Democratic fundraising platform ActBlue may have raked in millions through fraudulent donations, according to the testimonies of elderly Americans who said federal election records do not reflect their giving.
Eighteen registered Democrats in Connecticut, all over the age of 70, appear to have donated $1.9 million to Democratic causes, including ActBlue, through hundreds of thousands of small donations from 2016 to 2024, according to a review of Federal Election Commission filings by Dominic Rapini, cybersecurity company CEO and a former Connecticut Republican candidate for office.
Curious about the donation patterns, Rapini tracked down some of the Connecticut residents and asked them if they really did make thousands of small donations, sometimes multiple in a day, through ActBlue.
Several of the supposed donors told Rapini they did not make any of the reported donations, nor did they know anything about how their names were being used, Rapini told The Daily Signal.
An 88-year-old retired Yale University professor, for example, supposedly made 7,539 donations for a total of $213,163, according to FEC records. After Rapini informed him about the significant donations in his name, he signed an affidavit saying, “I believe this does not reflect my donation frequency or dollars I have donated.”
According to Rapini, who has analyzed numbers for three decades in the tech industry, this is a possible case of alleged identity theft and money laundering. A contribution made by one person in the name of another is illegal.
“When I examine the donation patterns tied to these alleged ‘smurfs,’ the irregularities jump off the page, revealing behavior that defies both human logic and common sense,” he told The Daily Signal. “To safeguard trust in our election process, we must confront these anomalies head-on.”
Rep. Bryan Steil, R-Wis., chairman of the House Administration Committee, told The Daily Signal he’s aware of similar reports from across the country.
“In response, last fall, I shared the findings of our investigation with several state attorneys general,” Steil said in an emailed statement. “The committee and I remain fully available to collaborate with any state law enforcement officials who wish to access the information we have gathered on this critical issue.”
An elderly acupuncturist and registered Democrat appears to have made 17 donations in 2022 through ActBlue totaling $317. In an email to Rapini, she promised she hasn’t made political contributions since 2016.
“I can promise you I have NOT made donations myself to the [Democratic National Committee] or Democratic local party since 2016 … ,” she said. “Anything past that are fake and/or manipulated donations.”
A 91-year-old woman appears to have made 2,591 donations totaling $41,000, according to FEC filings. She signed an affidavit with Rapini denying making the reported donations.
Another 75-year-old woman looks to have made 4,270 small donations adding up to $32,323. She too signed an affidavit with Rapini denying making the donations in this frequency or quantity.
ActBlue is currently under congressional investigation for alleged laundering of foreign money laundering.
ActBlue came under fire on Oct. 29 because of its donor-verification policies. In a letter that day to ActBlue, Steil said foreign actors from Iran, Russia, Venezuela, and China could use the platform to launder illicit money for use in U.S. political campaigns.
The Democratic fundraising platform admitted in 2023 to Steil that it didn’t require contributors to use a card verification value, or CVV, to donate on its website with a credit card. Those security codes are meant to ensure that the person making a purchase physically possesses the credit card.
ActBlue responded to The Daily Signal’s request for comment about the affidavits by referring The Daily Signal to a post on its blog, which says, “Because of how reporting works for intermediaries, contributions made on platforms like ours often show up more than once in public FEC records, because both ActBlue and the receiving campaign or committee must report the contributions.
“FEC rules require ActBlue to itemize every contribution made through its platform, regardless of amount,” the post says.
“Additionally, FEC reports often lump multiple donors with the same name together,” the post continues. “This can make it difficult to easily identify which contributions should be associated with each individual donor, especially donors with common names.”
Rapini said whether the suspicious donation patterns come from “sloppy data systems at the FEC” or “nefarious actors laundering money through unsuspecting elderly donors,” an investigation is needed.
“Transparency and accountability are nonnegotiable when it comes to protecting the integrity of our democracy,” he said.
