Jonathan James Bush

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Bush

Jonathan James Bush (born May 6, 1931), is an American banker and former Republican Party fundraiser.

Education and family

Jonathan Bush graduated from Hotchkiss School and Yale University, where he was a member of Skull and Bones. He is the fourth child of Prescott Sheldon Bush and Dorothy Walker Bush and is the brother of Prescott "Pressy" Bush, Jr. (1922-2010), the 41st President of the United States George H. W. Bush (1924), Nancy Bush (1926), and William "Bucky" Bush (1938). He is the uncle of the 43rd President George W. Bush.

Bush is the father of entertainment reporter Billy Bush and health care executive Jonathan S. Bush, and he resides in New Haven, Connecticut, and North Haven, Maine, with his wife Josephine Bush.

Career

Jonathan Bush founded J. Bush & Co. which provided discreet banking services for the Washington D.C. embassies of foreign governments for many years. In 1997, Riggs Bank bought J. Bush & Co. and made Bush CEO & President of Riggs Investment, a firm based in New Haven, Connecticut.

In the early 1980s, Jonathan Bush helped organize investors for George W. Bush's first oil venture, Arbusto, later called Bush Explorations.

During the 2000 presidential campaign, Bush was a major contributor and fundraiser to his nephew's election and was named a "Bush Pioneer" for raising more than $100,000 for the campaign.

Controversy

On May 15, 2004, The Washington Post published an item about Jonathan Bush which states: "A political Web site written by a Democratic operative drew attention yesterday to the fact that President Bush's uncle, Jonathan J. Bush, is a top executive at Riggs Bank, which this week agreed to pay a record $25 million in civil fines for violations of law intended to thwart money laundering."

The bank accounts under investigation may have been Saudi, though the article does not state such. It does, however, go on to say: "...a source familiar with the multiple federal investigations of the bank's Saudi accounts and other embassy accounts say Jonathan Bush's investment advice unit has 'no relationship whatsoever' with any of the Riggs's Saudi accounts." Moreover, the newspaper quotes a spokesman for the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency as saying "any suggestion of political influence in the Riggs situation is 'preposterous.'"

In 1991, Bush was fined $30,000 in Massachusetts and several thousand in Connecticut for violating registration laws governing securities sales. He was barred from securities brokerage with the general public in Massachusetts for one year.