News · Press Release

Alek Skarlatos Faces FEC Complaint for Corrupt Misuse of Campaign Funds Meant for Veterans

OPB: Alek Skarlatos faces campaign finance complaint for $65,000 transfer from nonprofit

Just weeks after OR-04 candidate Alek Skarlatos was caught using his veterans nonprofit as a slush fund for his congressional campaign, the disgraced candidate is now facing an FEC complaint for his shady and potentially illegal self-dealing.

The complaint alleges that Skarlatos violated campaign finance laws by illegally transferring $65,000 from a veterans’ nonprofit he founded to his 2022 campaign. To make matters worse, the nonprofit aimed at helping veterans in need “has shown few outward signs of activity.” 

In filing the complaint, End Citizens United President Tiffany Muller said: “Skarlatos’ dark money donation to his campaign is not only self-serving and corrupt but does not fall within the bounds of the law.”

OPB: Alek Skarlatos faces campaign finance complaint for $65,000 transfer from nonprofit 

By Dirk VanderHart 

Key points:

  • In a complaint filed Monday with the Federal Elections Commission, a political action committee is accusing Skarlatos, a Republican running in Oregon’s fourth congressional district, of inappropriately accepting $65,000 from a nonprofit he founded.

  • “Federal candidates cannot use dark money groups as slush funds for their political campaigns,” said Tiffany Muller, the president of End Citizens United, the Democrat-affiliated PAC that filed the complaint. “Skarlatos’ dark money donation to his campaign is not only self-serving and corrupt but does not fall within the bounds of the law.”

  • According to the AP report, Skarlatos founded the organization to address veterans’ issues, and used $93,000 in unspent funds from his 2020 campaign to give the group its start. But the organization has shown few outward signs of activity. In May, soon after Skarlatos announced he’d make another run at Congress, his campaign reported a $65,000 check from the 15:17 Trust in the form of a “return of charitable contribution.”

  • End Citizens United says that the “return” actually amounts to an impermissible contribution from a 501c4 organization, a type of nonprofit sometimes derided as “dark money” groups because they do not need to publicly report their donors. While the FEC has approved some such returns in the past, End Citizens United argues that the facts of Skarlatos’ transaction go beyond the bounds of what the commission has found acceptable.

  • FEC records show Skarlatos’ campaign was fined $3,539 earlier this year, for failing to provide appropriate notice of campaign finance contributions.

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