Virginia Probes Top Dem Fundraising Platform For ‘Fraudulent’ Behavior

Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares announced Friday that his office is investigating ActBlue for allegations of fraud across the state.

ActBlue is the premier fundraising platform for the Democratic Party and has facilitated billions of dollars in contributions since 2004. Miyares sent a letter to ActBlue warning the organization that it is now under investigation for collecting suspicious contributions in Virginia that point to “illegal” and “fraudulent” activities, demanding that the platform provide detailed records related to its transactions.

“My office has become aware of multiple serious allegations that ActBlue (and its affiliates) have engaged in fraudulent, deceptive, and/or otherwise illegal activities in the Commonwealth of Virginia and/or have aided and abetted others in doing so,” Miyares wrote in the letter to ActBlue. “The citizens of the Commonwealth of Virginia deserve to know that nonprofit and political entities are financed in a legal manner and that entities operating in Virginia are legitimately and legally raising funds. To undermine those concerns is to undermine the integrity of our elections and charities.”

Miyares pointed to hundreds of thousands of dollars in contributions to the fundraising platform coming from individual donors in Virginia “in volumes that are facially implausible,” according to the letter. Some of these high-level contributions have come from senior citizens who self-identify as retired or unemployed and are listed with “suspicious” addresses.

That appears to indicate that those donations are stemming from “fictional donors or dummy accounts,” or that the transactions are “fraudulent” altogether, Miyares wrote in the letter. Miyares noted that it is also possible that ActBlue is taking contributions from Virginia donors without their consent or awareness.