Clinton Calls for Scrutiny of Questionable Trump Foundation in Light of IRS Fine

Amid Donald Trump’s allegations that the Clinton Foundation is a "pay to play" organization, Hillary Clinton is attempting to make hay out of a report that the Republican presidential nominee paid a $2,500 penalty to the IRS this year for a 2013 donation a Trump charitable organization made to a group connected to Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi.

"You have the Trump Foundation, so called, being fined by the IRS for taking foundation resources and making a $25,000 contribution to the attorney general of Florida when she was about to investigate Trump University," Clinton told ABC News’ David Muir in the battleground state of Ohio Monday.

But Trump, over the skies of Ohio onboard his private plane, told reporters the same day that he never spoke to Bondi and, in response to the criticism of Trump University, said “many of the attorney generals turned that case down because I’ll win that case in court."

Former "students" at Trump University have sued the defunct real estate training program for misleading marketing tactics, which he has repeatedly denied.

The Republican presidential nominee added that he has known Bondi for years and has "a lot of respect for her as a person."

The Washington Post first reported the IRS fine, saying that in addition to Trump's foundation’s "violating the federal rules that prohibit charities from donating to political candidates," the donation itself to a Bondi political committee, And Justice for All, which has previously been reported, was also not disclosed to the Internal Revenue Service.

Bondi has reportedly denied dropping any investigation during the time when her office was contemplating whether to join a New York probe of Trump University. "I never, nor was my office, investigating him. Never. I would never lie. I would never take money. I've been obviously devastated over this," she said in a voicemail message the Tampa Bay Times said she left with one of its reporters in June.

But Clinton is unconvinced. "There’s so many things that are questionable about that, and the IRS certainly thought so and said it was illegal and fined Trump for that set of facts," she told reporters on her campaign plane Monday after her interview with ABC News.

She also told Muir that she's proud of the Clinton foundation’s work, adding that "no decision I ever made [as secretary of state] was influenced by anybody. I made a decision based on what was good for the United States, what was good for our values, our interests and our security and, as the State Department has confirmed, there is no evidence of any such influence at all."

Clinton encouraged people to contrast the work of the Clinton Foundation with the activities of the Trump Foundation, which her spokeswoman, Jennifer Palmieri, has called "an actual pay-to-play scandal."

"Donald Trump has no standing whatsoever to question the Clinton Foundation, which works to make AIDS and malaria drugs more accessible, when it's been proven he uses his own foundation to launder illegal campaign donations," according to a statement Palmieri released after news broke of the IRS fine.

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