By Walid Shoebat and Ben Barrack
**SHOEBAT EXCLUSIVE**
In a stunning discovery, the Executive Director listed on the 990-EZ for the Barack H. Obama Foundation (BHOF), which was approved by the IRS’s Lois Lerner, is Ray Baysden, a former U.S. intelligence agent.
Baysden, who knows the Obama family, is a former State Department employee who was stationed in Karachi, Pakistan at a time when President Barack Obama is said to have visited Karachi, in the 1980’s. He is also a registered Republican who has worked within the Intelligence Community (IC). BHOF was founded and is run by Malik Obama, the brother of the President. Malik is also steeped in terrorist connections, as Shoebat.com has long chronicled.
The evidence is bolstered by a screen shot of BHOF’s 990-EZ, received by the IRS office in Ogden, UT on July 5, 2011, more than three years after BHOF was founded. It lists Baysden and Gwendolyn Anderson as Executive Director and Director respectively:
BHOF Executive Director Ray Baysden and Director Gwendolyn Anderson.
According to a bio of Baysden, he has spent many years in the State Department and Intelligence Community:
For the past 35 years, Ray Baysden has distinguished himself as a trusted professional in diplomatic security and international crisis management. He has worked with the United States Army, the U.S. Intelligence Community, and a number of other national and international organizations, including the United Nations (UN).
The bio also states that Baysden is a member of the U.S. State Department Diplomatic Security Special Agents Association. Potentially further complicating matters is the fact that Baysden is a registered Republican.
As Shoebat.com has revealed [here and here], the Islamic Dawa Organization (IDO) Malik Obama helps lead as Executive Director, is a member organization of “The Union of Good” (UG), which the U.S. Treasury designated as “Terrorist”.
The official website for UG still shows the IDO of Malik and his boss Suar al-Dahab as being an official member organization in the coalition. UG is an umbrella organization that represents over 50 Islamic fundraising groups worldwide and was designated by the U.S. Department of Treasury as a terrorist entity under Executive Order 13224.
It’s difficult to say why members of Congress, as well as the attorney for one of the conservative groups that was targeted by the IRS – Cleta Mitchell (we went into great detail about this case with her assistant) – are choosing to ignore the biggest and most glaring aspect to the IRS scandal. Subpoenaing the testimony of Baysden and Anderson might be a good place to start getting answers, even if they don’t give any.
Simply introducing the scandal and asking both individuals questions about their involvement would generate far more public interest than IRS hearings to date.
Should Baysden and Anderson follow the course of Lois Lerner and invoke their fifth amendment rights, it would say quite a bit. If there was no knowledge on their part about what Malik was truly up to, wouldn’t they want to come forward to clear their names?
Alton Ray Baysden, Executive Director
It is at best curious why Baysden would choose to be the Executive Director of BHOF and to be part of an entity engaged in fraudulent behavior, to some extent by his own admission. Now that Malik Obama’s terrorism ties have been revealed, Baysden’s silence is even more curious.
Alton Ray Baysden
The bio ends with the following sentence:
Ray Baysden holds membership in the U.S. State Department Diplomatic Security Special Agents Association, and has served as Counselor to a number of United States Embassies, including Haiti, Pakistan, and the Ivory Coast.
Based on the 1984 Key Officers of Foreign Service Posts Manual (copy below stamped as being property of Columbia University), Baysden was stationed in Karachi, Pakistan that year (page 55):
Columbia University copy of State Dept. Manual.
Baysden stationed in Karachi, Pakistan in 1984.
The potential significance of this point in time in Baysden’s career may involve Barack Obama’s visits to Karachi with his Pakistani roommate, Sohail Siddiqui and two other Pakistanis. Here are some relevant excerpts from a 2008 Associated Press article…
Obama spent the six years between 1979 and 1985 at Occidental College in Los Angeles and then in New York at Columbia University and in the workplace. His memoir, “Dreams from My Father,” talks about this time, but not in great detail…
And…
Not everyone who knew Obama in those years is eager to talk.
