Out of the $9 million, Broidy paid around $2.4 million to his co-conspirator, Nickie Lum Davis. He agreed to forfeit the $6.6 million as part of his plea agreement.
Some of the efforts Broidy attempted included arranging meetings for Chinese Minister A with the Attorney General, the Secretary of Homeland Security, and other high-level officials in May 2017. Chinese Minister A was visiting the United States at the time. He also provided talking points to the Secretary of State regarding the 1MDB investigation before a meeting with the Malaysian Prime Minister in August 2017. He also pushed the White House Chief of Staff to set a golf game between the President and the Malaysian Prime Minister to seek settlement of the 1MDB probe. His efforts were unsuccessful, according to the DOJ.
A former Justice Department employee named George Higginbotham pleaded guilty for his role in the scheme on November 30, 2018. Lum Davis pleaded guilty on August 31, 2020.
A threat to U.S. national security and democracy
In a statement, DOJ Criminal Division Acting Assistant Attorney General Brian Rabbit said, “In exchange for millions of dollars, Elliott Broidy and his co-conspirators agreed to secretly do the bidding of a foreign government and a foreign national…Although his repeated efforts to influence the administration were unsuccessful, Mr. Broidy never disclosed that he was actually acting on behalf of foreign actors. This case demonstrates how foreign governments and principals seek to advance their agendas in the United States by hiding behind politically influential proxies.”
