A prominent Delaware law firm founded by alleged Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden received a loan from the Check Protection Program (PPP) for between $ 150,000 and $ 350,000, according to records released Monday by the Treasury Department and the Administration. Small Business.
The Trump campaign told Fox News that the records conflict with recent messages from the Biden campaign that the PPP program is ineffective and a vehicle to reward Trump’s “cronies.”
“Instead of attacking President Trump as an unintended reflex, perhaps Joe Biden should say ‘thank you’ from time to time,” Trump campaign communications director Tim Murtaugh told Fox News. “The PPP saved 51 million jobs nationwide, including at Biden’s former law firm and a number of companies related to alumni of the Obama administration. One very likely explanation is that Biden simply does not know what he is talking about and prefers make a political weapon with a program that helped people pay the rent and the mortgage. ”
The law firm that received the big pay was originally founded as Biden and Walsh and is now known as Monzack Mersky McLaughlin and Browder.
Melvyn Monzack, whom the former vice president called one of his “great friends” in 2017, has had close ties to the former vice president. He served as Biden’s Senate reelection treasurer in 2002, as well as Biden’s presidential career treasurer in 2008.
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According to CBS News, Monzack, who has donated thousands of dollars to the Biden presidential campaign, attended a state dinner at the White House for Chinese President Hu Jintao in 2011. The law firm is also a registered agent of related companies. to Biden.
Records reviewed by Fox News show that on July 6, 1987, Biden gave Monzack his legal power to “demand, sue, and receive all debts, money, money, property, personal property, or other personal property. “
Power of attorney signed by Biden.
Last week, the Biden campaign released a video that included a small business owner saying that the Trump administration had done nothing to help her; The announcement did not reveal that the business owner received thousands of federal aid money. Biden and her allies have also stepped up their attacks on what they call President Trump’s cronyism in the distribution of stimulus money.
An assistant to Biden responded after the publication of this story, both in the Trump campaign and on Fox News.
“The only thing this story tells us is how desperate the Trump campaign is to find an attack on Vice President Biden that will stay, and how eager Fox News is to assist them in their efforts,” the aide said. “Joe Biden is not the president (yet) and has no control over how PPP funds are distributed, so perhaps instead of covering how a Biden law firm briefly worked decades ago he got a loan, Fox News should look into that the largest individual recipient of PPP funds was a massive Trump donor, or why 40 lobbyists connected to Trump were able to direct more than $ 10 billion in taxpayer money to their wealthy clients. “
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Meanwhile, the team of Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi rejects reports that a company related to her husband received large sums of money under the government’s coronavirus relief emergency program, arguing that her connection to the company is minimal.
The company, EDI Associates in San Rafael, California, has 52 employees and says it is in the “full-service restaurant business,” government documents show. The company received between $ 350,000 and $ 1 million in Check Protection Program (PPP) money.
“He is an investor,” Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill told Fox News. “He was not involved in the loan application or aware of it.”
The Washington Post reported that EDI Associates is identified on Pelosi’s disclosure forms “as a limited partnership with an investment in Hotel El Dorado … The value of the asset on the form, identified as belonging to Pelosi’s spouse, is at the list between $ 250,001 and $ 500,000. “
The newspaper noted that “four other House members appeared in previous business reports” that took PPP money, including Republican representatives Roger Williams of Texas and Vicky Hartzler of Missouri and Democrats Susie Lee of Nevada and Debbie Mucarsel-Powell of Florida, who “have ties to companies that are run by their families or employ their spouses as top executives.”
The Daily Beast reported that other well-known individuals and entities received generous APP funds, including “a tax liability advocacy organization led by anti-tax crusader Grover Norquist, a high-powered consulting firm led by former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, the nonprofit led by former Trump campaign official David Bossie, and a political strategy firm linked to two former Obama White House alumni who have turned the anti-Trump podcast into a company. lucrative. “
President Trump signed a bill on Saturday extending the PPP, a lifeline for companies struggling to keep paying employees, until August 8.
The measure also separates the authorized limits for commitments under the PPP from other Small Business Administration loan programs.
On Monday, the Treasury Department and the Small Business Administration revealed businesses that have received $ 150,000 as part of the PPP, a list that includes roughly two-thirds of total dollars loaned, but a much smaller percentage of total loans. Loans can be converted into grants under certain conditions.
Fox Business Network’s James Legatte contributed to this report.
