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12 Jun, 2016 19:35

Meet the Clinton insiders who attended Bilderberg this weekend

Meet the Clinton insiders who attended Bilderberg this weekend

While it remains to be seen how the Orlando shooting will affect the US presidential race, the Bilderberg conference wrapping up Sunday hosted 10 insiders from Clinton’s inner circle, the Obama White House, and the Democrats.

One of the items listed on the 2015 conference agenda was the “US Elections” and conspiracy theorists believe Hillary Clinton was anointed as the group’s preferred candidate before Donald Trump or Bernie Sanders started to surge.

They cite the fact that one of Clinton’s top advisers, Jim Messina, was part of that discussion last year and then went on to run the Priorities USA Action super PAC.

READ MORE: US election and refugees top of agenda at secret invite-only conference

This year, the discussion continues with the “US Political landscape” agenda item and Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, no fan of his party’s presumptive nominee for president, said “how to beat Trump” was the main topic.

While Messina wasn’t on the guest list, several attendees were on hand to ensure the Clinton family - and the neo-liberal wing of the Democratic Party - were well represented.

1. Roger C. Altman

Investment banker by trade, Altman served as the Deputy Secretary of the Treasury under Bill Clinton in 1993-94, but resigned in the fallout from the Whitewater controversy. Now President of Evercore Partners, Altman donated $250,000 to Priorities USA Action. 

2. Sam Altman

CEO of Y Combinator, "the world's most powerful start-up incubator," Sam Altman hatched a number of expensive fundraisers for the Democratic party with admission costing up to $32,000.

3. William J Burns

Clinton used the secret weapon of US secretaries of state when she was America’s top diplomat, appointing him as her Deputy Secretary of State in 2011.

4. David Cote

One of America’s leading defense contractors, or war profiteers, depending who you ask, Honeywell CEO Cote is a friend of the Clintons who’s not afraid to mix business with pleasure.

He contacted Clinton when she was Secretary of State to help tweak export regulations that were hampering the fortunes of his company, which paid no tax in 2009 and 2010 and received a $510 million tax refund despite profits of almost $3 billion.

5. Roger Ferguson

Ferguson is President and CEO of the powerful Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association - College Retirement Equities Fund known as TIAA-CREF, but he’s also a keen fundraiser for the Democrats.

He was appointed by Obama to the Council on Jobs and Competitiveness and advised the White House on job creation.

6. James A Johnson

Former Fannie Mae CEO Johnson is a long-time Democratic Party insider dating back to the 1984 campaign of Walter Mondale.

Since then, he has been a member of a number of pro-Hillary groups, including Friends of Hillary, Hillary Clinton for President, and Hillary Rodham Clinton for US Senate Committee.

7. Klaus Kleinfeld

The current CEO of manufacturing company Alcoa and former head of Siemens, Kleinfeld committed $10 million to the Clinton Foundation for the controversial “Clinton Global Initiative.”

8. Craig Mundie

Now a senior adviser to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, Mundie consulted with Secretary Clinton as the former Chief Research and Strategy Officer.

He was also appointed to the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology by Obama in 2009.

9. David Petraeus

David Petraeus is a former director of the CIA and traded several emails with Clinton on a number of topics between January and February 2009.

This revelation is part of broader investigations against both of them over whether or not classified information was illegally mishandled.

10. Eric Schmidt

Executive chairman of Alphabet, the parent company of Google, Schmidt is reportedly funding a start-up called Groundwork which works on technological tools and infrastructure used by the Clinton campaign.

11. Vernon Jordan

After he was shot and seriously wounded by the same serial killer who put Larry Flynt in a wheelchair, Jordan became part of the Bill Clinton's transition team in 1992-93. He later was tasked with finding a job for Monica Lewinsky - and the power couple danced it up at his 80th birthday party last year.

"Vernon Jordan is an old hand," Mary Frances Berry of the US Commission on Civil Rights, who has known Jordan for several years, told the Washington Post. "He knows the issues. He knows what the political problems are. He knows the people who have experience and he should be able to help Clinton get a good fit between those important things. He knows where the bodies are buried. He knows all that."

Billionaire Peter Thiel was the only vocal Trump supporter at Bilderberg this year and while it's not known how he shaped the discussion inside, he took time to address the conference's secrecy with reporters outside.

READ MORE: Libertarianism not synonymous with radical transparency, claims Peter Thiel

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