![People enter and exit a polling station at the Stedman Community Building on September 10, 2019. A special election was held for voters in the 9th congressional district of North Carolina after a charges of voter fraud in the previous election. [Melissa Sue Gerrits/For Carolina Public Press]](https://i0.wp.com/carolinapublicpress.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/special-election-carolina-pp02-e1568171042902.jpg?fit=780%2C521&ssl=1)
Cumberland County election board member Brenda (Bree) Eldridge made a $25,000 donation to the county Republican Party in early 2022 to help pay for a featured speaker. The issue? Allegedly, the money wasn’t all hers.
Under North Carolina campaign finance law, it is a felony to make a contribution in someone else’s name, if the contributions exceed $10,000.
According to a series of complaints filed with the State Board of Elections by campaign finance watchdog Bob Hall, Eldridge may have gotten some of the $25,000 from anonymous donors, potentially including people in the military who didn’t want to be publicly identified.
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Eldridge did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Hall’s complaint, which includes sworn statements from various members of the county Republican party, also implicates Republican county election board member Linda Devore.
According to several party members, Devore made comments about Eldridge’s donation over the years, including that it was an illegal contribution and the reason she stepped down from the audit committee in 2022.
Devore denies this. She told Carolina Public Press that she trusts Eldridge, and believes the $25,000 was Eldridge’s personal money. She added that she stepped down for a different reason: to take care of her ailing mother.
“I trust Bree 100%,” Devore said. “She gave a $25,000 contribution. It’s her money. That’s what she said. She’s never deviated from that.”
Donation for a $25,000 speaking fee
Retired Army Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, former national security advisor to Donald Trump, spoke at Cumberland County Republican Party’s annual fundraiser in 2022.
According to executive board meeting minutes, then-party chair Eldridge “raised the speaking fee of $25,000.”
Eldridge’s $25,000 donation appears in campaign finance records from March 2022. It was an unusually large contribution from her: since 2020, her only other contributions to the county party were small-dollar donations totalling $2,400.
Devore wasn’t involved in the fundraiser details, so the first time she saw the $25,000 donation was during the first meeting of the audit committee that year.
Devore was surprised at the amount, she told CPP. She said Eldridge told her that the original plan had been to get her husband’s friends to contribute, but she instead had just used her own money, including from the sale of some of her stocks.
When Devore stepped down to take care of her mother, Eldridge was concerned that it was because Devore suspected misconduct. Devore assured her she trusted her to report contributions accurately.
“She’s a CPA,” Devore said. “She knows the rules. She’s a trained treasurer.”
Eldridge didn’t make a big deal of the contribution.
“She kept kind of quiet about it, as anybody would, I think, who gave a large donation, because they don’t want other people asking for donations from them also,” Devore said.
Several party members speak out
Nothing happened at the time. But in the years since, rumors have swirled about the $25,000 contribution.
Party member Calista Cuevas is now trying to take action on what she says she thinks was an illegal donation. She enlisted Hall’s help to investigate.
“Because many members of the CCGOP Executive Committee are not familiar with campaign finance laws, they may not realize that using funds provided by others to make a contribution in one’s own name is unlawful,” she said in an affidavit, which is part of the complaint.
In sworn statements, county party members Juanita Gonzalez and Venus De La Cruz mentioned the same event: a discussion about the $25,000 donation in early 2025 during an audit committee meeting.
Both said Devore was there. They also said Eldridge’s contribution was illegal and the reason Devore stepped down from that year’s audit committee.
“Now I wonder how Brenda and Linda can serve on the Cumberland County Board of Elections and oversee elections and campaigns,” Gonzalez said. “It doesn’t seem right to me”
Linda McAlister-Brown was also present for that meeting, and involved in planning for the Flynn event.
“I feel sure that anything Brenda did was meant for the benefit of the party,” she said in a sworn statement. “Her intentions were for the good. I never thought there was anything deceitful or that any money was pocketed.”
During that conversation, Devore said, she emphasized the importance of following campaign finance rules by mentioning Dinesh D’Souza, a conservative commentator who was convicted of a felony and incarcerated for making illegal contributions in the names of others.
“I always do that,” she said. “I want to scare people out of thinking about doing anything that has to be reported, that they know it’s going to be reported.”
Another party member and former county chair Nina Morton was not at that meeting, but also said in a sworn statement that Devore had indicated to her in a separate phone conversation that Eldridge’s donation was illegal.
“My understanding is that the private donations Bree raised came from military people who didn’t want to be identified because it was an event with Lt. General Flynn,” Morton said.
Morton and Gonzalez both called the State Board about the $25,000 donation, they said in their statements. It appears that nothing came of that.
Devore isn’t sure what the State Board will do with the complaints.
“It seems to me that the complaint as it relates to Bree and anything that I would have to do with that is just allegations,” she said.
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