The federal indictment of Democratic Congresswoman Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick for campaign fraud is rooted in her successful campaign to win a 2021 special election for the seat of longtime incumbent Alcee Hastings after losing in two previous primaries against him.
The difference for Cherfilus-McCormick in 2021: Money. Lots of money.
She vastly outspent her opponents by loaning her campaign millions of dollars. In her two previous primary challenges, she had raised a combined $109,380, but for the special election she raised more than $6.7 million.
She won an upset victory in an 11-person race, edging out longtime Broward Commissioner Dale Holness by just 5 votes. She became the first Haitian Democratic member of Congress when she handily defeated Jason Marinier, a Republican challenger in the special election on Jan 11, 2022.
That notable uptick in funding drew almost immediate scrutiny. In 2024, the Office of Congressional Ethics recommended that the House Committee on Ethics further review a number of charges including potential violations of House rules and federal law with her campaign activities. In May of this year, the House Committee on Ethics said that investigation was still ongoing.
In last month’s indictment, a Miami grand jury alleged that Cherfilus-McCormick stole more than $5 million in federal disaster relief funds through her family’s company, Trinity Healthcare Services, and, in coordination with her brother, Edwin Cherfilus used that money to fund her campaign and enrich herself.
READ MORE: Judge sets $60K bond for Cherfilus-McCormick, accused of stealing $5M in COVID-19 funds
Cherfilus-McCormick is also accused of conspiring with her campaign manager, Nadege LeBlanc, to conduct a straw donor scheme, and conspiring with her accountant, David Kofi Spencer, to file a fraudulent tax return.
In response to the federal indictment charges, Cherfilus-McCormick called it “an unjust, baseless, sham indictment.”
“I am innocent,” she said. “The timing alone is curious and clearly meant to distract from far more pressing national issues. From day one, I have cooperated with every lawful request, and I will continue to do so until this matter is resolved."
FDEM overpays Trinity Healthcare Services
On March 4 2021, The Florida Department of Emergency Management hired Trinity Healthcare Services to employ community health canvassers to perform vaccine registrations and to administer shots during the COVID-19 Pandemic.
Around the same time, Trinity opened a corporate bank account to receive payment for work orders done under their agreement with FDEM. Both Cherfilus-McCormick and Edwin Cherfilus were authorized signers on that account.
Over the next few months, Edwin submitted 17 invoices to the state on behalf of Trinity Healthcare. On July 1, due to what the FDEM calls a “clerical error” an invoice sent by Trinity Healthcare for $50,578.50 was paid out for $5,057,850.00. After the overpayment landed in Trinity Healthcare's business account, Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick sent a screenshot of the bank account’s activity to Edwin.
Trinity made no effort to repay the money, and a month after it hit Trinity’s corporate bank account Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick and Edwin began moving the money around to different accounts they owned.
On August 11 2021, one day after the deadline for candidates to declare for the special election, the Trinity corporate account sent more than $2.4 million via check to a bank account owned by SCM Consulting Group, LLC. SCM Consulting is a consulting company owned by Cherfilus-McCormick created in March of 2021. McCormick is the only listed officer and her Miramar home is listed as the business’s mailing address and principal place of business.
That same day, a check for more than $190,000 was sent to a bank account belonging to The EC Firm, LLC a consulting company owned by Edwin Cherfilus created on the same date as SCM Consulting. Similarly, Edwin is the only listed officer and a Miramar home is listed as the business’s mailing address and principal place of business.
On August 12, the Trinity corporate account transferred around $1.25 million into the account of a Delaware-based management company. The company is not named in the indictment, and its owners are listed as “Person 3” and “Person 4” both of whom are relatives of Cherfilus-McCormick and Edwin.
On August 16, the Trinity corporate account paid an Orlando-based consulting company more than $830,000. That company is owned by an individual listed in the indictment as “Person 1” who is listed as a friend of Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick. Person 1 was also the treasurer of Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick for Congress, Inc. (SCM for Congress), a political action committee.
