He House of Representatives Committee which oversees the integrity of elections, demanded on Monday that ActBlue, Democratic online fundraising platforminformation on whether Kamala Harris received illegal funding from Iran, China or Venezuela. Members of Congress want the platform to reveal to Congress how it verifies the identities of donors before accepting money, which they then send to the vice president. Fears that Iran, China, Russia and Venezuela will pump funds into Kamala Harris’ campaignpretending to be straw donors (straw donors). They use the identities of US citizens to make donations with their money via their credit cards. By law, foreigners cannot make campaign donations. ActBlue is a PAC (political action committee) which raises money for Democrats through small online donations. He raised $1.5 billion for Democratic politicians from about seven million people. Instead, a disproportionate amount has been paid to the vice president in recent weeks. In the first days of his campaign alone, donors gave him $200 million through the platform.
“Our research indicated that these actors They may be donating straw.”wrote House Administration Committee Chairman Bryan Steil in a letter to ActBlue CEO Regina Wallace-Jones, warning her that his committee would soon send him a subpoena.
Donations to Kamala Harris would be made using Americans’ identities and addresses with credit cards from Iran, China or Venezuela, as ActBlue to facilitate donation does not require a CVV, the number associated with the credit card to confirm identity. In this sense, Steil, Republican from Wisconsin, expressed concern about the security practices of the fundraising platform. As noted, ActBlue does not require donors to verify credit cards. It is not necessary to provide the CVV number, Identity theft and money laundering protection key.
Two months ago, Steil’s committee conducted a computer analysis of hundreds of thousands of small donations made through ActBlue to Democratic candidates. The results aroused suspicion. Donations came from cards supposedly associated with addresses in low-income areas.
These findings led Steil to forward the evidence to attorneys general in five states for possible criminal or civil investigation, depending on consumer fraud laws. In a few weeks, these investigations spread to 19 states. Earlier this month, a Wisconsin Republican consultant filed a lawsuit in Waukesha County Circuit Court alleging that his identity and an old campaign email were used to make hundreds of donations without his permission using a California credit card.
Foreign funding for Bill Clinton
In the 1990s, the Democratic Party was embroiled in the Chinagate scandal, which revealed that businessmen with ties to China had donated millions to Democrats. to help Bill Clinton in his 1996 re-election campaign. So they did the same thing: they used straw donors to make donations on their behalf, because foreign citizens cannot donate to American candidates. Dozens of them were convicted and some were imprisoned.
