Mike Rogers (MI) has built his Senate campaign on a single promise, repeated everywhere he goes.
"We've got to get the government under control. Every waste, every fraud, every abuse, we've got to find it."
That was Rogers on the Grassroots Army Podcast last year. He has said he is running to help Donald Trump eliminate "waste, corruption, fraud and abuse," and called it a five-year project. He praised the Department of Government Efficiency, and said federal programs — Social Security among them — needed the "waste, fraud and abuse" cut out of them.
On August 11, 2026, the Detroit Metro Times reported where some of the money funding that message came from.
Rogers' campaign and the political committees backing him have taken more than $234,000 from three donors with their own fraud histories, according to research from American Bridge 21st Century provided to the paper. The underlying cases are public record, and they are not close calls.
$127,000 from a man whose company paid $9 million over a pandemic loan
The largest chunk — $127,000 across Rogers' campaign, Team Rogers, and the super PAC GLCF, Inc. — came from Jeffrey Cappo, owner of Victory Automotive Group.
In October 2023, the Justice Department announced that Victory Automotive agreed to pay $9 million to settle False Claims Act allegations over a Paycheck Protection Program loan.
The allegation was straightforward. Victory certified it was a small business with fewer than 500 employees to get a $6.28 million pandemic loan. Federal prosecutors said that when its affiliated dealerships were counted, the company had more than 3,000 employees — making it ineligible.
The loan was forgiven in full anyway. The case came to the government through a whistleblower, a former employee who received more than $1.6 million of the settlement.
A federal complaint specifically accused Cappo of directing or knowingly allowing company officials to apply using applications with false statements. The settlement was civil, not criminal, and resolved the allegations without a conviction.
This is the exact category of thing Rogers campaigns against — taxpayer money going out the door on a false certification, during an emergency program, and never coming back. It is also, per federal prosecutors, how his single largest identified donor's company got $6.28 million.
$100,000 from a nursing home executive
Team Rogers received $100,000 from Mohammad Qazi, president and CEO of Ciena Healthcare.
In 2007, Ciena agreed to pay $1.25 million in Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements to settle a lawsuit alleging inadequate care and improper billing at Michigan nursing homes. The investigation focused on four facilities, three of them in Detroit.
The suit alleged Ciena billed Medicaid and Medicare while failing to provide required care — nutrition and hydration, resident assessments, medication management, fall prevention.
Ciena denied wrongdoing. It said the settlement carried no finding or admission of liability, and that it settled to avoid costly litigation and stay focused on resident care.
$7,231 from a man Trump pardoned last month
The third donor is Adam Kidan, who gave Rogers $7,231.
Kidan pleaded guilty in 2005 to conspiracy and fraud charges tied to his purchase of a casino boat company with disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff. He and Abramoff used a fraudulent wire-transfer document to help obtain financing for their $147.5 million purchase of SunCruz Casinos. Both were sentenced to 70 months in prison and ordered to pay $21.7 million in restitution.
Kidan was released in 2009 and became a major Republican donor. Trump pardoned him last month.
The thing about anti-fraud campaigns
There is no claim here that Rogers did anything illegal. Taking a legal contribution from a donor with a settlement in their past is not a crime.
But Rogers is not running as a generic Republican. He has made fraud his identity. He praised DOGE's cuts and said he advised the group on shrinking the federal workforce. He has argued Social Security needs waste cut out of it.
When your central promise is that you will find "every waste, every fraud, every abuse," voters are entitled to ask whether that applies to the people writing your checks. The answer, so far, is that Rogers' campaign accepted the money and kept the slogan.
It also fits a longer pattern with him. Rogers has collected $125,600 from a state pension since 2022 while his disclosures showed assets worth many millions. Financial disclosures showed he took in nearly $2 million over two years from corporate boards and consulting after leaving Congress — including about $460,000 from Nokia that his campaign has not explained.
He also asked supporters for money to help "protect" Elon Musk from congressional scrutiny over DOGE — the same DOGE whose cuts he praised.
Michigan's choice
Rogers is unopposed on the Republican side and faces Democrat Abdul El-Sayed, who narrowly beat Rep. Haley Stevens in last week's primary, 48.5% to 47.5%. They are running for the seat retiring Sen. Gary Peters is vacating, in a race that could decide control of the Senate.
Rogers has had trouble with the truth in this campaign before — a fact-checker rated his claim about El-Sayed and 9/11 "Pants on Fire".
Michigan voters keep hearing that the problem in Washington is waste and fraud. The Metro Times just published a list of who is paying for that message.
Source
Mike Rogers attacks waste and fraud while taking money from donors linked to both by Steve Neavling, Detroit Metro Times, August 11, 2026, based on research from American Bridge 21st Century.
