Washington, DC – U.S. Senators Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Andy Kim (D-NJ), and Representative Jamie Raskin (D-MD-8) sent a letter yesterday to the 2025 Trump Vance Inaugural Committee requesting information on the Committee’s practices for identifying and screening out illegal anonymous and foreign donations.
“Recent reporting indicates that the Trump Vance Inaugural Committee is on track to raise over $150 million. Given that a foreign national was found to have illegally donated $900,000 to the first Trump inaugural committee, and to evaluate whether additional congressional action is required to address the issue of foreign donors illegally contributing to inaugural funds, we request that the Inaugural Committee provide answers to the following questions,” wrote the members.
The members asked the Trump Vance Inaugural Committee for further details on procedures to ensure the accuracy of its financial disclosure reports, its measures to identify individual donors or the beneficial owners of corporate entities, its screening measures to identify donations from foreign nationals, and its processes to screen out obviously fake or anonymous donors. In 2021, a foreign national was sentenced to twelve years in prison after pleading guilty to charges that included making an illegal contribution to President-elect Trump’s first inaugural committee.
“The public deserves a full accounting of diligence measures to ensure the Trump Vance Inaugural Committee is meeting its reporting and screening requirements for donations,” added the members.
Senator Whitehouse has long led the charge to end the scourge of anonymous and foreign money in American politics. The Senator’s DISCLOSE Act would require organizations spending money in elections – including super PACs and 501(c)(4) dark money groups – to promptly disclose donors who give $10,000 or more during an election cycle. Whitehouse and Raskin also introduced the Get Foreign Money Out of U.S. Elections Act, legislation that would close a major loophole in campaign finance law that allows U.S. companies appreciably owned by foreign entities to pour unlimited sums of money into American elections.
The text of the letter is below and a PDF is available here.
January 13, 2025
Dear Senator Loeffler and Mr. Witkoff:
We write to request information on the 2025 Trump Vance Inaugural Committee’s practices regarding screening contributions from foreign donors.
Federal law prohibits foreign nationals from making, directly or indirectly, any donations to an inaugural committee.[1] Inaugural committees may not knowingly accept donations from foreign nationals.[2] Further, inaugural committees must report to the Federal Election Commission (FEC) any donation of money or anything of value aggregating $200 or more, including basic information about the donor, the amount of the donation, and the date of receipt.[3]
Recent reporting indicates that the Trump Vance Inaugural Committee is on track to raise over $150 million.[4] Given that a foreign national was found to have illegally donated $900,000 to the first Trump inaugural committee,[5] and to evaluate whether additional congressional action is required to address the issue of foreign donors illegally contributing to inaugural funds, we request that the Inaugural Committee provide answers to the following questions by January 21, 2025:
- What measures has the Trump Vance Inaugural Committee instituted to meet its legal obligation to submit accurate financial disclosure reports to the FEC identifying the sources of the millions of dollars it raised?
- What measures has the Trump Vance Inaugural Committee instituted to identify individual donors and/or ultimate beneficial owners responsible for donations made through corporate entities?
- What measures has the Trump Vance Inaugural Committee instituted to identify whether a donor is a foreign national?
- What processes are in place to ensure that a donor is not a foreign national, other than having the donor check a box certifying that the donor is not a foreign national and the contribution is being made from the donor’s own funds? Please provide specific information.
- What processes are in place to screen for obviously fake or anonymized donor information, such as falsified names and addresses (e.g., “John Doe,” listing a NASA facility address, etc.)? Please provide specific information.
- Please provide a copy of any written operating procedures regarding verification of donor information submitted to the Trump Vance Inaugural Committee.
- Please provide a copy of all materials containing information about programming and benefits offered to individuals who donate to the Trump Vance Inaugural Committee.
The public deserves a full accounting of diligence measures to ensure the Trump Vance Inaugural Committee is meeting its reporting and screening requirements for donations. Thank you for your attention to this important matter.
Sincerely,
[1] 11 C.F.R. § 110.20(j).
[2] Id.
[3] 11 C.F.R. § 104.21.
[4] Soo Rin Kim, Trump-Vance inaugural committee on track to raise record amount as pledged contributions surpass $150M, ABC News (Dec. 18, 2024), https://abcnews.go.com/US/trump-vance-inaugural-committee-track-raise-record-amount/story?id=116918692.
[5] Mike Ives, Donor to Trump Inauguration Sentenced to 12 Years in Federal Inquiry, New York Times (Feb. 19, 2021), https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/19/us/politics/imaad-zuberi-sentence.html.
