The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is hiring lobbyists as President-elect Joe Biden, who has indicated he will take a tougher stance with the nation, is preparing to take office.
With the potential for a more turbulent relationship with the United States, Saudi Arabia has hired some pressure groups related to Republican leaders in Congress.
These pressure groups will potentially be more successful in engaging with GOP lawmakers in the new Congress rather than the administration of Democrats or Biden. Republicans won in the House of Representatives during the 2020 election and could have a slight advantage in the Senate if they won one of the seats in the two Georgia qualifiers scheduled for early next month.
Biden told the Foreign Relations Council last year during the Democratic primary that he would reduce U.S. support for Saudi Arabia on key issues.
“I end with U.S. support for the disastrous Saudi-led war in Yemen and would order a new assessment of our relationship with Saudi Arabia,” Biden said at the time. “Time has passed to restore the sense of balance, perspective and fidelity to our values in our relations with the Middle East. President Trump has issued a dangerous blank check to Saudi Arabia,” he added.
The kingdom is largely ruled by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. NBC News reported in 2018 that it ordered the assassination of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, which the Crown Prince has denied. The president, then, was on the side of Saudi Arabia after Khashoggi’s death. The two nations had signed a nearly $ 110 billion arms deal the year before.
The Saudi government ended up investing more than $ 30 million in lobbying activities in 2018, according to the Nonpartisan Center for Responsible Policy. By 2020, spending has been $ 5 million.
A representative of the Saudi embassy in Washington did not respond to any requests for comment.
One of the recent hires came through the Larson Shannahan Slifka Group, an Iowa-based public affairs store that last year signed a lucrative contract with the Saudi embassy. Also known as the LS2 group, the embassy agreed in 2019 to pay it $ 1.5 million for a year.
The new records show LS2 recently presented to Arena Strategy Group, for actions that “will include informing the public, government officials and the media about the importance of fostering and promoting strong relations between the United States and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.” says the pressure report.
The contract began Dec. 1, weeks after Biden was declared president-elect, and will include government relations work, according to the document. The contract is valued at approximately $ 5,000 per month.
Arena’s government efforts are led by Mark Graul, a Republican political strategist who was director of the state of Wisconsin for President George W. Bush’s re-election campaign in 2004. He was also chief of staff to the ‘former Rep. Mark Green, R-Wis., when Green was in Congress. Green went on to become the head of the United States Agency for International Development under Trump, until he resigned earlier this year.
Graul did not return any requests for comment.
The Saudi Arabian embassy DC has also recently hired Off Hill Strategies for the period spanning the final straight of elections during the transition period.
The firm is a lobbying store founded by Tripp Baird, who was once director of government relations for the conservative organization Heritage Action for America. The contract began in late October, while Biden was ahead of Trump in almost every national poll. He also notes that the $ 25,000-a-month deal extends through Jan. 18, two days before Biden’s inauguration.
According to his contract, Off Hill’s lobbying efforts focus on “supporting the outreach efforts of the Embassy Congress and further advancing bilateral ties between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the United States of America. “. A separate lobbying disclosure report shows that Off Hill was helping Saudi Arabia “gather information on year-end omnibus legislation.”
Baird did not return any requests for comment.
In another case, the Saudis turned to a leading public relations firm to support the development of expensive urban development that sought to bolster the nation’s growing international ambitions.
According to a file, a public relations executive Edelman emailed a leader of a massive Saudi land development known as Neom to detail his agreement. Jere Sullivan, the firm’s vice president of global public affairs, told Neom that Edelman would provide strategic advice, media relations, stakeholder identification and involvement, and content development.
According to the email, the deal will run from mid-November to February and is expected to cost up to $ 75,000 each month.
Neom, according to the foreign lobby disclosure report for Edelman, is wholly owned by the Public Investment Fund (PIF), which is a sovereign wealth of the Government of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Therefore, its activities are supervised, directed, controlled., funded and subsidized by the PIF. “
The Wall Street Journal reported last year that the Neom project is backed by MBS and that the project for the Saudi city-state is worth $ 500 billion. The newspaper then reported that by 2030, MBS expects this newly developed region to be one of the world’s technology hubs, with Saudi management believing it could replace Silicon Valley’s U.S. technology hub. His scheduled completion schedule coincides with Biden’s first term as president and would extend beyond 2024.
Neom’s website says it is a “region of northwestern Saudi Arabia in the Red Sea that is being built from the beginning as a living laboratory” and that “will provide a lot of unique development opportunities, as its strategic location on the Red Sea coast is notable for its proximity to international markets and trade routes. “
The group says it expects the project to be completed in the next seven to ten years.
Sullivan declined to comment.