Ex-Miami Congressman David Rivera charged with illegal lobbying for Venezuelan on ICE's Most Wanted list
MIAMI - A federal grand jury has handed up an indictment of former Miami Congressman David Rivera which accuses him of acting as an unregistered agent for a Venezuelan media tycoon and fugitive on ICE's Most Wanted list.
Rivera, 59, has been charged with violating the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) and laundering funds to conceal and promote his criminal conduct.
According to the indictment, from about June 2019 through April 2020, Rivera provided consulting and lobbying services to sanctioned Venezuelan businessman Raul Gorrín.
In January 2019, Gorrín was sanctioned by the U.S. when he was added to the Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons List (SDN List) by the Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control.
During the 10-month period, Rivera is accused of lobbying U.S. government officials on behalf of Gorrín to get him removed from the SDN List. The indictment alleges that Rivera never registered under FARA, which is required by law, and received more than $5.5 million for his efforts.
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, to conceal his criminal activities Rivera created fraudulent shell companies using names associated with a law firm and with a government official, identified as Government Official-1 in the indictment, to give the appearance that they were legitimate.
"In reality, these entities were not affiliated with the law firm or Government Official-1, and neither the law firm nor Government Official-1 were aware that Rivera had created shell companies in their names," according to a statement from the Justice Department.
Rivera allegedly funneled the money paid by Gorrín through one of the shell companies to pay those who assisted him in lobbying the senior government officials.
This was not the first time the former congressman was federally indicted.
In November 2022, Rivera and his former political consultant Esther Nuhfer allegedly negotiated on behalf of the Venezuelan government without disclosing it to the U.S. government or the officials they met with.
Rivera and Nuhfire were accused of violating FARA by lobbying politicians and others for the normalization of relations with Venezuela in 2017, which included working on a legal dispute with a US oil company and against sanctions.
The indictment alleges the conspiracy played out from February 2017 to December 2018, involving people at the highest levels of the Venezuelan government.
