A longtime Trump insider has been pushing a proposal to build dozens of nuclear power plants in Saudi Arabia while seeking to avoid restrictions on the transfer of U.S. nuclear technology and has at times stood to profit from the effort, according to an investigative report by the House Oversight Committee
“Today’s report reveals new and extensive evidence that corroborates Committee whistle-blowers and exposes how corporate and foreign interests are using their unique access to advocate for the transfer of U.S. nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia,” said Rep. Elijah Cummings, the Maryland Democrat who chairs the committee.
Republicans also argued that Barrack had no conflicts by promoting the nuclear proposal because he ultimately did not join the administration. Ahead of the report’s release, a spokesman for Barrack spoke with The New York Times about allegations that the longtime Trump friend used his connections to assist foreign interests, telling the newspaper Barrack had no incentive to lobby on behalf of any particular country or countries in the Persian Gulf because his business interests and policy concerns span the entire region.
In a February statement responding to the committee's interim report, IP3 defended its efforts, arguing the group was working to empower the U.S. nuclear industry and counteract Russian and Chinese efforts to export nuclear technology in the Middle East and other regions. He was also “taking steps for his own company, Colony NorthStar, to profit from the same proposals he was advancing,” according to the report. That included an effort to acquire a leading American nuclear company that would have played a key role in the project.
After Trump’s win in the election, Hewitt and other boosters of the project began aggressively working to secure support for the plan. IP3 officials traveled to Saudi Arabia in December of 2016 to solicit $120 million in funding for the project and conveyed “strong, unequivocal support for this program from the Trump administration,” retired Gen. Keith Alexander wrote in an email cited in the report.
Barrack met with Trump at the White House about the Middle East Marshall Plan on the same day the president met with Saudi Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman at the White House, correspondence between Barrack’s secretary and the White House cited in the report shows. Soon after, Barrack began corresponding with top officials at IP3 about a plan to bid for Westinghouse in what Democrats believe to be the Saudi Public Investment Fund, a sovereign wealth fund. IP3 officials met with Kushner in August on their proposal to acquire Westinghouse, which, under the agreement, would be the main partner in the effort to build more than 30 nuclear reactors in Saudi Arabia.
On Aug. 1, 2018, Brookfield completed its acquisition of Westinghouse after securing final government approval for the deal from the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, a review board filled by Cabinet secretaries. It’s not clear whether Barrack’s company participated in the successful bid.
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