Tony Podesta registers as foreign agent for Libyan government

Longtime Democratic lobbyist Tony Podesta has registered as a foreign agent for the Libyan government to rally U.S. support for elections in the nation, according to a recent Justice Department filing.

Podesta, once one of the most influential lobbyists in Washington, is mounting a comeback after an investigation into his former firm by special counsel Robert Mueller forced it to disband in 2017.

According to a contract with Dubai consulting firm Tala Elemary Consulting, Podesta will seek to strengthen Libyan leaders’ ties with the Biden administration, Congress and the U.S. media and push for “fair elections and stability in Libya” this year.

The Justice Department registration comes as competing Libyan factions battle for control of the war-torn country. The United Nations had pushed for elections last December, but rival lawmakers couldn’t agree on terms, and U.N.-led negotiations appeared to fall apart on Monday.

Research group OpenSecrets first reported the registration and noted that Podesta, the brother of former Obama administration official John Podesta, made his first political donations since 2020 in February. He gave $500 to the campaign of Senate Foreign Relations chair Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) and $5,000 to a political group controlled by Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).

Podesta’s new firm, Podesta.com, raked in $1 million from embattled Chinese telecom Huawei and $500,000 from Bulgarian energy firm Protos Energy SSC last year. However, recent filings show that Huawei paid Podesta less than $5,000 through the first three months of 2022, and Protos Energy terminated its contract.