GOP committee sounds alarm on document it says 'confirms' fears about Biden agency's activities in key state
FIRST ON FOX: The House Committee on Small Business has released a "Memorandum of Understanding" between the Biden administration and the state of Michigan which it fears represents a potentially unconstitutional agreement that is aimed at registering voters in the key swing state with a political agenda in mind.
Biden’s Small Business Administration announced a memorandum of understanding (MOU) in March with the Michigan Department of State to "promote civic engagement and voter registration in Michigan" that it called the "first-of-its-kind collaboration" that immediately raised questions from the committee.
The MOU, which has been uploaded to the Congressional Repository, outlines the coordination between Michigan and the Biden administration where the state will "provide the Agency access to training resources related to the online Michigan Voter Information Center (MVIC)" and "The Agency shall provide voter registration training to all personnel conducting activities under this MOA.
"This training shall include information on who is eligible to register to vote, the interactions during which Agency staff must make voter registration services available, instructions to Agency staff on how to refer individuals to register to vote online using MVIC, and an overview of additional information that is available to voters in MVIC," the MOU continued.
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The MOU also discusses how the Michigan Department of State would "create a unique URL for the SBA to use to drive online visitors to register to vote," and that the SBA’s Michigan field office would allow state government officials to facilitate in-person voter registration at the federal agency’s business outreach events.
The committee told Fox News Digital that they released the documentation in the interest of "transparency" and after seeing the MOU, the committee’s previous concerns that the program is "unconstitutional" and an improper use of taxpayer funds were not assuaged.
"Seeing the MOU with Michigan does nothing to ease our concerns about the SBA getting involved in federal elections," Committee Chairman Roger Williams said.
"In fact, this agreement confirms SBA employees are preparing to undergo trainings on how to best register voters rather than spend their time working to help struggling small businesses," the chairman continued. "I encourage all Americans to look at this agreement and decide if this is how they want their tax dollars spent. The SBA must end all these electioneering activities on behalf of President Biden and get back to their sole mission of supporting the needs of Main Street."
The committee, who has referred to the Michigan agreement as the state essentially serving as a "campaign arm" for Biden's reelection, also released maps that overlay former SBA events, census data, Michigan Department of State data, and publicly reported information of Democrat-targeted voter blocs which they say suggests possible areas that voter registration efforts will target when the effort is officially rolled out.
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An investigation by the House Small Business Committee found that 22 out of 25 of SBA outreach events from January 2024 to April 2024 have taken place in counties with the highest population of Democratic National Committee (DNC) target demographics.
Meanwhile, 11 of 15 Michigan counties that showed the largest voter registration increases over the last year have ranked highest in population of young voters and Black voters, according to the committee – two of the left’s most-sought voting blocs.
"SBA’s MOU with Michigan proves that the agency is more concerned with registering voters than performing its official duties," GOP Sen. Joni Ernst, Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, told Fox News Digital.
"This outrageous misuse and abuse of Americans’ hard-earned tax dollars will not go unpunished under my watch. Chairman Williams and I will continue shining a light on the SBA and exposing Biden’s bad actors."
The data for the maps was compiled after the committee says it became aware of a video recording of an SBA adviser discussing SBA Administrator Guzman traveling to battleground states and "indirectly campaigning for Biden", according to the committee, and inviting Democratic members of Congress on the trips at a higher rate than Republicans.
"Today’s letter is a continuation of our Committee’s investigation into the SBA’s voter registration and electioneering efforts," Chairman Williams said in a press release earlier this month. "The SBA has shown a serious lack of transparency regarding the travels of senior SBA officials, including Administrator Guzman. Main Street – and the American People – have a right to know what exactly is going on and how the SBA is spending their hard-earned tax dollars. I hope the SBA will be forthcoming with us and provide us with the requested documents as we continue our investigation into this matter."
The coordination between the SBA and Michigan was sparked by a 2021 executive order from Biden directing federal agencies to promote "access to voting," which raised concerns from some that the administration is using the government agency to register votes in a swing state that many believe will be one of the states the November election hinges upon.
The House committee earlier this month subpoenaed SBA Chief of Staff Arthur Plews and his special adviser, Tyler Robinson, after they are said to have been no-shows at scheduled transcribed interviews with the committee and failed to turn over documents and information related to the SBA program.
Plews was scheduled to testify before the committee on Thursday but recently retained personal counsel and the committee says they are negotiating a new time for him to meet with the committee to provide information on the program.
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Fox News Digital reached out to the SBA and White House but did not receive a comment.
Fox News Digital’s Elizabeth Elkind and Charles Creitz contributed to this report