Club for Growth Asks Chamber of Commerce To Help Stop Export-Import Bank Loans To Russian Companies

Andrew Roth  |   March 19, 2014
 Club for Growth President Chris Chocola: “We don’t think that the Export-Import Bank should exist at all, let alone even consider giving loans and loan guarantees to Russian oligarchs and companies with ties to the Russian mob.”  

Washington, DC – Today, the Club for Growth noted that the Export-Import Bank of the United States had discussions with Putin ally and Russian billionaire Gennady Timchenko about the possibility of U.S. taxpayers backing purchases of luxury airplanes for Timchenko’s charter flight company. Timchenko was not on the list of Russians sanctioned by the Obama administration.

The Export-Import Bank has a long history of activity in Russia. It once gave a loan to a Russian oil company with ties to the Russian mafia: “One of these loans was approved in April by the U.S. Export-Import Bank. It guaranteed $489 million in credits to a Russian oil company whose roots are imbedded in a legacy of KGB and Communist Party corruption, as well as drug trafficking and organized crime funds, according to Russian and U.S. sources and documents.”

“We don’t think that the Export-Import Bank should exist at all, let alone even consider giving loans and loan guarantees to Russian oligarchs and companies with ties to the Russian mob,” said Club for Growth President Chris Chocola. “We have no idea what happened with the Export-Import Bank’s discussions with Timchenko, but there’s certainly no reason now why U.S. taxpayers should be footing the bill for subsidies to one of Vladimir Putin’s biggest allies. We hope the Chamber of Commerce will join us in asking the Export-Import Bank to immediately cease doing business with all Russian companies, and finally acknowledge that an agency that has given subsidies to everything from Enron to Mexican Drug Cartels to a company with ties to Russian organized crime should be completely eliminated.”