The Wall Street analyst who helped uncover the 2009 financial scandal at General Electric says the Clinton Foundation has been playing games with its financial records.
According to a report published last week by Charles Ortel, who blew the whistle on accounting irregularities at GE, the Clinton Foundation has failed to produce required audits of its financial statements.
Certain states compel registered charities that exceed a certain amount of revenue to file audited reports. In New York state, one of the states in which the Clinton Foundation is registered as a charity, audited reports are required if a charity has revenues of over $500,000 per year.
Ortel wrote that between 2001 and 2014, the Clinton Foundation either neglected to file annual audited reports, failed to disclose relevant information, or filed "work product purporting to be an audit of consolidated results for the Clinton Foundation" that did not meet professional requirements.
"[T]his information is not a required audit of consolidated financial results as contemplated by U.S. Generally Accepting Auditing Standards," wrote Ortel.
According to Ortel, the Clinton Foundation’s accounting practices obscure its finances and raise legal issues:
When you understand relevant accounting rules and laws, you will reach a simple conclusion: the Clinton Foundation (including all of its various corporate subsidiaries and "initiatives") has been operating boldly and illegally out of control, in plain view of the general public and government authorities.
Consider this, at no time in Bill Clinton's post-presidency has any Clinton Foundation entity provided a proper, independent audit of financial statements, even as trustees, management, and professional advisors solicited donations across the United States and around the world using telephones, mails, and digital media.
This means there has never been legally required verification of financial claims made in Clinton Foundation public disclosures by independent, professional accountants.
As of this moment, and since 2000, it is simply not possible to "follow the money" and understand, with confidence, what actually may have happened to billions of dollars sent toward the Clinton Foundation.