Who is peddling influence with our legislators in DC? Representative Joe Wilson received a large campaign contribution from Mohamed Soltan, a former political prisoner in Egypt. Soltan’s father was a senior member of the Muslim Brotherhood, which has ties to Hamas, and served as a deputy minister of endowments in the government of Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi (also a member of the Muslim Brotherhood). Wikipedia also states that Soltan’s father “is a prominent scholar of Islamic jurisprudence who taught at many Islamic education institutions and authored more than 60 books.”

According to the FEC, in June 2023, Wilson received $3300 from Soltan, who donated a total of $36k to a handful of politicians on both sides of the aisle this year, including $5000 to left-leaning 150pac.org and Barbara Lee (D-CA), who is running to replace the late Dianne Feinstein. The enemy of my enemy is my friend…depending on what year it is.

Mohamed Soltan has received a lot of press over the past several years due to his very public imprisonment in Egypt. The Obama-Biden administration openly advocated for his release and once Soltan had obtained freedom he co-founded The Freedom Initiative, a “DC-based non-profit dedicated to advocating for prisoners wrongfully detained in the Middle East and North Africa.” Freedom Initiative raised $4.9 million in 2021.

Also, Rep. Wilson received 51 donations totaling $40,250 this year from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee PAC. Interestingly, over 38% of this PAC’s donations goes to Democrats. This pales in comparison to the 827 contributions totaling $1,068,305.00 to recently-indicted Senator Bob Menendez (D-NJ) received from the same PAC. Rep. Joe Wilson made the short list of their Republican candidates who garnered a much higher than average contribution from this PAC – Republicans averaged $27,424.471 vs Democrats’ average of $78,016.31. Interestingly, Senator McCarthy pulled in $304,625.00 as the top Republican (none of the 8 Republicans who voted to remove him received any money from this PAC), compared to 5 Democrats whose receipts exceeded this amount, with two topping $1M. Reaching across the aisle, both Wilson and Menendez received donations from multiple of the same individuals/organizations, including at least one that advocates a regime change in Iran. And a significant number of his individual donors appear to be of foreign descent.

This rally took place in NY just two weeks before the attack by Hamas.

Bolstering Wilson’s globalist tendencies, along with his close allegiance with the Military Industrial Complex, donors such as L3Harris, BAE Systems, Employees of Northrup Grumman, Honeywell, BWX Technologies, Boeing, Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, Amentum and Textron contributed over $29k this year to Wilson’s campaign.

As if flying the Ukrainian flag below the American flag at his office in Columbia weren’t enough. One might ask where Wilson’s true allegiances lie? With America? Or with other countries? When politicians are so financially driven by the military industrial complex and foreign affairs, they can fail to adequately represent the needs of their constituents back home. Let us know in the comments below how you think Representative Wilson is doing representing constituents in SC.

January 2023, outside of Representative Wilson’s office in Columbia, SC. Photo courtesy of Vicki Simons