Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton on Monday announced the findings of an investigation into the Democratic mega-funder ActBlue, following reports that donors to the site were allegedly using other people’s identities. did.
Paxton listed the following findings from the ongoing case: press release. he said in a certain way letter Potential donors can exploit loopholes in existing election laws to raise millions of dollars worth of donations in someone else’s name, a lawsuit filed with the Federal Election Commission says.
Paxton urged the FEC to close existing loopholes to prevent fraud.
“Our investigation into ActBlue uncovered facts showing that bad actors can illegally interfere in U.S. elections by disguising political contributions,” Paxton said. “The FEC will shut down channels that we have identified through which foreign donations and contributions in excess of legal limits can be illegally funneled into political campaigns, circumvent campaign finance regulations, and potentially violate election systems. I am calling on the FEC to immediately begin creating rules to protect elections from any criminals who exploit these vulnerabilities.”
BREAKING NEWS: Our investigation for ActBlue uncovers facts showing that bad actors can illegally interfere in American elections by disguising political contributions.
Contributions from foreign countries… pic.twitter.com/8E5vfaYxDL
— Attorney General Ken Paxton (@KenPaxtonTX) October 21, 2024
Paxton claimed his research corroborated reports that illegal donors were stealing people’s identities for payments of up to thousands of dollars. Donors were said to sometimes donate multiple times a day.
The investigation also revealed that those involved in the alleged criminal scheme were so sophisticated that even Paxton civil investigators had difficulty tracing the transactions.
“The Attorney General’s civil investigators do not typically see this type of criminal evasion,” Paxton wrote in the FEC letter. “We don’t have the technical expertise to do so.” (Related: Exclusive: ActBlue’s new security measures don’t address funding loopholes cited by Republican lawmakers)
Election Watch is organization It specializes in monitoring FEC data of so-called smurf accounts. Smurfs are donor accounts whose personal information may have been stolen without their knowledge. Smurf accounts, according to election monitoring data made From 2017 to April 2023, more than $2 billion in political contributions were made using the identities of Texans. More than 14 million transactions were tracked from these accounts during that time, according to the data.
Paxton asked the FEC to perform cross-checks on all political contributions made using credit, debit, gift, and prepaid cards to ensure the donor’s identity matches the identity listed on the card. It recommended that it be made compulsory. His letter also recommended that prepaid and gift cards be accepted only if a match can be made to the company that issued the card.
The Act Blue controversy has spread beyond Texas and has garnered national attention in recent months. Republican Wisconsin Congressman Brian Still said: letter On September 18, he directed five state attorneys general, including Mr. Paxton, to investigate ActBlue and Smurf donation brokering.
The Daily Caller has reached out to Paxton for comment.
