EXCLUSIVE — If ActBlue fails to comply with House Republicans’ latest demand for documents, Congress may compel its leadership to testify and hold the organization’s CEO in contempt, a GOP aide familiar with the matter told the Washington Examiner.
In a letter sent to ActBlue on Tuesday, Reps. Bryan Steil (R-WI) and Jim Jordan (R-OH) alleged that ActBlue, a massive Democratic fundraising platform, failed to provide them with documents they had subpoenaed in 2025, when lawmakers began digging into allegations that the platform illegally accepted foreign political donations. The congressmen pointed out that a recent New York Times report referenced documents Congress had not received but appeared to fit the description of what they had demanded from ActBlue. On April 2, the New York Times had reported that ActBlue’s lawyers told the payment processor that it may have misled Congress regarding how much it had actually done to block foreign donations up to that point.
“Given ActBlue’s demonstrated history of misleading Congress, there is considerable reason to believe that ActBlue may have deliberately withheld this responsive material to impede our investigation,” the recent letter from the lawmakers reads. “Therefore, it is imperative that ActBlue promptly produce all materials responsive to the Committees’ subpoenas — including, but not limited to, the items above.”
“Absent these steps,” the letter continues, “the Committees are prepared to use available mechanisms to enforce our subpoenas.”
When asked what “mechanisms to enforce our subpoenas” were being considered by Congress, a GOP aide with knowledge of the matter told the Washington Examiner that the two strongest options on the table were holding ActBlue CEO Regina Wallace-Jones in contempt and summoning the organization’s leadership to testify before Congress.
The aide qualified his statement to the Washington Examiner by saying that these aren’t the only options available to the committee but that they are the two under the most serious consideration. The person also said that the lawmakers were not committing to these options but they were merely on the table.
Contempt is a federal crime typically prosecuted by the Department of Justice. Lying to Congress is also illegal.
“This latest letter from Congressional Republicans is a desperate attempt to deflect from the Right’s ongoing issues,” an ActBlue spokeswoman told the Washington Examiner. “They know no platform does more to protect the integrity of small-dollar democracy than ActBlue. To no surprise, this also comes on the heels of a record Democratic fundraising quarter ahead of the midterms. The reality is that we have always been forthcoming with Congress, and we will not be intimidated by partisan theater. Our focus remains on providing the secure infrastructure the Democratic movement needs to win this November.”
The current row between congressional Republicans and ActBlue stretches back years.
In 2023, then-Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida and Steil raised concerns that ActBlue’s security measures were insufficient to prevent fraud and illegal donations made by foreign nationals. Responding to these allegations, ActBlue wrote a letter to Congress wherein the payment processor claimed that its framework for guarding against illegal contributions was “multilayered, with checks and confirmations occurring throughout the donation process to verify donors and donor information.”
Lawyers for ActBlue, according to documents reviewed by the New York Times, later stated that the characterization it gave Congress was inaccurate, as the platform allegedly failed to collect sufficient documentation from donors using third-party platforms, such as Apple Pay or Venmo, to block nonresident foreign citizens from making political contributions. If true, this could contradict what ActBlue initially wrote to Congress.
ActBlue’s lawyers at Covington & Burling stated that the payment processor’s procedures created “a substantial risk that some of the funds received were impermissible contributions from foreign nationals,” according to a memo obtained by the New York Times.
ActBlue later tightened its vetting process to request more documents from users donating with third-party platforms, but did not admit to having misled Congress.
“We didn’t do it immediately, but as we understood the gap, then we remedied the situation and answered, continued to answer truthfully to the best of our knowledge at the time,” ActBlue board member Kimberly Peeler-Allen said of the pivot.
The New York Times referenced a report that was a resignation letter from former ActBlue interim general counsel and an internal message in which the organization’s former legal counsel had alleged he was being retaliated against for acting as a whistleblower.
House Republicans had previously issued a subpoena to ActBlue compelling it to provide “all documents and communications referring or relating to whistleblowers, retaliation against whistleblowers, and actual or alleged misconduct by ActBlue staff” and “all documents and communications referring or relating to the resignations of staff in ActBlue’s Office of the General Counsel.”
According to House Republicans, the documents referenced in the New York Times report were not provided to them despite fitting that description.
ACTBLUE’S LAWYERS SAID IT MAY HAVE MISLED CONGRESS ON FOREIGN DONATIONS
Now, Steil and Jordan are giving ActBlue until April 28 to provide them with “documents and communications referring or relating to the potential or actual use of ActBlue by foreign nationals to make political contributions” and “all documents and communications referring or relating to ActBlue’s policies, practices, or procedures for preventing, deterring, or detecting political contributions by foreign nationals.”
Steil and Jordan chair the committees on administration and judiciary, respectively.