Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign is accusing Donald Trump’s foundation of a pay-to-play controversy.
It comes as Trump has attacked Clinton with allegations of a pay-to-play scandal involving donors to the Clinton Foundation.
“Donald Trump has been falsely attacking the charity run by [former] President [Bill] Clinton when it is Trump’s own foundation that has been caught in an actual pay-to-play scandal,” Hillary Clinton’s communications director, Jennifer Palmieri, said in a statement Friday.
Palmieri was referencing reports that the Donald J. Trump Foundation illegally made a $25,000 political contribution in 2013 to Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi (R).
Trump’s foundation made the contribution to a group called “Justice for All,” which was supporting Bondi’s campaign. Bondi was weighing whether to pursue an investigation into accusations of fraud against Trump University at the time. She ultimately declined to bring charges.
{mosads}“While the Clinton Foundation has received the highest ratings from independent charitable watchdogs, Donald Trump’s use of foundation money to donate to the Florida Attorney General actually broke the law,” Palmieri said in the statement.
“Worst of all, it appears the payments may have been intended to stave off an investigation into the sham Trump University that has ripped off unsuspecting students.
“Donald Trump has no standing whatsoever to question the Clinton Foundation, which works to make AIDs and malaria drugs more accessible, when it’s been proven he uses his own foundation to launder illegal campaign donations.”
Trump had paid a $2,500 fine to the IRS earlier this year over the contribution.
The Washington Post reported that Trump’s foundation did not list a donation to the group backing Bondi in its 2013 tax filings. The Trump Foundation instead detailed a contribution to a charity in Kansas with a similar name which was never actually made. Trump’s organization additionally listed “no” when asked on a tax form if it had made any political donations that year.
“It was just an honest mistake,” Jeffrey McConney, a senior vice president at the Trump Organization, told the Post Thursday. “It wasn’t done intentionally to hide a political donation, it was just an error.”
Trump later reimbursed his foundation for the contribution out of his personal account, which his employees say is more often used for such political spending.
Trump, the GOP’s presidential nominee, has frequently accused the Clinton Foundation of presenting a conflict of interest for Clinton.
Clinton, the Democratic presidential nominee, has countered that donors to the Clinton Foundation did not get special treatment from her as secretary of state and would not influence her as president.