Arizona Democratic gubernatorial candidate Fred DuVal accepted a campaign contribution from Saddam Hussein’s Washington lobbyist.
Lobbyist Edward J. von Kloberg III, who represented former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and other tyrants including Congo dictator Mobutu Sese Seko, donated $1,000 to DuVal’s failed 2002 congressional campaign, records reveal. von Kloberg made the donation on Dec. 18, 2001.
The Daily Caller reported this week that Kloberg threw a farewell party at his Washington penthouse for DuVal when DuVal left the Clinton administration to move to Arizona in 2001. DuVal served in both the Clinton White House and State Department. The Democrat also runs a national political and business consulting firm.
Kloberg said at the party that DuVal “arrived [in Washington, D.C.] with the idealistic notion that what we do here really matters” and that DuVal’s “idealism still burns brightly.”
Kloberg, who died in 2005, became wealthy for representing clients that he called “the damned,” and was even suspected of trying to recruit North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Il as a client in 2001, the year that Kloberg threw his 150-guest party for DuVal.
The DuVal campaign did not return a request for comment on Kloberg’s donation. The campaign previously told TheDC that “Through Fred’s work at the State Department he occasionally encountered Mr. Von Kloberg, who was known as a shameless self-promoter within the Washington diplomatic corps, at diplomatic receptions and events” and that their association was an “acquaintanceship.”
DuVal is currently running for governor in a neck-in-neck race against Republican Doug Ducey.