NYT: Controversial Ecuadorian Family Donated About $100,000 to Obama...and the State Department Returned the Favor

A politically-connected Ecuadorean woman, whose family contributed heavily to President Barack Obama’s campaign and other Democrats, was previously barred from entering the United States but is now living in Miami after the State Department under former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton overturned the ban, the New York Times reported.

Former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton speaks after accepting the Robert F. Kennedy Ripple of Hope Award during a ceremony, Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2014 in New York. (AP Photo/Jason DeCrow)

Estefanía Isaías had been charged with fraudulently obtaining visas for her maids. After the State Department overturned the ban, Isaías went to work for an Obama fundraiser.

The government of Ecuador accuses Isaías family of getting political favors in the United States after fleeing justice over a banking scandal in Ecuador. The key figures in the alleged banking scandal in Ecuador were Roberto and William Isaías, who also live in Miami. The Ecuadorian government says the brothers used phony balance sheets to profit from bailout funds, costing the country $400 million. The United States has refused to extradite the brothers.

U.S. federal law enforcement officials have also investigated the family for suspicion of money laundering and immigration fraud, the Times reported.

Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, helped assist the family and pushed the State Department to lift the ban on Estefanía Isaías. Menendez’s staff urged then-Secretary Clinton’s chief of staff, Cheryl Mills, to waive the ban.

In 2011, Estefanía Isaías, a television executive, could not enter the United States to visit her relatives because of the “alien smuggling” charge.

Estefanía Isaías’s mother, María Mercedes, gave $40,000 to the Obama Victory Fund, which provided donations to the president and other Democrats. The mother also gave $30,000 to the Senate campaign committee that Mr. Menendez led.

In 2012, members of the Isaías family donated a total of about $100,000 to the Obama Victory Fund, according to the Times.

The Obama administration reversed the ban giving Isaías a waiver to come to the United States.

“In my old profession as a prosecutor, timelines mean a lot,” Ken Boehm, chairman of the National Legal and Policy Center, a government watchdog, told the Times. “When a donation happens and then something else happens, like the favor, as long as they are very, very close, that really paints a story.”

A Menendez spokeswoman said the senator’s work on behalf of Isaías had nothing to do with campaign contributions.

“Our office handled this case no differently than we have thousands of other immigration-related requests over the years, and to suggest that somehow the senator’s longstanding and principled beliefs on immigration have been compromised is just plain absurd,” Menendez spokeswoman Patricia Enright told the Times.