Around New England

Democratic State Committees Laundered Donations To Hillary Clinton’s 2016 Campaign for President, Federal Lawsuit Says

May 29, 2018

A federal lawsuit by a pro-Trump politico claims that 33 state Democratic Party committees illegally laundered donations totaling $84 million that ultimately ended up in accounts that directly benefited Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign for president.

Donations that on paper were supposed to benefit state Democratic committees actually ended up in large measure being passed through to the Democratic National Committee, which used it to try to get Clinton elected, according to Dan Backer, a lawyer for the Committee to Defend the President.

One example:  About $2.4 million raised by the Hillary Victory Fund, a joint fund-raising political action committee, went to the Maine Democratic Party “and then almost immediately” to the Democratic National Committee, according to the Bangor Daily News.

Defenders of the arrangement say it’s not illegal and that state Democratic Party committees benefited by getting to keep a portion of the money raised by the Hillary Victory Fund.

Backer is trying to pressure the Federal Election Commission to investigate.