The Georgia state senate is moving closer to a formal investigation of two-time gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams and her voting rights group after the organization was forced to pay a $300,000 fine for ethics violations related to Ms. Abrams’ 2018 campaign for Georgia governor.

State senator Bill Cowsert, who serves as chairman of the special committee on investigations, has introduced a resolution authorizing his panel to conduct further investigations into Ms. Abrams and her voting rights group, the New Georgia Project, which is accused of improperly spending money on canvassing and media for her 2018 campaign for governor.

Mr. Cowsert’s resolution states that they must conduct their own investigation because it is “necessary to determine whether Georgia laws related to campaign finance and ethics need to be strengthened to eliminate coordination between campaigns and advocacy organizations.”

The state senate resolution would also empower Mr. Cowsert and his committee to investigate Ms. Abrams after it was disclosed that a group with which she is affiliated allegedly received $2 billion in federal funds from the Biden-Harris administration. 

According to the Department of Government Efficiency and the Environmental Protection Agency, a federal grant program aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions sent out $20 billion in April 2024 to eight groups, one of them Power Forward Communities, a Georgia-based coalition of nonprofits whose mission is to “expand and preserve affordable housing, improve air quality, and create good-paying jobs by ramping up cost-saving home improvements.” 

Under the umbrella of Power Forward Communities is a non-government organization called Rewiring America, which aims to move homes and businesses away from fossil fuels. Ms. Abrams joined the organization as senior counsel in 2023, though according to Rewiring America’s website, she is no longer with the group. 

The allegations that Ms. Abrams’ affiliated group received the money stemmed from claims made by the new Environmental Protection Administration chief, Lee Zeldin, who says he discovered a $20 billion fund set up by the last administration to hand out grants to like-minded climate activist groups. The grant program — called the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund — was approved by Congress as part of the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, but the funds were later “parked at an outside financial institution” by the outgoing Biden administration to limit government oversight, Mr. Zeldin said. 

“Roughly twenty billion of your tax dollars were parked at an outside financial institution by the Biden EPA. This scheme was the first of its kind in EPA history and it was purposefully designed to obligate all of the money in a rush job with reduced oversight,” Mr. Zeldin said in a video statement on February 13. “One of my very top priorities at EPA is to be an excellent steward of your hard-earned tax dollars. There will be zero tolerance of any waste and abuse.”

In a statement to the Associated Press, Ms. Abrams called all allegations of wrongdoing “baseless.”

“Georgia Republicans are so terrified of the power of the people, they’re lashing out with unfounded attacks and baseless investigations that waste taxpayer dollars,” Ms. Abrams said. “Working across the state, I registered and turned out thousands of Georgians. I proudly led work to lower energy prices in the poorest region of the state.”

The state’s lieutenant governor, Burt Jones, who also serves as president of the state senate, said on Friday that he is willing to use subpoena power to get to the bottom of what was going on with Ms. Abrams’ nonprofit organizations. 

“The people of Georgia were defrauded by Stacey Abrams. She’s now been forced to admit it and tried to get it to go away. But Georgians want real accountability. With these subpoena powers, my office is going to get to the truth,” Mr. Jones wrote on X. “Anyone who broke the law and stole from taxpayers, including Stacey Abrams, should go to jail.”