WASHINGTON — House Republicans issued subpoenas Thursday to top lawyers at Democratic fundraising powerhouse ActBlue amid an ongoing probe of allegedly fraudulent donations “from domestic and foreign sources” in the last election cycle, according to letters obtained by The Post.
Former ActBlue general counsel Darrin Hurwitz and ex-director and associate general counsel Aaron Ting were both compelled to come before House investigators for depositions.
Another, anonymous, ActBlue legal counsel was also subpoenaed by the leaders of the House Administration, Judiciary and Oversight Committees who authored the missives.
Records uncovered by the committees showed that Hurwitz, Ting and the unidentified counsel worked with the platform’s fraud-prevention team as it implemented “more lenient” standards during the 2024 campaign.
ActBlue let debit or credit transactions occur without requiring a card verification value (CVV) until January 2024 — around halfway through the election cycle — and newer standards published last year still instructed employees to “look for reasons to accept contributions.”
In April 2024 and again in September of that year, ActBlue further relaxed guidelines, permitting between 14 and 28 more fraudulent contributions per month — meaning up to 6.4% of total donations that should have been rejected for fraud were accepted.
“Other internal ActBlue documents show that top fraud-prevention staff assessed that there were several mechanisms by which bad actors could evade ActBlue’s fraud-prevention systems and make illicit donations,” Thursday’s letter stated.
All three former ActBlue employees had already been invited to sit for transcribed interviews but backed out of the process following months of back-and-forth with committee staff.
The caution from the attorneys appears to have stemmed from President Trump’s decision to authorize a Department of Justice probe into ActBlue’s alleged allowance of “dummy” accounts or contributions from foreign nationals on its platform.
Danny Onorato, a lawyer now representing the ex-ActBlue employees, told House committee staff by phone this past April that he “would advise his clients not to appear before the Committee until he had ‘more information’ about” the DOJ’s probe, which could make use of their testimony to Congress.
Attorney General Pam Bondi is supposed to issue a report to the president on any suspicious donations that “undermine the integrity” of the electoral process 180 days after the April 24 memo from the White House asking for the investigation.
“The Committees’ investigation has a clear — and important — legislative purpose,” wrote Administration Committee Chairman Bryan Steil (R-Wis.), Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and Oversight Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.).
“Congress has a specific interest in ensuring that bad actors, including foreign actors, cannot make fraudulent or illegal political donations through online fundraising platforms. Our oversight to date indicates that current law may be insufficient to stop these illicit donations.”
The former ActBlue employees have been asked to appear for depositions on Oct. 15, 21 and 28.
An ActBlue spokesperson previously said that the fundraising platform had “very serious concerns of the partisan, parallel and collaborative investigations coming from separate branches of government and targeting solely the President’s political opposition.”
Neither Onorato, reps for ActBlue or attorneys for Hurwitz and Ting immediately responded to requests for comment.
