Democratic Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick of Florida was indicted for allegedly stealing millions of dollars in federal emergency funds and routing some of it to her campaign account, the Justice Department said.
Democratic Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick of Florida was indicted in federal court Wednesday for allegedly stealing millions of dollars in federal emergency funds and routing some of it to her campaign account, the Justice Department said in a statement.
The Justice Department alleged that in 2021, a year before Cherfilus-McCormick was elected to Congress, a health care company that she ran was overpaid $5 million on a Federal Emergency Management Agency-funded contract related to coronavirus vaccinations. The defendants in the case allegedly «conspired to steal» the money by sending it through multiple accounts.
Some of that overpaid money was then used to help fund Cherfilus-McCormick’s campaign to represent South Florida in the House, the Justice Department alleged. In particular, she was accused of funneling some of the money to friends and family members who donated it to her campaign, in what’s known as a «straw donor» scheme.
