Subpoena targets Michigan AG Dana Nessel over stalled 'dark money' probe

• An investigation into a potential campaign finance violation died amid a dispute between the department of state and attorney general 
• The group at question, Bipartisan Solutions, raised funds for a ballot committee co-chaired by Attorney General Dana Nessel’s wife
• The House Oversight Committee subpoenaed the department of attorney general for investigation records

More than two years after state campaign finance officials said a dark money group likely violated Michigan law by raising money for a ballot committee without disclosing donors, Republicans are questioning why the criminal referral went nowhere under Democratic Attorney General Dana Nessel. 

The House Oversight Committee this week authorized a subpoena for related communications within Nessel’s office, citing her wife’s role as co-chair for the ballot committee to which the funding ultimately flowed. 

It’s the latest conflict between the GOP-controlled chamber and top Democratic officials in state government. House Republicans who regained control of the lower chamber this year are touting the “most extensive use of the Legislature’s subpoena power in Michigan history.” 

The pending Nessel subpoena is warranted given her “personal” connections to the case because of her wife’s role, state Rep. Jay DeBoyer, a Republican from Clay Township, said during a brief committee hearing Tuesday. 

“Regardless of what occurred, we need to be absolutely certain that our state’s highest-ranking law enforcement official is not helping her friends and family evade the law,” he added in a statement. “If the attorney general has nothing to hide, she should welcome transparency into her house.” 

The committee’s 11 Republicans and five Democrats voted to approve the subpoena. Two Democrats abstained from voting. 

The pending subpoena targets communications between Nessel’s office and Bipartisan Solutions, a nonprofit group accountable for about 78% of donations to the Fair and Equal Michigan ballot committee. It seeks to find out whether Nessel intervened in the case and if there was an “isolation wall” between her and the investigation, given the potential conflict of interest. 

Nessel’s wife, Alanna Maguire, co-chaired Fair and Equal Michigan, which attempted — but ultimately failed — to put an LGBTQ anti-discrimination proposal before voters in the 2020 or 2022 elections. 

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Officials in Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson’s office determined in April 2023 that Bipartisan Solutions had likely violated Michigan campaign finance law by raising money for the initiative without disclosing donors. They referred the matter to Nessel for criminal investigation. 

But Nessel’s office never pursued the case. 

Instead, four months later, an acting bureau chief in the Department of Attorney General tried to send the case back to the Secretary of State, asserting election officials had not given Bipartisan Solutions the opportunity to respond to an initial complaint because they had “sent communications to an incorrect address.”

In an August 2023 letter provided to Bridge Michigan, Bryant Osikowicz asked the Department of State to “reopen your inquiry by attempting to communicate with the appropriate parties on this matter before referring it for criminal investigation.”   

The Michigan Department of State, however, responded by saying it didn’t have the legal authority to reopen an investigation once it had been sent to the attorney general, and contrary to what the AG suggested, “had sent several notices” to an East Lansing address on file, not the one listed by the AG.

The case appears to have effectively ended there, in a deadlock, with officials in each department putting the onus on the other to move forward.

“The matter was never referred back to our agency,” Nessel spokesperson Kim Bush told Bridge in a statement.

At least one advocate disagreed with the attorney general’s approach.

“The AG is responsible for completing this criminal investigation and shouldn’t have requested MDOS reopen its inquiry,” said Neil Thanedar, executive director of the Michigan Campaign Finance Network, a watchdog group. 

Thanedar argued campaign finance officials only need to “endeavor to correct the violation” for “90 business days” under law before it becomes state investigators’ responsibility to pursue a criminal probe.

The case stemmed from a July 2022 complaint filed by The Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust, a Washington-based conservative opposition research group known as FACT, which did not return a request for comment for this story.

FACT alleged that Bipartisan Solutions and six nonprofits violated Michigan’s campaign finance law by bankrolling ballot proposals without disclosing their donors. 

That was because their funding represented the bulk of the money raised by the ballot committees, a previously widespread, bipartisan practice the department had recently ruled was not legal. Bipartisan Solutions donated a total of $782,000 to Fair and Equal Michigan, according to state campaign finance records.

Nessel in early 2024 charged two Republican fundraisers with various crimes for a "dark money scheme” to use nonprofits to raise funds for the 2021 Unlock Michigan initiative backed by then-Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey. 

The case is “nearly identical” to the Bipartisan Solutions referral that Nessel is “refusing to investigate,” DeBoyer argued after securing authorization to subpoena her office. 

While Republicans had a Michigan House majority for 13 of the last 15 years, it’s currently the lone body the party controls in state government. The Oversight Committee has taken a markedly more aggressive stance since Republicans reclaimed the chamber this year to end a brief Democratic trifecta.

The committee previously subpoenaed Benson for election training materials, some of which she denied to provide, arguing they contain sensitive information that could jeopardize election security. Republicans went to court, and the Michigan Court of Claims this week ordered the two sides into mediation.

The committee on Tuesday authorized four additional subpoenas, including another for Nessel’s office, two to the Department of Natural Resources regarding their feral swine and Canada geese programs and another compelling Michigan Department of Health and Human Services Director Elizabeth Hertel to testify before the committee in September.