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Adviser to UAE emerges as focus for Mueller, indicating broadened inquiry
WASHINGTON — George Nader, a Lebanese-American businessman, has hovered on the fringes of international diplomacy for three decades. He was a back-channel negotiator with Syria during the Clinton administration, reinvented himself as an adviser to the de facto ruler of the United Arab Emirates and last year was a frequent visitor to President Donald Trump’s White House.
In recent weeks, Mueller’s investigators have questioned Nader and have pressed witnesses for information about any possible attempts by the Emiratis to buy political influence by directing money to support Trump during the presidential campaign, according to people with knowledge of the discussions.
The investigators have also asked about Nader’s role in White House policymaking, those people said, suggesting that the special counsel investigation has broadened beyond Russian election meddling to include Emirati influence on the Trump administration.
The focus on Nader could also prompt an examination of how money from multiple countries has flowed through and influenced Washington during the Trump era.
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In one example of Nader’s influential connections, which has not been previously reported, last fall he received a detailed report from a top Trump fundraiser, Elliott Broidy, about a private meeting with the president in the Oval Office.
Broidy owns a private security company with hundreds of millions of dollars in contracts with the United Arab Emirates, and he extolled to Trump a paramilitary force that his company was developing for the country.
He also lobbied the president to meet privately “in an informal setting” with the Emirates’ military commander and de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan; to back the UAE’s hawkish policies in the region; and to fire Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.
A copy of Broidy’s memorandum about the meeting was provided to The New York Times by someone critical of the Emirati influence in Washington.
Reached by phone last month, Nader, 58, said he had dinner guests and would call back. He did not, and attempts to reach him over several weeks were unsuccessful. Nader’s lawyer did not respond to messages seeking comment.
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The White House did not respond to requests for comment. In a statement, a spokesman for Broidy said his memorandum had been stolen through sophisticated hacking.
Yousef al-Otaiba, the Emirati ambassador to the United States, declined to comment. Axios first reported Mueller’s questioning of Nader.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
MARK MAZZETTI, DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK and MAGGIE HABERMAN © 2018 The New York Times
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