The Justice Department announced an indictment Wednesday against Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, a Florida Democrat, accusing her of bilking the government of $5 million in pandemic funds and using the money to boost a previous congressional campaign.
Prosecutors said the government overpaid her family company $5 million for a COVID-19 vaccination staffing contract. She and her brother Edwin Cherfilus then “conspired to steal that $5 million” by obfuscating its source.
The prosecutors said she siphoned “a substantial portion” of the money into her campaign for Congress in 2021, when she was seeking to fill the seat of the late Rep. Alcee Hastings. Prosecutors said Ms. Cherfilus-McCormick funneled some of the contract money to friends and relatives, who then donated back to her campaign.
She then filed a false federal tax return, claiming the political spending as a business deduction, while inflating her charitable contributions, the indictment charges.
“Using disaster relief funds for self-enrichment is a particularly selfish, cynical crime,” said Attorney General Pamela Bondi. “No one is above the law, least of all powerful people who rob taxpayers for personal gain.”
The Washington Times has sought comment from the congresswoman’s office.
In that 2021 campaign, Ms. Cherfilus-McCormick won the Democratic primary by just five votes, 11,662 to 11,657. She would go on to easily win the general election in January 2022.
Ms. Cherfilus-McCormick had been under investigation by congressional ethics investigators. That wide-ranging probe said it was exploring whether she used her position to siphon earmark money to a for-profit entity, accepted campaign donations “linked to an official action” or misreported the source of some campaign donations.
The Office of Congressional Ethics said Ms. Cherfilus-McCormick’s income surged in 2021 thanks to Trinity Health Care Services, the family firm. She went from $86,000 in 2020 to nearly $6 million in 2021, based on “consulting fees” she paid herself.
She also reported lending her campaign millions of dollars that year.
Late last year, a Florida government agency sued Trinity Services over the overpayments.
The lawsuit said the state meant to pay Trinity $50,578.50 for one invoice. Instead, due to a “clerical error,” it sent $5,057,850.
The lawsuit said the state then discovered more than $700,000 in 16 other overpaid invoices to Trinity.
Trinity refused to repay the money.
Trinity had been on contract to provide canvassers to get people to register for vaccination.
The firm bragged in its solicitation to state officials about being owned by a Black woman and having a dozen “women of color” on its board of directors.
The indictment that authorities announced Wednesday was handed up by a grand jury in Miami.
In addition to the congresswoman it names her brother Nadege Leblanc, who is accused of arranging the straw campaign donations; and David K. Spencer, the congresswoman’s tax preparer for 2021.
