The Department of Justice has opened a probe into an outspoken critic of Trump following allegations that he improperly used his authority.
The investigation focuses on the head of the United Auto Workers union and is based on allegations that he pressured another official in order to secure benefits for his relatives.
The allegations had been detailed in reports released last month by the union’s court-appointed monitor, New York attorney Neil Barofsky, that claim UAW President Shawn Fain pressured another high-ranking union official in an effort to secure a financial bonus for his fiancée and a workers’ compensation claim for her sister. Barofsky deferred a decision on disciplinary action pending further review, but did not cite the federal probe.
Barofsky’s role as monitor involves ensuring the union complies with an agreement it made with federal authorities following a 2020 corruption scandal. His office issues periodic reports on the union’s activities.
Fain also allegedly retaliated against UAW Vice President Rich Boyer for refusing to approve the benefits, stripping him of his role as chief negotiator with the maker of Jeep and Ram vehicles, Stellantis NV. The accusations were made by Boyer, according to the New York Times.
Bloomberg then reported on Sunday that the DOJ has launched a grand jury investigation into Fain, and that the federal grand jury has subpoenaed Barofsky, citing emails seen by the outlet that were sent to Fain, Boyer, and members of the union’s law firm. The investigation was also reported by the New York Times.
In a June 18 email seen by Reuters, the monitor’s lead counsel wrote, “We are not publishing the details of our factual findings on this issue at this time out of deference to a Grand Jury investigation DOJ has initiated into that issue. We do not intend to publicly disclose the existence of that investigation at this time.”
In a statement to Bloomberg, Fain dismissed the allegations as false and accused Boyer of trying to influence the upcoming UAW election. In another statement, he accused Boyer of feeding the monitor false allegations and alleged that the monitor had a “political grudge against me because the UAW took an anti-war stance about what was happening in Gaza.”
“What the Monitor is doing is wrong, it’s unfair to the UAW and to you as members, and my lawyers are looking at any and all legal options I can pursue to make it stop,” the statement continued.
Additionally, he labeled the allegations as “bogus” to the New York Times.
Fain, who endorsed Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election and spoke at the Democratic National Convention wearing a shirt reading, ‘Trump Is A Scab,’ is campaigning for a second four-year term as president in an election scheduled for later this year. Boyer is one of the candidates running against him.
He also called Trump a scab in his speech, prompting impassioned chants of “Trump’s a scab” from the audience.
“That’s not just my opinion, that’s a fact,” Fain added. “All we have to do is look at the track record‚” he continued, before detailing Trump’s failure to support the auto industry or rein in corporate America during his first term, though he later applauded the president’s tariffs on imported autos and auto parts in his second term.
Under Trump, the DOJ has been aggressively pursuing the president’s critics, including California Governor Gavin Newsom, New York Attorney General Letitia James, the Southern Poverty Law Center, and ActBlue, a fundraising group aligned with the Democratic Party.
The DOJ did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Bloomberg. The Daily Beast has contacted the DOJ for comment. A spokesperson for the UAW told the New York Times that the union was not the focus of a grand jury investigation.
An electrician by trade, Fain, 57, was elected to lead the UAW in March 2023, in the union’s first-ever direct election. The union represents over 400,000 active members across more than 600 local unions in the U.S., Canada, and Puerto Rico.
It has been under federal oversight since a 2020 settlement following a corruption scandal involving more than a dozen union officials, some of whom pleaded guilty to embezzling millions of dollars for their own benefit. Two officials, including a former union board member, were handed prison sentences for their role in the scandal.
