RAPPER and founder of the hip-hop group The Fugees, Pras Michel, is the latest subject ensnared in the US Department of Justice’s investigation into funds siphoned off 1MDB.

The Grammy Award winner donated US$1 million (RM4.1 million) to Barack Obama’s 2012 presidential campaign after receiving US$20 million in gifts around the same time from Low Taek Jho, better known as Jho Low, the financier at the heart of the 1Malaysia Development Bhd scandal, reports The Wall Street Journal.

The DoJ is investigating whether an agreement existed between Michel and Low to back efforts to re-elect former president Obama in violation of federal campaign-finance laws, the WSJ cited sources as saying.

Michel’s lawyer, Kit Pierson, declined to comment on the star’s relationship with Low, except to say that a “false narrative about Mr Michel is in place”.

In the latest report, WSJ said it has seen documents which show that Low paid US$20 million in 2012 to two limited-liability companies controlled by Michel.

Michel donated more than US$1.3 million to the Obama campaign in September and October of 2012, including US$1.225 million to a super PAC called Black Men Vote, said WSJ.

The American business daily said Low, a confidante of Najib Razak, was trying to boost the prime minister’s profile in the US around that time.

The DoJ recently launched a criminal investigation into alleged embezzlement and money laundering in 1MDB after calling for the suspension of its civil suit to seize assets worth US$4.5 billion (RM19 billon) that it claims were bought with money stolen from 1MDB.

It also named Low as being central to its investigations.

The WSJ also revealed in 2015 that some US$700 million (about RM2.6 billion then) of 1MDB funds were wired into Najib’s personal account in AmBank between January 2011 and April 2013.

In October, however, the Malaysian government cleared Low of the abuses linked to the state investor with Home Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi saying police have closed their investigation into the businessman. – November 29, 2017.