* A previous version of this article stated that, according to US prosecutors, Mr Fullbrook flew to Puerto Rico to tell Garced how he could help her win the election and provided her with a strategy. It also stated that Mr Fullbrook had brokered payments between Velutini and CT and further described him as a “formal subject” of the investigation. In fact, Mr Fullbrook met with Garced to pitch CT’s services and was never formally engaged by her. Velutini engaged CT and paid for its services. US law enforcement describes virtually everyone, including potential witnesses, as a “subject” at the start of an investigation: Mr Fullbrook was interviewed as a witness. We are happy to clarify the record.
Liz Truss’s chief of staff has been interviewed by the FBI over an alleged criminal plot to bribe an American politician and influence a US election.
Mark Fullbrook, who ran the Prime Minister’s leadership campaign, has been questioned as a witness by agents.
The FBI is investigating an alleged conspiracy to subvert the democracy of Puerto Rico – a US-administered island in the Caribbean.
The probe centres upon Tory donor Julio Herrera Velutini, the London-based owner of a Puerto Rican bank, Bancredito.
The 50-year-old, and former FBI agent, Mark Rossini, 60, allegedly promised ex-Puerto Rico governor Wanda Vázquez Garced £260,000 for her 2020 re-election campaign if she sacked the island’s chief financial regulator.
Records reportedly show Velutini donated £650,604 to the Conservative Party between December 2019 and June 2022.
It is understood he was not eligible to donate to a US election while claimed in his indictment he did not want the deal to become known.
As such, he paid the money to CT Group, an Australian-British lobbying firm where Mr Fullbrook was boss and the company’s chief global projects officer at the time.
According to US prosecutors, as part of a pitch, he flew to Puerto Rico to tell Garced how he could help her win the election. Garced did not proceed to engage CT. Velutini instructed CT and paid for its services.
The Donald Trump-supporting Republican was unsuccessful in her re-election bid in 2020.
Last month, the US Department of Justice (DoJ) charged Garced, Rossini and Velutini with conspiracy, federal programs bribery, and honest services wire fraud that could see them face up to 20 years in prison.
All deny any wrongdoing.
At the time of the arrests on August 4, Kenneth Polite Jr, an assistant attorney-general at the DoJ said: “The alleged bribery scheme rose to the highest levels of the Puerto Rican Government, threatening public trust in our electoral processes and institutions of governance.”
Mr Fullbrook, who is married to former Tory MP Lorraine Fullbrook, was interviewed as a witness in the DoJ and FBI investigation this year.
In April, the bureau approached Britain’s National Crime Agency and the Metropolitan Police to help secure his attendance for a formal interview.
He agreed after he was approached by Scotland Yard with his company subpoenaed and forced to hand over thousands of sensitive emails.
A spokesman for Mr Fullbrook said: “He is committed to and complies with all laws and regulations in any jurisdiction in which he works and is confident he has done so in this matter.
“Indeed, Mark Fullbrook is a witness in this matter and has fully, completely and voluntarily engaged with the US authorities.
“The work was engaged only by Mr Herrera Velutini and only to conduct opinion research for him and no one else.”
“Mr Fullbrook never did any work for, nor presented any research findings to, the Governor or her campaign.
“There has been no engagement since.”
