hundreds of thousands of dollars by the government of the former Soviet republic of Georgia.
The payments raise ethical questions about the intersection of Randy Scheunemann's personal financial interests and his advice to the Republican presidential candidate who is seizing on Russian aggression in Georgia as a campaign issue.
AdvertisementMcCain warned Russian leaders Tuesday that their assault in Georgia risks “the benefits they enjoy from being part of the civilized world.” McCain said Russia's actions against Georgia were “totally, absolutely unacceptable.”
On April 17, a month and a half after Scheunemann stopped working for Georgia, his partner signed a $200,000 contract with the Georgian government. That deal added to an arrangement that brought in more than $800,000 to the two-man firm from 2004 to mid-2007. Scheunemann is taking a leave of absence from the firm for the duration of the campaign.
“Scheunemann's work as a lobbyist poses valid questions about McCain's judgment in choosing someone who – and whose firm – are paid to promote the interests of other nations,” New York University law professor Stephen Gillers said. “So one must ask whether McCain is getting disinterested advice, at least when the issues concern those nations.”
McCain has been to Georgia three times since 1997 and “this is an issue he has been involved with for well over a decade,” McCain campaign spokesman Brian Rogers said.
McCain also has long ties with Scheunemann, a strong conservative who was an aide in the 1990s to then-Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott of Mississippi.
Scheunemann, who also was a foreign policy adviser in McCain's 2000 presidential campaign, has for years traveled the same road as McCain in pushing for regime change in Iraq and promoting NATO membership for Georgia and other former Soviet republics.
While their politics coincide, Russia's invasion of Georgia casts a spotlight on Scheunemann's business interests and McCain's conduct as a senator.
Scheunemann's firm lobbied McCain's office on four bills and resolutions regarding Georgia, with McCain as a co-sponsor or supporter of all of them.
In addition to the 49 contacts with McCain or his staff regarding Georgia, Scheunemann's firm has lobbied the senator or his aides on at least 47 occasions since 2001 on behalf of the governments of Taiwan and Macedonia, which each paid Scheunemann and his partner Mike Mitchell more than half a million dollars; Romania, which paid more than $400,000; and Latvia, which paid nearly $250,000. Federal law requires Scheunemann to publicly disclose to the Justice Department all his lobbying contacts as an agent of a foreign government.
Four months ago, on the same day Scheunemann's partner signed the latest $200,000 agreement with Georgia, McCain spoke with Saakashvili by phone.