On August 18, Nadege LeBlanc, Cherfilus-McCormick’s campaign manager, received a deposit of nearly $335,000 from Trinity Healthcare’s corporate account.
On August 31, SCM Consulting made a roughly $1 million deposit into a money market account owned by Cherfilus-McCormick and Edwin.
The next day, that money market account paid $109,000 to a jeweler in New York for a 3.14-carat “Fancy Vivid Yellow Diamond” ring. Cherfilus-McCormick can be seen wearing a ring matching the description in her official congressional portrait.
On Sept 3, SCM Consulting made another deposit of $800,000 into the shared money market account. Over the next month, that money market account made five deposits, totalling $1.14 million, into accounts owned by SCM for Congress.
The indictment alleges that Cherfilus-McCormick and Edwin conspired to steal the $5 million and rout it through “multiple accounts to disguise its source.”
“Prosecutors allege that a substantial portion of the misappropriated funds was used as candidate contributions to Cherfilus-McCormick’s 2021 congressional campaign and for the personal benefit of the defendants,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Miami said in a statement.
In June of 2024, the FDEM noticed the clerical error that caused the overpayment. In fact, the department's review found that Trinity Healthcare had been overpaid more than $5.7 million over the course of their agreement and contacted Trinity Healthcare to ask them to return the funds. Trinity refused to return the money and was sued on Dec 30, 2024. In April 2025, the two sides agreed to mediation. The case was voluntarily dismissed by FDEM in May.
Straw donors scheme
The indictment alleges that criminal acts relating to Cherfilus-McCormick’s special election campaign began before FDEM’s overpayment.
From June 25 to June 30, 2021, Cherfilus-McCormick took money from Trinity Healthcare’s corporate bank account to give to friends and family members and family members of Nadege LeBlanc, her campaign manager. Those family members and friends would then write checks in their own names to disguise the fact that Trinity Healthcare was the source of the money.
During the 2021-22 election cycle, the Federal Election Campaign Act capped contributions for individual donors at $2,900 per election per candidate. For Cherfilus-McCormick that meant donors could send two checks, one for the primary and one for the general election.
On June 25, Cherfilus-McCormick sent $50,000 to a relative, listed in the indictment as “Person 2”. That person then withdrew $30,000 in cash to give to LeBlanc. The same day, LeBlanc took some of that money and donated it in the form of two personal checks of $2,900 to SCM for Congress.
Over the next five days, LeBlanc reached out to five friends and family members to make contributions to SCM for Congress with money she provided.
The indictment shows that on one instance, LeBlanc texted one of the straw donors “I just sent you $500. Please donate to the campaign.”
To another straw donor she texted: “I need a favor. If I give you $5,800 in cash, can you write me two checks for $2,900?” The indictment claims that after the donor wrote the checks, LeBlanc made good on that promise.
Cherfilus-McCormick herself reached out to Person 1, her friend and treasurer of SCM for Congress, to solicit a donation to her campaign. When Person 1 asked what the contribution limit was, Cherfilus-McCormick responded:
“The max is 2 checks of 2900. That is why [Person 2] had to give money to Nadege for her to make another donation."
The entire time these transactions were happening LeBlanc kept Cherfilus-McCormick updated every step of the way. LeBlanc sent photographs of the checks written by the straw donors and advised Cherfilus-McCormick of the status of the outstanding donors.
LeBlanc texted Cherfilus-McCormick on June 29, 2021: "[Straw Donor 4] is dropping hers off tonight." and “And [Straw Donor 3] will have to pay online cause I have no way to get a check to her.”
The Federal Elections Commission website corroborates the pattern of donations described in the indictment.
Fraudulent tax return
Cherfilus-McCormick has frequently advocated for higher taxes on wealthy individuals and corporations. In 2022, she posted in support of the Inflation Reduction Act.
