Mnuchin foundation donated to groups that vouched for his bank

Unethical and conflict of interest. A totally corrupt appointment by Trump.

From: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/11/mnunchin-treasury-foundation-trump-232016

Donald Trump’s choice for treasury secretary, Steven Mnuchin, earned tens of millions of dollars from a 2015 bank sale that got a boost from an array of nonprofit groups that had one thing in common — they had received tens of thousands of dollars each from the bank’s foundation, which was run by Mnuchin.

The sale of OneWest, a bank that Mnuchin co-founded and chaired, to CIT Group for $3.4 billion drew significant opposition from public interest groups because OneWest had been accused of wrongful foreclosures and racial discrimination in its mortgages and small-business loans.

But a parade of community-based nonprofits stepped forward to testify to the federal regulators considering the merger about the good corporate citizenship of OneWest. All of the groups — ranging from a pair oflocal Boys &Girls Clubs to a pair of Junior Achievement clubs — were beneficiaries of grants from the bank’s charitable arm, the OneWest Foundation, which Mnuchin chaired, according to a POLITICO review of filings with the Internal Revenue Service and the Federal Reserve.

In all, 14 groups that sent letters to the Fed in support of the merger received a combined total of $2.5 million from the OneWest Foundation in the four years leading up to the merger. In their letters, the groups lauded OneWest’s support for community groups. In seven of the letters, the groups acknowledged the dollar amounts they received from Mnuchin’s charity arm; in the other seven, they referenced only having enjoyed the support of the bank.

But at least two of the nonprofits acknowledged to POLITICO that it was explicitly asked by OneWest to write a supportive letter.