Observer.com:
Hillary Clinton’s campaign is stealing from her poorest supporters by purposefully and repeatedly overcharging them after they make what’s supposed to be a one-time small donation through her official campaign website, multiple sources tell the Observer.
The overcharges are occurring so often that the fraud department at one of the nation’s biggest banks receives up to 100 phone calls a day from Clinton’s small donors asking for refunds for unauthorized charges to their bankcards made by Clinton’s campaign. One elderly Clinton donor, who has been a victim of this fraud scheme, has filed a complaint with her state’s attorney general and a representative from the office told her that they had forwarded her case to the Federal Election Commission.
“We get up to a hundred calls a day from Hillary’s low-income supporters complaining about multiple unauthorized charges,” a source, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of job security, from the Wells Fargo fraud department told the Observer. The source claims that the Clinton campaign has been pulling this stunt since Spring of this year. The Hillary for America campaign will overcharge small donors by repeatedly charging small amounts such as $20 to the bankcards of donors who made a one-time donation. However, the Clinton campaign strategically doesn’t overcharge these donors $100 or more because the bank would then be obligated to investigate the fraud.
“We don’t investigate fraudulent charges unless they are over $100,” the fraud specialist explained. “The Clinton campaign knows this, that’s why we don’t see any charges over the $100 amount, they’ll stop the charges just below $100. We’ll see her campaign overcharge donors by $20, $40 or $60 but never more than $100.” The source, who has worked for Wells Fargo for over 10 years, said that the total amount they refund customers on a daily basis who have been overcharged by Clinton’s campaign “varies” but the bank usually issues refunds that total between $700 and $1200 per day.
The fraud specialist said that Clinton donors who call in will attempt to resolve the issue with the campaign first but they never get anywhere. “They will call the Clinton campaign to get their refund and the issue never gets resolved. So they call us and we just issue the refund. The Clinton campaign knows these charges are small potatoes and that we’ll just refund the money back.”
The source said that pornography companies often deploy a similar arrangement pull. “We see this same scheme with a lot of seedy porn companies,” the source said. The source also notes that the dozens of phone calls his department receives daily are from people who notice the fraudulent charges on their statements. “The people who call us are just the ones who catch the fraudulent charges. I can’t imagine how many more people are getting overcharged by Hillary’s campaign and they have no idea.”
The source said he’s apolitical but noted that the bank’s fraud department is yet to receive one call from a Donald Trump supporter claiming to have been overcharged by Trump’s campaign. “I’m only talking to you because what Hillary’s doing is so messed up, she’s stealing from her poorest supporters.”
Wells Fargo recently came under fire after news broke that various regulators fined the big bank $185 million for opening 2 million phony customer accounts without their customers’ permission. This massive scandal resulted in the firing of 5,300 Wells Fargo employees.
Carol Mahre, an 81-year-old grandmother of seven from Minnesota, is one of the victims of Clinton’s campaign donor fraud scandal. In March, Mahre said she made a one-time $25 donation via Clinton’s official campaign website. However, when she received her US Bank card statement, she noticed multiple $25 charges were made. Mahre, who said in an interview she only contributed $25 because she’s “not rich” and that’s all she could afford, contacted her son, Roger Mahre, to help her dispute the unauthorized charges.
Roger, who is an attorney, told the Observer that he called the Clinton campaign dozens of times in April and early May in an attempt to resolve the issue. “It took me at least 40 to 50 phone calls to the campaign office before I finally got ahold of someone,” Roger said. “After I got a campaign worker on the phone, she said they would stop making the charges.”
Incredibly, the very next day, Carol’s card was charged yet again and the campaign had never reversed the initial fraudulent charges. “I was told they would stop charging my mother’s card but they never stopped.” He added that he knows his mother did not sign up for recurring payments. “She’s very good with the Internet so I know she only made a one-time payment.” Roger also pointed out that even if his mother mistakenly signed up for recurring monthly payments then she should’ve been charged for the same amount of money each month, not multiple charges for varying amounts on the same day or in the same month. Furthermore, Roger said that after the campaign was made aware of this situation, the charges should’ve stopped but they never did.