cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/20723675

As a hedge fund manager, Pennsylvania Republican U.S. Senate candidate Dave McCormick’s company held roughly $415 million in Russian sovereign bonds prior to Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.

According to a Thursday report in the Guardian, McCormick — who is running against three-term incumbent Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA) — was found to have held the Russian debt through his firm, Bridgewater Associates, between 2017 and 2021. Sovereign debt is a major source of funding for countries to pay for operations and service debt, and has become increasingly subjected to sanctions since 2019.

McCormick has previously taken full ownership of Bridgewater’s decisions during his tenure as CEO — a position he held until 2022, when he unsuccessfully ran in Pennsylvania’s Republican Senate primary (he went on to lose to Mehmet Oz). In a 2023 speech to the American Enterprise Institute, McCormick told the audience: “Whatever we did I’m responsible for.”