The House Oversight Committee will be investigating new allegations that the Trump-allied Postmaster General, Louis DeJoy, pressured employees of his old company into donating to GOP candidates and causes, according to the committee’s Chairwoman Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.). Allegedly, during DeJoy’s tenure as CEO of the North Carolina company New Breed Logistics, employees who donated to Republican candidates were reimbursed via bonuses — which is illegal under both federal and state law. There is a statute of limitations restricting prosecutions under the federal legislation, but there’s not one for the state law.
Besides the brazen criminality of the alleged reimbursement scheme, DeJoy also may have criminal exposure over having lied to Congress, because he claimed to Maloney’s committee that he had not repaid executives for donations to Trump’s campaign, she noted — although it’s worth adding that DeJoy had sold New Breed Logistics by 2016. Apparently reimbursed donations came earlier. Simultaneous to her revelation of an investigation into the corruption allegations against DeJoy — which he has denied — Maloney also called for the immediate suspension of DeJoy by the Postal Service’s Board of Governors, who are responsible for his controversial original appointment as Postmaster General.
The original story in The Washington Post that revealed the apparent corruption at DeJoy’s old company used two employees as sources for the reimbursement component and five other people who worked for the business as sources for the component of the pressure on staffers to donate to Republican causes in the first place. According to the Post, 124 employees of DeJoy’s former company donated more than $1 million to Republican candidates between 2000 and 2014 — if even part of that money was reimbursed via bonuses, then that could constitute quite a substantial DeJoy-led criminal enterprise.
DeJoy has personally donated over $1.1 million to Trump Victory, which is the collaborative fundraising operation of the Trump campaign and the national Republican Party. While on the job as Postmaster General, he’s faced steep criticism for the policy changes that he has implemented that have had the effect of slowing down mail delivery across the country. These slowdowns have occurred with just a short time left until the presidential election, when mail-in ballots could have an even more important role than usual thanks to concerns around in-person voting due to the Coronavirus pandemic. DeJoy claimed during testimony to Maloney’s committee last month that the Postal Service “will do everything in our power and structure to deliver the ballots on time” — but will he really?
DeJoy spokesperson Monty Hegler “did not directly address the assertions that DeJoy reimbursed workers for making contributions,” according to the Post. Instead, he reiterated a statement insisting that DeJoy “believes that he has always followed campaign fundraising laws and regulations.”
Ironically, during DeJoy’s contentious recent appearance before the House, Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.) asked him if his “backup plan” was “to be pardoned like Roger Stone.” (Stone, a convicted criminal, had his prison sentence commuted by Trump recently.) DeJoy mockingly dismissed the question — but as it turns out, he might have some use for something like a pardon, although presidential pardons don’t cover state crimes.
WHOA: Rep. Jim Cooper (D-TN) to the Postmaster General at today's hearing: "Mr. DeJoy, is your backup plan to be pardoned like Roger Stone?" pic.twitter.com/eL50K7GOnu
— The Recount (@therecount) August 24, 2020