Some explained that they feared inadvertently hurting Obama’s campaign. Among his friends were Siddiqi and two other Pakistanis, all of them from Karachi; several of those interviewed said the Pakistanis were reluctant to talk for fear of stoking rumors that Obama is a Muslim… As a freshman, he quickly became friends with Mohammed Hasan Chandoo and Wahid Hamid, two wealthy Pakistanis… In 1981, Obama transferred from Occidental to Columbia. In between, he traveled to Pakistan — a trip that enhanced his foreign policy qualifications, he maintained in a private speech at a San Francisco fundraiser last month. Obama spent “about three weeks” in Pakistan, traveling with Hamid and staying in Karachi with Chandoo’s family, said Bill Burton, Obama’s press secretary.
So why would a former State Department and Intelligence Community professional, who is a Republican become the Executive Director for an allegedly fraudulent foundation whose founder has ties to terrorism?
Barack Obama with his Pakistani roommate at Columbia (1981-1985).
Did Barack Obama ever meet Baysden while the two were in Karachi, Pakistan? If so, what was the nature of their relationship?
Another figure worth introducing is a man named Neville Cramer, author of a 2007 book entitled, “Immigration Chaos”. Cramer, an apparent hawk on illegal immigration, has a storied career as posted on his website, which states that:
“At the time of his retirement in 2002, he was one of the most experienced INS Special Agents in the U.S. Department of Justice.”
At about the same time that Baysden was helping Malik found the BHOF (April of 2008), Baysden gave a five-star review of Cramer’s anti-illegal immigration book:
Baysden’s review of Neville Cramer’s 2007 book.
As to soliciting donations under the guise of them being tax deductible when they’re really not, such activity would constitute “common law fraud and potentially even federal mail fraud,” according to the Chairman of the National Legal and Policy Center. Former IRS official and charity expert Marcus Owens agrees, saying:
“If they haven’t applied for exemption, they can’t promise their donors that contributions are deductible.”
In a quote attributed to Baysden last year, an interesting fact emerged:
Alton Ray Baysden, a former State Department employee at whose Virginia home the charity was founded in 2008, admitted the organization has not even applied for tax-exempt status.
“We haven’t been able to find someone with the expertise to do this,” he told The Post. “We are informally scouting for an executive director, someone who knows how to register the charity.”
Unfortunately for Baysden and Anderson, the BHOF wasn’t just about expeditious and retroactive tax exempt status; it was also about financing terrorism, as Shoebat.com has demonstrated time and again.
It is also a stretch to consider the possibility that the President or his brother did NOT know about Baysden’s history by 2011, when the tax exempt status for BHOF was processed so expeditiously that influence had to have come from the White House.
There are no fewer than three possibilities that could explain Baysden’s decision to serve as Executive Director for BHOF. They include but are not limited to: 1.) Ideological alliance with the founder of BHOF – Malik Obama – or President Obama; 2.) An intelligence operation; or 3.) Blackmail.
Based on what has been learned about Baysden above, option 1 is not likely.
Gwendolyn Anderson, Director
Information about BHOF’s Director is a bit more difficult to come by. However, there is sufficient evidence that Ms. Anderson has also gone by the names “Gwendolyn Andersen” (with an “e” instead of an “o”) and “Gwendolyn Bonebrake”.
On the Linkedin profile of Gwendolyn Andersen, which matches almost exactly the work history of Gwendolyn Anderson. It states in part:
More than twenty years of experience in renewable and conventional energy, energy efficiency, and climate change.
Currently, this individual works as a Senior Clean Energy Economist for Abt Associates. A quick look at the Abt website reveals a company that is rife with government clients, to include DHS, HHS, HUD, DOJ, VA, Treasury, and many more.
Anderson’s career includes work with several renewable energy companies like American Renewable Fuel Institute, International Resources Group, Center for Glabal Change at the University of Maryland.
One company Anderson worked for – the Women’s Council on Energy and the Environment – includes the following in its Mission statement:
Our mission is to provide nonpartisan, policy neutral forums on energy and environmental issues and to foster the professional development of our members.
