Stella Schnabel says she is confident and sure that her partner, US millionaire philanthropist James “Fergie” Cox Chambers, will not be extradited to the United States and that they will be able to settle and live in Spain with their son and the child expected next year. In an interview with elDiario.es, she recalls that she was not so calm almost three months ago, when Spanish authorities arrested Chambers in Ibiza—where the family intended to settle—following an extradition request from the administration of Donald Trump, which has focused on Chambers’ donations to organizations and projects in the Gaza Strip.
With spirits calmer, Schnabel remembers the initial uncertainty, when she did not understand what was happening. Now, she appears optimistic: “It doesn’t matter who is in government in Spain, we are sure the judicial system is very strong and will make the right decision, which is not to extradite him.” Meanwhile, the activist remains in pretrial detention. “We hope he will be granted conditional release and that he could obtain asylum in Spain,” she adds.
Chambers appeared before Spain’s Audiencia Nacional at the end of September and refused to be extradited to the US, claiming he is the target of political persecution by president Donald Trump. The US justice system is seeking him for three crimes: public disorder —for taking part in protests supporting direct actions against facilities manufacturing armaments for the Israeli military on US soil, conspiracy to incite riots, and money laundering. The funds in question are those that Chambers donated to charitable projects in Tunisia and the Gaza Strip, among others.
“Spain has taken such a brave stance regarding the genocide and has been very critical, especially Pedro Sánchez, so I believe we are lucky to be in this country and not somewhere else,” Schnabel says assuredly. Faced with the possibility that the Spanish government could change after the snap election on November 29, she also appears confident: “It doesn’t matter whether the government is left or right, as long as it supports humanity, a philanthropist who has not committed any crime. He is clearly innocent, and there is absolutely no evidence against him; all of this has been manufactured by the Trump administration; there is nothing factual.” Even if the Audiencia Nacional were to approve Chambers’s extradition to the US, the Spanish Executive could block it.
Last August, in a statement, a group of more than 100 cultural figures condemned the persecution of Chambers because he used “his wealth to support Palestine and those suffering a genocide in Gaza” and asked Sánchez’s government not to extradite him.
Schnabel, who is an actress and producer and helped her partner with his philanthropic work, explains that Chambers directed money to a desalination plant in Gaza, to build a bakery oven, and to the only hospital in the Strip that provided prostheses to children, among other projects in which she participated. That support even predates the start of the brutal Israeli offensive in October 2023, the third anniversary of which falls this week, during which more than 74,000 Palestinians have been killed.
The US has focused on US $7.5 million that Chambers transferred several years ago from a US bank account to Tunisia, where the philanthropist lived with his partner and their son for some years. “He likes soccer, like 99% of people worldwide, and he supported a soccer team in Tunisia, where we were living at the time,” Schnabel argues. “We have proof that that money was used to build sports centers for young people in Tunisia, to finance a local soccer team that was in debt, to pay players’ salaries, to hire a new coach, and more. They suggest that, because the money was sent to an Arab country, it must have been intended for something else,” she repeated, with irony: “something else.”
The leftist activist had been helping the Palestinian people in Gaza for years, a territory occupied by “Israel” and that since 2007 had been governed by Hamás and controlled by the militia internally; however, everything that enters the Strip from outside or is transferred, do so with the approval of Israeli authorities, which block the Strip by land, sea, and air. “He has always supported Palestine emotionally and philosophically, since he had the means. He had donated money to Palestinians even before the current genocide, when he first inherited a little money; he was about 20 years old,” she recalled.
Chambers is now 41 years old and obtained the bulk of his fortune in 2023, when he broke with his family and received US $250 million that belonged to him from the family company, Cox Enterprises, a US conglomerate dedicated to media, the auto industry, and telecommunications. From 2023 onwards, he had more capacity to help others, Schnabel notes, and that is why he began to be more troublesome for the authorities. “He also helped many people by paying for a lawyer, people who cannot pay for their defense or who are political activists and are not treated well in the US,” highlighted the 43-year-old, who says Chambers had never been afraid to speak up and defend the causes he considered just.
“He never stopped saying what he thought and, when you are rich, you feel you can say things because you can protect yourself, but right now there is no rule of law nor any norm that matters… There is no respect for human rights,” she said.
There is another element Schnabel believes has influenced the Trump administration’s extradition request: “The pressure from the Zionist regime and from Zionists is extreme,” she noted, because since 2023, millions of people around the world have mobilized for Palestine. Schnabel goes further and says that “US and Zionist interests are the same, both those of tech conglomerates and of the armament companies.”
Schnabel says they could not arrest and seek the extradition of “Fergie” merely for participating in “nonviolent protests” or for paying for the lawyer of “a protester who painted graffiti” in the US, so she asserts that the authorities have to “invent something,” and linking donations to charitable organizations in Gaza with financing Hamas (considered a terrorist group by the US) would be “the only pretext to extradite him.” However, the objective is to send a warning message to all US citizens: “The principal aim is to instill fear in many people, so that people keep quiet,” added Schnabel.
“It is very clear that this case has a political purpose; it seeks to stop other people, anyone who is against the current regime” in the US, she stated. The actress, who is pregnant, noted that Chambers is not just a “rich guy” but that his family has traditionally supported the Democratic Party, rival to Trump’s Republican Party, and controls media in the US.
“He does not work with his family, he has nothing to do with them or with their business, but he inherited all that money and believed he had to help those who have nothing while he is so fortunate. He really wanted to dedicate his life and his wealth to just causes,” she concluded.
(elDiario.es) by Lluna Bartual
Translation: Orinoco Tribune
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