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Sen. Susan Collins helped steer millions in federal defense contracts to Navatek, whose CEO illegally funneled thousands of dollars to her campaign. The FBI sought to launch a probe and was eyeing Collins and other lawmakers. Then Trump gutted the unit in charge. THREAD 🧵

2/ Our story starts in 2019. Collins is at risk of losing her seat. A year earlier, she helped Navatek land a multimillion-dollar Navy contract in Maine. Scott Reed, head of the pro-Collins super PAC, meets with Navatek execs in a D.C. cafe and asks for a $500K donation.

3/ This is risky. Government contractors are banned from making political contributions. For the company to offer donations to Collins in exchange for an official action, or for Collins to accept, would constitute criminal bribery.

4/ To skirt campaign finance laws and conceal the source of the funds, Navatek’s CEO, Martin Kao, sends an initial $150K to the pro-Collins super PAC (1820 PAC) using a shell company. Reed knows Kao is behind the donation. “Very smart,” he says in an email viewed by ProPublica.

5/ Kao wants assurance Collins would know he was behind it, and according to Kao, Reed confirms that she would. Seven days after the super PAC cashes the check, one of Reed’s subordinates emails a Navatek lobbyist: “Senator Collins would like to call Martin to thank him.”

6/ Weeks later, Kao tells his team Collins committed to getting the company $32M in naval contracts.

7/ But then, Kao got caught. The FBI had seen through his shell company ruse, and in 2022 a grand jury indicted him for making illegal campaign contributions. No one working for Collins was charged.

8/ Facing years in prison, Kao recounted the cafe meeting to the FBI in 2022, hoping to reduce his sentence by revealing the scheme. What he told them has never before become public.

9/ That cafe meeting, Kao asserted, was just one episode in a sprawling pay-to-play operation in Congress. He and his close associates donated nearly $900K to dozens of politicians, allowing Navatek to establish operations in half a dozen states with $40M+ a year in government funds.

10/ Of all the politicians Navatek courted, Collins was its most important patron. At times, Kao and his associates cut checks to Collins’ campaign within 24 hours of the annual defense spending bill, which funds military contracts, clearing a key Senate hurdle.

11/ Even Navatek’s executives were surprised at how far their money went in D.C. “It was eye-opening for me, frankly. ‘Oh my God, all of it is for sale. It’s all for sale,’” former executive Eric Schiff said.

12/ Here’s a crazy part: Kao told the FBI that the company’s government work was of no real value. Its research under his stewardship resulted in products Navatek knew the military would never buy, former employees said. One example: This 3D-printed boat Collins is posing with 👇

14/ He eviscerated the specialized FBI and DOJ teams handling public corruption investigations, some of which were involved in Trump-related cases. And the government stopped talking to an informant who had offered a road map to corruption in Congress.

15/ ProPublica is revealing the existence of the case for the first time. We reviewed a trove of evidence gathered by the FBI and thousands of pages of legal records, and have independently corroborated much of Kao’s account. This is the first piece of an ongoing series:

16/ Collins is once again fighting to keep her seat, in a race that could determine control of the Senate. We’re continuing to report. If you have information about political dealmaking in Washington, contact us on Signal at 917-512-0201. www.propublica.org/tips/

But JD says this admin is going after corruption…? 😵‍💫