Tuesday, December 30, 2003
Friends in high places
Neil Bush, brother of the president and son of the former president, earned nearly $1.4 million in 2000 and nearly half of it came from simply introducing the executives of a Thailand-based conglomerate to the executives of a U.S. company that makes computer components.
The introduction, which led to a $20 million investment in the U.S. company, is one of several high-stakes international business deals that President Bush's younger brother has been involved in over the past few years, according to court and corporate records.
Neil Bush, 48, the second-youngest son of former President George Bush, has chosen not to join the family business of politics, but to some he seems to have parlayed the family name into a lucrative private enterprise.
While most multinational business deals are made behind the scenes, Neil Bush's role in several major transactions and other financial business is detailed in a lengthy court document relating to his stormy divorce this year from Sharon Bush.
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In one situation brought up in the proceedings, Neil Bush acknowledged that he was being paid about $60,000 a year by a company called Crest Investment, where he said he served as "co-chairman."
Asked by Brown what his duties were at Crest, Neil Bush said he provided "miscellaneous consulting services, such as answering phone call[s]." He said he spent about three or four hours a week to earn the $60,000 from Crest.
Steven Weiss, a spokesman for the Center for Responsive Politics, a public watchdog group, said that making a connection with the president's brother was "an obvious way to develop a relationship that could lead to the president himself."
The dirt.
posted by chris at 1:51 PM
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