A senior Department of Defense official linked to an organization that lobbies for the mullahs in Tehran has continued to hold the highest level of security clearance and visit the White House.
In September 2023, Semafor posted an expose of the Iran Experts Initiative (IEI), a project of the Iranian Foreign Ministry. It was initiated in 2014 with the mission to "promote Tehran's arguments in the West."
“This initiative which we call ‘Iran Experts Initiative (IEI)’ is consisted of a core group of 6-10 distinguished second-generation Iranians who have established affiliations with the leading international think-tanks and academic institutions, mainly in Europe and the US,” Saeed Khatibzadeh, a Berlin-based Iranian diplomat and future Foreign Ministry spokesman, wrote to Mostafa Zahrani, the head of the IPIS think tank in Tehran, on March 5, 2014, as the project gained steam. Their communication veered between English and Farsi — which was translated by Iran International and independently verified by Semafor.
Khatibzadeh wrote again a week later, on March 11, and said that he had gained support for the IEI from two young academics — Ariane Tabatabai and Dina Esfandiary — following a meeting with them in Prague. “We three agreed to be the core group of the IEI.”
The center of this pseudo-spy ring, which had backchannel conversations and coordinated its activities with Iran, was Biden's special envoy to Iran, Robert Malley. Malley was also Obama's point man on Iran, and he was brought back into the White House by Biden's handlers to jump-start US relations with Iran and Donald Trump's realism. Malley's security clearance was suspended in April/May 2023 and is the subject of an FBI investigation. He continued to work at the State Department until June 2023, when he was placed on unpaid leave only after CNN reported on his suspended security clearance. The implication is that from April/May 2023 until he was placed on leave in June, he had access to highly classified information.
Malley did succeed in bringing close associates, who were of recent Iranian descent, into the government.
A similar report was published in cooperation with Iran International by the American-based publication Semafor. Most damningly, the two reports identify three of Mr. Malley’s associates who were members of that influence-peddling network.
The three Iranian-Americans named in the two reports are Mr. Malley’s protege and adviser, Ali Vaez; his former aide at the State Department, Dina Esfandiary; and another former State Department official who currently holds a senior position at the Pentagon, Ariane Tabatabai.
The three are identified in emails and cross references as members of the Iran Experts Initiative. The Initiative was established by Iranian foreign minister Mohammad Jafar Zarif to promote Tehran’s arguments in the west. Several European counterparts are also named in the reports.
“As an Iranian, based on my national and patriotic duty, I have not hesitated to help you in any way,” Mr. Vaez wrote to Mr. Zarif in 2014, according to an email translated from the Farsi by Iran International. “From proposing to Your Excellency a public campaign against the notion of [nuclear] breakout, to assisting your team in preparing reports on practical needs of Iran.”
Vaez could not pass a background check even in the permissive environment of the Biden regime. Esfandiary seems to have left the government, but I can't say that conclusively. Arguably, the most problematic figure remains. That would be Ariane Tabatabai, the chief of staff for the Department of Defense’s Office for Special Operations and Low-Intensity Conflict and a member of the Malley-led Iran nuclear negotiating team.
Zahrani - a Revolutionary Guards member and a veteran diplomat - was instrumental in supporting the network and securing its funding, while acting as the main point of contact between the IEI members and Zarif.
Zahrani’s communications with almost a dozen Iranian analysts in Western think tanks between 2014 and 2021 showed how some of the analysts looked to Tehran for counsel. Tabatabai, for instance, sought Tehran’s advice on matters like visiting Israel or participating in conferences, while Vaez sent an article to the Iranian authorities for a pre-publication review.
...
Almost three weeks after the IEI meeting in Vienna, Ariane Tabatabai and Dina Esfandiary wrote an article for the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists about Iran’s nuclear fuel supply needs. Tabatabai sent the link of the article to Zahrani and said, “As I mentioned last week, Dina and I wrote an article about the nuclear fuel of Bushehr [nuclear power plant] for the Bulletin which was published today. Our goal was to show what is said in the West - that Iran does not need more than 1500 centrifuges - is wrong, and that Iran should not be expected to reduce the number of its centrifuges." The email was forwarded by Zahrani to Zarif on the same day.
To an untrained observer, this looks damned curious.
Despite her known and public connection to the ruling clique in Tehran and the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, a listed terrorist organization, she continues to have access to the White House.
Senior Department of Defense official Ariane Tabatabai participated in multiple meetings organized by the White House’s Presidential Personnel Office, which is responsible for recruiting and vetting scores of nominees across the government, visitor logs reviewed by the Washington Free Beacon show.
Tabatabai was at the White House just two months after Semafor revealed she was a key member of a secretive Iranian influence group, the Iran Experts Initiative, that reported back to Tehran’s foreign ministry, according to the logs. She participated in at least seven other White House gatherings throughout the end of 2023 and into April 2024, mixing with officials from a range of cabinet-level agencies.
Tabatabai’s access to the White House is driving renewed scrutiny in the wake of an investigation by Sen. Tom Cotton (R., Ark.) and Rep. Elise Stefanik (R., N.Y.) into her relationship with vice president Kamala Harris’s national security adviser, Phil Gordon. Tabatabai and Gordon coauthored at least three opinion pieces that argued against sanctions on the Iranian regime.
Her patron is none other than Phil Gordon, Kamala Harris's national security adviser.
Tabatabai’s access to the White House is driving renewed scrutiny in the wake of an investigation by Sen. Tom Cotton (R., Ark.) and Rep. Elise Stefanik (R., N.Y.) into her relationship with vice president Kamala Harris’s national security adviser, Phil Gordon. Tabatabai and Gordon coauthored at least three opinion pieces that argued against sanctions on the Iranian regime.
Gordon is affiliated with the National Iranian American Council (NIAC). The group is so closely associated with Iran that it is frequently referred to as Tehran's lobbying arm in Washington. In 2012, NIAC sued a journalist for referring to them as agents of the Tehran regime, and the judge tossed the case because there was no proof that the journalist was wrong.
This kind of deep-rooted Iranian influence in the Biden White House results in lobbying allies to prevent them from punishing Iran for building a nuclear weapon. This is from the Wall Street Journal in May 2024; Exclusive | U.S. Opposes European Plan to Censure Iran Over Nuclear Work.
The Biden administration is pressing European allies to back off plans to rebuke Iran for advances in its nuclear program, even as it expands its stockpile of near-weapons-grade fissile material to a record level, according to diplomats involved in discussions.
The U.S. is arguing against an effort by Britain and France to censure Iran at the International Atomic Energy Agency’s member-state board in early June, the diplomats said. The U.S. has pressed a number of other countries to abstain in a censure vote, saying that is what Washington will do, they said.
Why is Kamala Harris employing someone with roots in an Iranian lobbying organization as her national security adviser? Why was someone checking in with the Iranian government about articles and visits working in the office that oversees US special operations forces and their operations?