Conservative commentator, author and filmmaker Dinesh D'Souza has been indicted on charges of violating campaign finance laws.
The U.S. Attorney's Office of New York accuses D'Souza of "making illegal contributions to a United States Senate campaign in the names of others and causing false statements to be made to the Federal Election Commission in connection with those contributions."
Basically, the charges say D'Souza used what The New York Times calls "straw donors" — people who agreed to make campaign contributions in their name with D'Souza's money.
The prosecutors say by doing this D'Souza was able to give an unnamed Senate candidate $20,000 in contributions. By law, a donor can only give a candidate up to $5,000.
D'Souza is a regular fixture in the media. He's appeared on CNN discussing politics, on Fox News talking about religion, and most recently he made headlines for calling President Obama the grown-up Trayvon Martin in the White House over Thanksgiving.
He's also the man behind the documentary "2016: Obama's America." Released during the 2012 presidential race, the film became one of the highest-grossing documentaries in decades. (Via Rocky Mountain Pictures / "2016: Obama's America")
D'Souza's lawyer released a statement which called the campaign contributions "misguided" but said there was no criminal intent, and the Senate candidate didn't even know about D'Souza's actions.
