Former Reps. James Moran and Tom Davis lobbied lawmakers about ‘Qatar’s higher education funding,’ foreign agent disclosures reveal
Gov. Abigail Spanberger (D., Va.) has appointed two Qatari lobbyists to serve on George Mason University’s board of visitors, a Washington Free Beacon review has found.
Spanberger, who was sworn into office on Saturday, tapped former Reps. James Moran (D., Va.) and Tom Davis (R., Va.) to serve on George Mason’s 16-person board of visitors, which advises the school on “policy-making and oversight.” After retiring from Congress in 2015, Moran launched Moran Global Strategies, which registered as a foreign agent of the Qatari embassy in April 2023. Davis, who resigned from Congress in 2008, is a lobbyist at Holland & Knight, which subcontracts with Moran’s firm on its Qatari lobbying contract.
Qatar, an oil-rich Gulf monarchy that harbors Hamas, has paid Moran’s firm $2.3 million through August 2025 to advance “bilateral relations” with the United States, according to foreign agent disclosures. Moran Global Strategies has, in turn, paid Holland & Knight $35,000 per month for its lobbying services. Davis is listed as Moran’s “principal point of contact” in the Qatari lobbying contract, records show.
The appointments are a sharp departure from the “moderate” image Spanberger presented to the public during the campaign.
Moran, who served 24 years in the House, has lobbied his former colleagues on behalf of Qatar on educational issues, according to lobbying disclosures. In July, he met with two members of the House Education and Workforce Committee prior to a hearing on “antisemitism in higher education,” disclosures show. Moran was spotted in the audience at the hearing, seated behind Georgetown University president Robert Groves, Jewish Insider reported.
Last March, Moran contacted an aide to Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine (D.), whose wife previously served as interim president of George Mason, regarding “outreach on Qatar’s higher education funding,” according to disclosures. Holland & Knight and Davis have lobbied Republican lawmakers on education issues regarding Qatar. Davis met Rep. Kevin Kiley (R., Calif.) on June 25 for a “discussion” about the Committee on Education and Workforce, according to lobbying records.
Moran’s Qatari gig is perhaps a perfect fit for the 80-year-old lobbyist. In 2003, Moran apologized for the anti-Semitic statement that “the strong support of the Jewish community for this war” was to blame for the Iraq war. He made similar claims about AIPAC in 2007. Since leaving Congress, Moran has appeared alongside various anti-Israel extremists. In February 2023, a month before signing his contract with Qatar, Moran spoke at an online event for the Arab Organization for Human Rights in the U.K., whose leader was sanctioned by Israel in 2019 for his ties to Hamas. Moran’s co-panelist, longtime Marxist activist Sara Flounders, has praised Hamas’s “heroic, daring October 7” attack on Israel.
Moran, whose wife accused him in 2000 of shoving her during a confrontation, did not respond to questions about whether his Qatari gig will overlap with his duties at George Mason.
But Qatar, which has donated $5.9 million to George Mason, has used its gifts to extract concessions from beneficiaries. Qatar’s contract with Northwestern University, which hosts a satellite campus in Doha, prohibits students and faculty from criticizing the Qatari regime, the Free Beacon reported.
Qatar is the largest foreign donor to U.S. schools, according to a Department of Education database, giving $6.6 billion in all to American schools—50 percent more than the next largest donor, Germany.
Qatar has hired other heavy hitters in its quest to shape American academia. William Bennett, the former education secretary for President Ronald Reagan, is lobbying on behalf of the Qatari embassy, according to foreign agent filings.
Bennett says he will “publicize the fact that Qatari higher education efforts do not support radical Islamicist movements or positions,” the filing says.
George Mason has faced a series of stumbles in recent years in its handling of DEI policies and anti-Israel protesters.
The Trump administration launched investigations into the school in July over allegations that Jewish students and faculty have faced a hostile environment at the school, the Free Beacon reported.
Last year, George Mason reinstated the school’s Students for Justice in Palestine chapter, which was suspended after police found weapons, Hamas paraphernalia, and posters stating “Death to Jews” in the home of two SJP leaders, the Free Beacon reported. SJP celebrated the reinstatement by releasing a recruitment video praising former Hamas commander Mohammed Deif.
The Spanberger administration and Davis did not respond to requests for comment.
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