WASHINGTON — Democrats in Washington are ramping up efforts to investigate White House border czar Tom Homan over allegations that he accepted $50,000 in cash from undercover FBI agents last year.
In a letter obtained first by NBC News, Democrats on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee urged Attorney General Pam Bondi on Wednesday to “immediately” release documents related to the probe that the Justice Department reportedly closed. Homan, who served as acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement during President Donald Trump’s first term, owned a private consulting business at the time.
“The fact that the incoming Trump Administration reportedly closed this investigation prematurely raises further concerns that the Administration is weaponizing our system of justice to protect the president’s friends and to persecute his political foes,” the letter, led by Sens. Gary Peters, D-Mich., Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., and Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., said.
In an operation last year, first reported by MSNBC, citing multiple sources familiar with the investigation and internal documents, FBI agents posing as business executives allegedly recorded Homan accepting a bag of cash after indicating he could help them with future federal contracts if he became the nation’s top immigration official during Trump’s second term. Trump appointees officially closed the investigation in recent weeks, MSNBC reported, citing two sources familiar with the matter.
In the letter, co-signed by Sens. John Fetterman, D-Pa., Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., Andy Kim, D-N.J., and Maggie Hassan, D-N.H., Democrats asked FBI Director Kash Patel to turn over documents and files, including any audio and videotapes of the transaction between Homan and the FBI agents.
The DOJ did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the letter.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt denied reports that Homan took the money, telling reporters this week, “This was another example of the weaponization of the Biden Department of Justice against one of President Trump’s strongest and most vocal supporters in the midst of a presidential campaign.”
She accused President Joe Biden’s FBI of “going undercover to try and entrap one of the president’s top allies and supporters, someone who they knew very well would be taking a government position months later” and reiterated that “Mr. Homan did absolutely nothing wrong.”
Homan has dismissed the report that he accepted a bribe as a “hit piece.”
“Look, I did nothing criminal. I did nothing illegal,” Homan said on Fox News on Monday.
Senate Democrats also pointed to $170 billion that Congress recently appropriated for border security and immigration enforcement in their letter.
“It is critical that the American people be able to trust that the influence of White House and other government officials has not been bought, and that contracts will be awarded to companies based on merit, not to those willing to pay bribes,” the letter said.
The letter marks Senate Democrats’ latest attempt to probe the Homan investigation. On Tuesday, Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee demanded tapes and other materials from the DOJ and FBI.
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