Rep. Carolyn Maloney, the Democrat in charge of the House Oversight and Reform committee, announced Monday evening that the committee is launching an investigation into allegations that Postmaster General Louis DeJoy used an illegal straw donor scheme to evade campaign finance laws. The Washington Post broke the story of DeJoy's fundraising at his company, New Breed, from 2000 to 2014 when he was becoming a major Republican donor.
The Post reported that 124 New Breed employees contributed a sum of over $1 million to Republican candidates in those years while donating just $700 to Democrats, and that managers "received strongly worded admonitions" to give to DeJoy's fundraisers. DeJoy's executive assistant also "personally called senior staffers" to make sure they were attending. The donations then appeared to be reimbursed through bonuses. That's against the law, both federally and in North Carolina where it happened—and where there is no statute of limitations for felonies. Maloney said the Post is investigating that, and whether DeJoy lied to her committee under oath when he was asked about his campaign finance activities. She also urged the U.S. Postal Service’s (USPS) board of governors to suspend DeJoy, whom "they never should have hired in the first place."
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The lying to Congress part points to a question by Democratic Rep. Jim Cooper (TN), who asked DeJoy about his fundraising for the Trump campaign, saying: "you were picked along with Michael Cohen and Elliott Broidy, two men who have already pled guilty to felonies, to be the three deputy finance chairmen of the Republican National Committee." He asked straight up: "Did you pay back several of your top executives for contributing to Trump's campaign by bouncing or rewarding them?" Technically, DeJoy's denial of this might not be a lie because the Post's reporting predates the Trump campaign. It alleges that DeJoy did precisely this, but for other Republican candidates. That's not to say that DeJoy kept up the practice at XPO Logistics, the company that bought New Breed, which is under investigation for exceedingly lucrative contracts with the USPS. DeJoy was a director there until 2018.
That is one of the things the House will probably be looking into. DeJoy faces "criminal exposure" if the allegations are proven, "but also for lying to our committee under oath," Maloney said. That's if they can find the evidence that DeJoy's straw donor financing continued through the Trump campaign. Which seems pretty darned likely; given Cooper’s line of questioning during the hearing, they might have some knowledge of that already. The hearing was held to delve into the operational changes that DeJoy was making at the Postal Service that have resulted in unacceptable service delays and put the November election in jeopardy in many states, and what was behind those changes. (Like an attempt to help Trump’s reelection.) That and destroying the USPS so it could be sold off as parts to competing private companies.
North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein might just be looking into it as well. He tweeted on Sunday that "it is against the law to directly or indirectly reimburse someone for a political contribution. Any credible allegations of such actions merit investigation by the appropriate state and federal authorities." He would be the appropriate state authority, but he told the Post it was inappropriate for him to comment further on that when they approached him for follow-up. Numerous congressional Democrats have called for further investigation and for DeJoy's firing.
