Democrat lawmakers are seeking answers into whether U.S. President Donald Trump’s threat to stall the opening of the Gordie Howe International Bridge was due to lobbying from a billionaire donor and owner of the competing Ambassador Bridge.
In a letter sent Wednesday, Democrats on the U.S. House Oversight Committee demanded Matthew Moroun provide documentation of a reported meeting held with U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick on Feb. 9.
The New York Times reported last week that the meeting between Lutnick and Moroun, whose family has sought for years to cancel the Gordie Howe bridge project, came hours before Trump’s social media threat that demanded concessions from Canada.
The report said Lutnick briefed Trump on the meeting, citing anonymous sources familiar with the private discussions.
“It appears that you may have used your influence as a donor to President Donald Trump to jeopardize American commerce to protect your company’s bottom line,” the letter from the committee’s ranking member Rep. Robert Garcia of California and Rep. Rashida Tlaib of Michigan begins.
“To understand any undue influence you may have had on the United States’s economic and foreign policy, we request information regarding your communications with the Trump Administration.”
Messages left with the Detroit International Bridge Company, where Moroun serves as CEO, were not immediately returned. Global News has also reached out to Lutnick’s office for comment.
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Garcia sent a similar letter to Lutnick last week demanding documents relating to his reported meeting with Moroun and any communications with him or his family, as well as all documents and communications about the Gordie Howe bridge, the Ambassador Bridge, and Prime Minister Mark Carney between Lutnick and anyone in the Commerce Department and the White House.
The letter gives Lutnick until Feb. 25 to provide the information, while Moroun faces a deadline of March 4.
U.S. election records show Moroun has donated over US$600,000 to Trump’s presidential campaigns and related fundraising committees, as well as to the Republican Party, since 2019. He has donated thousands more to various GOP congressional campaigns.
“President Trump’s wealthy donors should not be holding secret meetings with administration officials to influence economic and foreign policies that have real impacts on the American people,” Garcia said in a press release Wednesday.
Lobbying records show the Detroit International Bridge Company spent over US$2.5 million to lobby the first Trump administration on “issues related to construction and operation of international bridges.” Since Trump returned to office last year, the company has spent another US$250,000 on lobbying.
The lobbying firm hired by Moroun’s company, Ballard Partners, previously employed current White House chief of staff Susie Wiles and U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi.
In 2021, while working at Ballard, Bondi filed to work with the Detroit International Bridge Company in lobbying to Congress and the U.S. State Department. The filing notes Bondi served as a special adviser to Trump in the White House Counsel’s Office from 2019 to 2020.
Moroun’s father, Manuel Moroun, fought the Gordie Howe bridge project for years before his death in 2020, arguing the new Windsor-to-Detroit crossing will lead to reduced toll revenue on the Ambassador Bridge.
In 2012, after the Gordie Howe bridge was formally announced, Moroun spent over US$30 million on advertising and lobbying for a ballot proposal that would change Michigan’s constitution and require the project be approved by a statewide referendum and a separate vote by Detroit residents.
The measure failed, as did numerous lawsuits and free trade disputes the family filed to block construction.
Canada and Michigan struck a joint ownership agreement over the Gordie Howe bridge, which was launched to expand commercial capacity in the busy cross-border trade corridor.
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