Tell the Senate: Demand Answers About Sen. Collins & Navatek

FBI agents followed a defense contractor's political money toward Congress. They questioned its former CEO about Sen. Susan Collins. Then Trump returned to office, the agents were forced out, and their push for a broader corruption investigation died. Why?

ProPublica reports that Navatek CEO Martin Kao routed $150,000 through a shell company to a super PAC backing Collins. Kao later pleaded guilty to campaign finance crimes. Collins championed Navy funding for Navatek, and her office pressed Navy officials to award it contracts. Navatek grew to more than $40 million a year in government funding, yet its research never produced anything the military wanted to buy.

By late 2024, agents believed Kao's account and other evidence warranted a broader bribery investigation involving members of Congress. Instead, their anti-corruption unit was purged, prosecutors were ordered to halt new corruption cases, and the effort went nowhere.

Tell Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley and Ranking Member Dick Durbin: Find out why the FBI stopped following the Navatek money.

Collins' office denies any pay-to-play arrangement, and no one working for her was charged. The FBI says an earlier review found nothing implicating her, but it would not answer ProPublica's questions about the later work. Supervisors did approve one new case, but it centered on South Carolina.

The Senate Judiciary Committee oversees the FBI. It must demand records, question officials, and establish how evidence involving lawmakers was handled. Grassley has spent years demanding FBI documents and championing whistleblowers. He should hold this case to the same standard, and Durbin can request the records now.

Taxpayers funded Navatek's contracts. They deserve to know where the evidence leads, regardless of which senators it might implicate.

Add your name: Demand answers about the Navatek inquiry and why it stopped.

The petition to Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley and Ranking Member Dick Durbin reads:

“Obtain the FBI and Justice Department records on the 2024 request to expand the Navatek investigation and on the case supervisors later approved. Determine why that work ended and how evidence involving Senator Susan Collins was assessed, and make the findings public to the extent permitted by law.”