To the extent that WCEE is nonpartisan is undetermined but as the name indicates, gender equality may be an issue.
Another company Anderson has a history with is Chemonics, a company that does business internationally, though the exact business it does is not easily gleaned from reading the website, which states:
From our founding in 1975, we have worked in more than 150 countries to help our clients, partners, and beneficiaries face difficult challenges, from political instability to limited healthcare to a lack of market infrastructure. We have helped them overcome those challenges by working together to find and implement innovative projects that achieve development impact.
Unlike Baysden, the ideological background of Anderson appears to more closely align with that of President Obama.
In any event, both Baysden and Anderson / Andersen / Bonebrake should be persons of interest for any and all Congressional committees – to include House Oversight and House Ways and Means Committees. Either both Baysden and Anderson should be interested in clearing their names relative to being part of a foundation that allegedly committed fraud and is tied to terrorism; OR they should both be compelled to testify about what they know and why they haven’t come forward already.
Congress Suppressing Biggest Scandal in U.S. History
When news first broke that Malik’s BHOF was a “questionable charity” that didn’t file its necessary paperwork at the time it was founded in 2008, no one truly knew how bad it was. As Shoebat.com has clearly demonstrated, the brother of the President of the United States works for a State Sponsor of Terrorism in Sudan and for its President – Omar al-Bashir – who is wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for crimes against humanity.
At least 11 Members of Congress know this and two have expressed agreement with the findings (see below).
Some time in early May of 2011, some very powerful wheels were put in motion to get BHOF it’s 501(c)(3) tax exempt status. On June 26th – a Sunday – that status was granted with a letter bearing Lois Lerner’s signature.
Malik Obama’s Foundation granted 501(c)(3) status on a Sunday.
In a 2013 interview with the Daily Mail, Malik admitted that his foundation was funded by nation states that are known hotbeds for terrorism:
…there have been questions about where the money has gone. A probe was launched over cash owed to the US taxman from his fund-raising activities. Much of the money raised had come from Malik’s Muslim connections in Saudi Arabia, Libya, Sudan and Yemen.
‘These people were happy that my brother is the President of the United States,’ he says. ‘So they invited me to conferences. I saw it as a chance to use my name in a good cause.’
One such gathering appears to have been in Khartoum, Sudan at the 2010 Annual Islamic Da’wa Organization (IDO) conference, attended by Malik and presided over by al-Bashir and another known terrorist named Suar al-Dahab. It is worth noting that this would have been at a time when BHOF was allegedly committing fraud by declaring itself tax exempt when it was not:
President Omar Al-Bashir and Suar al-Dahab preside over 2010 IDO Conference attended by Malik Obama.
Malik Obama speaks at 2010 IDO Conference (al-Dahab in background).
Does brother Barack know about Malik’s unfortunate tax problems which Lerner expeditiously and illegally processed? According to one report published at the time BHOF’s legitimacy was formally questioned, there was no response from the White House:
When asked about why it wasn’t a registered charity, Malik, an accountant by trade, said that he was “in process” of changing that. The White House did not return a message seeking comment.
It can be concluded therefore that brother Barack either did know or chose not to know.
How about Malik’s acceptance of funds from places like Sudan, which was clearly a country more troubling than the others because of its “State Sponsor of Terrorism” status? It is noteworthy that Barack Obama has been working to have Sudan removed from that list as Shoebat.com has reported.
Two U.S. Congressmen – Reps. Mike Kelly (R-PA) and Louie Gohmert (R-TX) – have said our findings against Lois Lerner and Malik Obama are “spot on” and “all true” respectively. Earlier this year, they and ten other members of Congress received all the information necessary to be brought up to speed. Five of those members – Trey Gowdy (R-SC), Darrell Issa (R-CA), Jim Jordan (R-OH), Dave Camp (R-MI), and Kelly – all had the opportunity to bring this scandal up during the testimony of IRS Commissioner John Koskinen at a House Ways and Means Committee hearing on June 20th and then at a House Oversight Committee hearing on June 23rd.
None did so.
Alana Cook contributed to this report