Virginia AG Miyares concerned over potential foreign money seeping into US election via ActBlue

Virginia GOP Attorney Jason Miyares said this week that he is worried about the potential influence of foreign money impacting U.S. elections through the Democratic online fund-raising platform ActBlue that he is investigating. 

"I don't want to get too specific on ActBlue....I have long worried about what I have seen with foreign influence overseas, whether it be through nonprofits or others using foreign money to essentially do political advocacy in the United States," Miyares said on the John Solomon Reports podcast. 

House investigators formally subpoenaed ActBlue to expand an ongoing probe into possible illicit foreign funding in the 2024 election after the Treasury Department confirmed to Congress its money laundering detection system has generated hundreds of suspicious activity reports related to the online fundraising giant.

The developments were communicated to House members and ActBlue itself in a series of memos this week obtained by Just the News that reaffirmed that lawmakers' fear that foreign adversaries like China, Iran, Venezuela and Russia may be routing illicit foreign money into Democratic coffers by using the names of unsuspecting American donors.

"Any candidate for either state or federal office is not allowed to accept donations from a foreign entity, and so I have been very concerned about that," Miyares said.

$16 billion

He added that leaders like the president have massive influence on the global stage and that foreign donations were a huge problem, referencing when the Clinton administration fundraised money on the People's Republic of China. 

ActBlue, which has raised more than $16 billion in small donations for liberal causes in the last two decades, has not responded to multiple requests for comment. But it has denied wrongdoing and says it is cooperating with investigations, which include two in Congress and 19 in the states. 

In December of 2023, Texas GOP Attorney General Ken Paxton opened up an investigation to ActBlue, and in 2024 said in a statement that "suspicious actors appear to be using ActBlue’s political fundraising platform to make a large number of straw political donations." 

CVV codes, the three-digit security number on the back of credit and debit cards, are often required when donations are given for security measures and there were allegations that those codes were not required with ActBlue. Due to Paxton's investigation, ActBlue now mandates the codes. According to The Texas Scorecard, “ActBlue has cooperated with our ongoing investigation,” said Paxton. “They have changed their requirements to now include ‘CVV’ codes for donations on their platform. This is a critical change that can help prevent fraudulent donations.”

Miyares also launched an investigation into ActBlue, saying that he had constituents approach him about the issue. 

"I actually also had some constituents that approached me that said that [Act Blue] was suddenly showing up on the credit card donations and they were lifelong Republicans," Miyares said.