In January, the Government of Guatemala hired Tallahassee-based lobbyist Brian Ballard to lobby the United States on its behalf to the tune of nearly $1 million, according to a recent Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) filing. But Guatemala wasn’t paying Ballard—that was the responsibility of an entirely different country, one on the other side of the world: Taiwan.
Ballard made a name for himself both as a major fundraiser and middleman for President Donald Trump. After getting his start in the Florida political scene, he opened a federal lobbying office in Washington, D.C., following Trump’s inauguration. Not long after, Ballard’s firm, Ballard Partners, soon to be among D.C.’s elite lobbying outfits, began to do business with countries like Azerbaijan, Qatar, Mali, Kosovo, and Turkey.
As fate would have it, it was his work with Venezuelan clients, including known allies to the dictator Nicolas Maduro, that brought Ballard Partners awfully close to criminal activity. In 2017, the Miami law firm, Salcedo Partners, retained Ballard Partners. One of Salcedo’s clients was Samark Lopez-Bello, a “frontman” for the Venezuelan Vice President, Tareck El Aissami, who was then under US sanctions. Subsequently, Immigration and Customs Enforcement placed Lopez-Bello on their most wanted list, alongside Aissami, for his efforts to evade sanctions while working with Aissami.
Neither Ballard nor his firm were directly implicated in the subsequent indictments, but it does shed light on the kinds of clients one might deal with in Ballard’s world of foreign lobbying. It also demonstrates how strange the foreign side of lobbying can be to the outside observer.
Taiwan is another such example.
Taiwan is unique among the world’s countries in that just about everyone treats it like any other country, except not officially. The official name for Taiwan is the Republic of China (ROC) and it used to hold a permanent seat at the United Nations Security Council alongside the United States as the officially recognized government of all China. Yet, as part of efforts begun by President Richard Nixon to open relations with mainland Communist China (aka People’s Republic of China, PRC), international recognition for China was switched from the Republic to the People’s Republic.
Most countries now officially recognize the PRC over the ROC, but some, including the United States and its allies, maintain informal relations with Taiwan. Only fourteen countries still formally recognize the ROC over the PRC, and Guatemala is one of them. And at first glance this may seem to explain Taiwan’s funding of Guatemala’s hiring of Ballard Partners.
Guatemala and Taiwan have been rather vague about the arrangement, with a spokesperson from the Taiwanese government saying it demonstrates “mutual assistance and mutual benefit to promote pragmatic diplomacy.” Guatemala also thanked the ROC for helping to “strengthen our positioning in the U.S.”
Furthermore, a thorough examination of FARA filings from the other countries that formally recognize Taiwan reveals that none have been paid by Taiwan under a similar arrangement.
As other media reports have pointed out, this contract came on the heels of neighboring Nicaragua switching its recognition from the ROC to the PRC and then President-elect of Honduras suggesting she could do the same. Perhaps this has driven Taiwan to lean into its relations with Guatemala, but the filing and its related documents don’t fork up much information to that end. Outside of Taiwan covering the cost of the contract, there are very few details mentioned (this is, unfortunately, a common feature of FARA filings).
One other possibility is that Taiwan and Guatemala are resuming “checkbook diplomacy” after the 2014 indictment of former Guatemalan President Alfonso Portillo revealed Taiwan paid $2.5 million to ensure Guatemala continued its recognition of Taiwan over mainland China. Registering with FARA may serve as a way to legitimize their diplomatic efforts.
Whatever the truth of the matter is, Guatemala’s hiring of Ballard through Taiwan appears unique.