“Big corporations have spent decades exploiting the system to avoid paying their fair share in taxes. The #InflationReductionAct will crack down on wealthy tax cheats — and use that money to lower costs for families,” she said on X.
But the indictment says that her private actions contradict her public statements. In 2022, Cherfilus-McCormick along with her accountant David Kofi Spencer conspired to inflate the business expenses of SCM Consulting in 2021.
On March 18, 2022, an employee of Kofi Spencer’s firm, DKS Tax and Consulting, LLC, prepared a trial balance for Cherfilus-McCormick’s 2021 tax return. That trial balance included the more than $4 million in transfers made by SCM Consulting to Edwin Cherfilus’s account and SCM for Congress among others. On the March 18 trial balance, those deposits were listed as “Owner’s Distributions”, “Campaign”, “EC Firm” and “Sheila Personal”.
On April 11, Kofi Spencer asked a different employee to create a second trial balance. In that trial balance, the names of the deposits were changed to “Consulting” and “Contractors” – names that were not in the March 18 trial balance.
It was this version of Cherfilus-McCormick’s tax return – with more than $4 million in falsely listed business expenses – that was filed by Kofi Spencer in August of 2023. Cherfilus-McCormick signed a form acknowledging that everything in her 2021 tax return was true, correct, and complete.
That tax return also included charitable contributions that the indictment says was inflated by Kofi Spencer. Cherfilus-McCormick’s tax return listed a contribution of $1.2 million to a church in Laurel, Maryland. In January of 2024, the IRS subpoenaed Kofi Spencer’s records for Cherfilus-McCormick’s tax returns. In response, Kofi Spencer altered the original tax letter from the church to falsely claim Cherfilus-McCormick donated $1.2 million and submitted it to the IRS.
Both the misreported business expenses and charitable contributions were an effort, the indictment alleges, so Cherfilus-McCormick would pay less tax than she owed.
Previous allegations
Since her campaign for the special election, Cherfilus-McCormick has been dogged by accusations of malfeasance over the money she spent on her campaign.
In 2021, after her primary victory, she responded to those claims in a phone interview with the South Florida Sun-Sentinel.
“When it’s a Black woman who’s successful and a Black family, and we put money in, there’s always a criticizing and a hatred that comes because for some reason we’re not supposed to be successful enough to put money in our account. And it’s not just me,” Cherfilus-McCormick said. “It’s racist. It’s a racist comment, racist idea. The obsession with it is because you believe that a Black woman should not be able to be successful enough to do the same thing that her white counterparts have been doing.”
In 2022, Cherfilus-McCormick again faced off with Dale Holness in a primary. During the campaign, Holness’s team sent out a fundraising text that included a reference to Cherfilus-McCormick:
“We’re running a campaign powered by grassroots supporters like you. We don’t need to embezzle $6 million in taxpayer dollars to buy a seat in Congress. Our opponent may think she can do that. (She probably needs to do so to win).”
Cherfilus-McCormick sued Holness for defamation for $1 million, after a lengthy court process the Florida Supreme Court declined to hear the case in September of this year.
In the same month, Cherfilus-McCormick sued Elijah Manley, a primary challenger for the upcoming 2026 election, for defamation for $1 million. Manley said in an Instagram campaign video that Cherfilus-McCormick “Took 5.7 million from tax payers and shows bad judgment on her part.” in reference to the overpayments to Trinity Healthcare made by FDEM. A summons was issued in that case, but Malnley says he has not yet been served.
Cherfilus-McCormick continues to profess her innocence in light of the federal indictment. She appeared in court on Tuesday and made a statement following her arraignment.
“Today I made my initial appearance in a case that is both politically timed and politically motivated,” Cherfilus-McCormick said in the statement. “Let me be clear: I am innocent and I look forward to my day in court. This has been a fight not just for my name — it's a fight for my constituents, an attack on the progress we have been making and the movement we have started.
A federal judge in Miami has set Cherfilus-McCormick’s bond at $60,000.
