Trafficking

Ballard Partners is working with Qatar, which is under a blockade by Saudi Arabia and its Arab allies, to provide guidance and counsel on matters regarding human trafficking.

The State Dept.’s “2019 Trafficking in Persons Report” released June 20 concluded that Qatar “does not fully meet the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking but is making significant efforts to do so.”

Unskilled male and female workers from Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Sudan, Nigeria, Kenya, Uganda, Philippines, Indonesia and Sri Lanka, who migrate to Qatar looking for work "comprise the largest group at risk of trafficking, while domestic workers remain the most vulnerable,” according to the report.

The firm of Brian Ballard, who headed Donald Trump’s fundraising drive in Florida during the 2016 campaign, amended its $50K contract signed a year ago to include the anti-trafficking agenda.

The monthly fee of the revamped pact was upped to $115K per-month through June 20, 2020.

Ballard’s Jamie Rubin, former assistant secretary of state for PA in Bill Clinton’s White House, and Pam Bondi, who was Florida’s attorney general, are listed as the “designated key personnel” on the agreement with Qatar’s DC embassy.

The pact prohibits Ballard from representing any other state in the Middle East/North Africa region for a year following the termination of the agreement with Qatar.