ActBlue has processed nearly $19 billion in contributions since its 2004 founding, according to the New York Times. In 2025 alone, it reported $1.8 billion — a 41% jump compared to 2021 — with 1.35 million new donors added to its growing base.
Paxton opened his investigation into the platform in 2023. By August 2024, ActBlue had made changes, adding CVV code requirements for donations. “This is a critical change that can help prevent fraudulent donations,” Paxton said at the time, while warning that “suspicious activity on fundraising platforms must be fully investigated.”
But Paxton says the cooperation was a facade. In October 2024, he filed a petition for rulemaking with the FEC detailing how suspicious actors appeared to still be using the platform for straw donations and made a criminal referral to the U.S. Department of Justice.
“Amidst the OAG’s investigation and a Congressional investigation, ActBlue claimed it stopped its illegal operations,” the Office of the Attorney General said in an April 20 press release.
The final straw, Paxton says, came from ActBlue’s own lawyers. He cited recent New York Times reporting in which “ActBlue’s own outside counsel acknowledged that the organization’s representations about its donation safeguards were not true.”
Investigators also found that ActBlue continued processing gift card and prepaid debit card donations — payment methods with limited identification requirements that Paxton says create “a substantial risk that impermissible foreign contributions may have been processed” — despite the company’s claims to the contrary.
“The radical left has relied on ActBlue as a way to funnel foreign donations and dark money into their political campaigns to subvert our laws and compromise the integrity of our elections,” the OAG said.
“Fair elections are the foundation of our democracy, and I will work to ensure no illegal campaign donation flies under the radar,” Paxton said
(RELATED: Talarico Takes in $27 Million in Texas Senate Race)
(RELATED: Lululemon’s ‘Forever Chemicals’ Probed by Texas AG)
