Fredreka Schouten

USA TODAY

Dinesh D%27Souza charged with donating %2420%2C000 to a Senate candidate

Conservative commentator is harsh critic of President Obama%27s

Prosecutors claim donations were made by %22straw%22 donors

WASHINGTON — Federal prosecutors Thursday indicted conservative commentator Dinesh D'Souza, alleging he used "straw donors" to make excessive contributions to a U.S. Senate candidate in the 2012 election.

D'Souza, 52, is charged with one count of making $20,000 in illegal contributions. During the 2012 election, federal rules capped individual donations to a single candidate at $5,000.

Federal authorities "take a zero-tolerance approach to corruption of the electoral process," Preet Bharara, the U.S. attorney for the southern district of New York, said in a news release announcing the indictment.

D'Souza, who lives in San Diego, is expected to be arraigned Friday in New York.

The indictment does not identify the Senate candidate who allegedly received the excess contributions. Prosecutors claim D'Souza "directed other individuals" to donate to the candidate in August 2012 and then reimbursed them.

Campaign records show his only contributions in 2012 were to Wendy Long, a Republican who sought unsuccessfully to oust Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D.-N.Y. Long and D'Souza graduated from Dartmouth College in the early 1980s.

D'Souza's attorney, Benjamin Brafman, released a statement Thursday evening saying D'Souza "did not act with any corrupt or criminal intent whatsoever." He described his client as acting out of "misguided friendship" to help someone he had known since his college days.

The conservative author has been harshly critical of President Obama. In 2012, he released 2016: Obama's America, a film that claims Obama's worldview was shaped by anti-colonialist views of his Kenyan father, with whom Obama had little contact.

Prosecutors said the charges were the result of a routine FBI review of campaign reports.