WASHINGTON — Private businesses risk an onslaught of congressional investigations if Democrats prevail in midterm elections as the opposition party prepares to concentrate sweeping oversight powers on allegations of Trump administration corruption and public anger over the cost of living.

Companies including Amazon.com Inc. and Nvidia Corp. have already been hit with investigative inquiries from Democrats who could compel testimony if the party secures a congressional majority.

“There’s a cost to the American people of the out-of-control corruption that has been visited upon them by Donald Trump and MAGA extremists,” House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries declared last month, as lawmakers left Washington for full-time campaigning. “We’re going to hold the crooks accountable beginning on Day One.”

Trump retains a veto over legislation for two more years, regardless of the election results. Not so over a new majority’s oversight authority, which it can wield as a potent political weapon through attention-grabbing public hearings and damaging investigative revelations.

On consumer issues, key Democrats likely to gain subpoena power are showing continued interest in scrutinizing the party’s perennial corporate punching bags in healthcare, tech, housing and financial services, as well as new targets related to surveillance pricing, data centers and artificial intelligence.

Companies and corporate executives also would be in the crosshairs of Democratic probes of Trump administration ethics controversies. Businesses perceived to have profited from ties to the White House would be targets — and with fewer legal privileges than the executive branch offer the quickest route to revelations that could ignite public outcry.

Amazon.com Inc., Apple Inc., Comcast Corp., Meta Platforms Inc., Microsoft Corp. and Nvidia Corp. have already been hit with letters from Democratic lawmakers demanding information on donations to Trump’s ballroom. Such letters typically telegraph investigative objectives.

Plenty of companies aren’t waiting for the election to get ready.

“Many corporate clients, in particular, are acutely aware that there is a dark cloud looming on the horizon just past the beginning of November, and that there is going to be a broad wave of congressional investigations directed against Corporate America,” said Robert Kelner, who leads Covington & Burling’s congressional investigations practice.

Congressional probes can exact a heavy toll. Tobacco executives faced lengthy perjury investigations following testimony in a 1994 hearing on nicotine and addiction. Wells Fargo & Co.’s then-chief executive officer, John Stumpf, resigned and forfeited millions in compensation weeks after two bruising back-to-back 2016 hearings on the bank’s creation of fake accounts. Three Ivy League university presidents quit under pressure following a 2023 hearing on student protests over Gaza.

Trump ties

Democrats have made clear Trump and the administration’s alleged corruption will be center stage next year. With cooperation from the executive branch unlikely, lawmakers are likely to quickly turn their attention to private-sector entities in Trump’s orbit, former congressional investigators said.

The private sector lacks legal privileges the executive branch can use to slow walk congressional investigations. They also risk alienating customers and shareholders if they openly defy Congress.

The corporate world’s courting of the administration through donations to the president’s pet projects, as well as the deals cut with the administration to offer equity stakes, lower drug prices and tariff exemptions offer Democrats a rich target environment.

Companies are likely to receive an “awful lot of subpoenas and demands in the next year,” said Giancarlo Pellegrini, who until June managed House Democrats’ investigation into the late sex offender and financier Jeffrey Epstein and now chairs the law firm Squire Patton Boggs’s congressional oversight and investigations practice.

Donations to Trump’s inaugural committee, his presidential library and his Freedom 250 Independence Day celebrations are also likely targets, with Democrats seeking to determine whether contributors received any special treatment, former investigators said. Democrats have already made clear they intend to scrutinize Trump’s trading and cryptocurrency holdings, as well as any conflicts of interest or opportunities for self-dealing created by companies he or family members have stakes in.

“The extent of corruption in this administration is absolutely mind-boggling, not only in frequency, but also scope and scale,” said Senator Richard Blumenthal, the top Democrat on the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, a premier forum for congressional muckraking.

He said his party would seek information from businesses as they investigate the president.

“We can assume they’ll do nothing to alienate the administration, but the president is going to be, in some sense, a lame duck after November,” he said. “I think the corporations may be less intimidated.”

Pellegrini said any company that has received a letter from Democrats or been mentioned publicly should brace for a follow-up investigation.

“Members are not traditionally coy about what their interests are,” he said. Lawmakers have sent letters querying the administration’s contracting practices, settlements the White House reached with white shoe law firms, Trump’s most-favored-nations deals on drug prices, as well as the loans and equity stakes the administration has taken in critical minerals companies.

Cost of living

Arya Hariharan, previously a counsel to Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee who was involved in both Trump impeachments and is now a partner at Holland & Knight’s congressional investigations practice, said Democrats gain maximum political advantage from investigations that tie into the public’s cost-of-living concerns

“You have to make sure that whatever oversight you engage in, it either confronts issues that are why Americans are feeling the pinch or is going to tug at their heartstrings,” she said. “If it doesn’t do either of that or it’s not paired well, they will lose interest. It just won’t land.”

Likely targets in an oversight agenda focused on consumers and the cost of living include private equity and its involvement across industries, food prices and safety, Big Agriculture, data centers and the cost of energy and utilities generally, healthcare, defense and Big Tech, she said.

On affordability, Democrats have sent dozens of letters raising questions for businesses on a range of topics. They’ve pressed tech companies and retailers, including Amazon, Apple, Energizer Holdings Inc., Motorola Solutions Inc., Nike Inc., Target Corp. and Walmart Inc., about tariff refunds; nearly two dozen grocery chains and airlines, including United Airlines Holdings Inc., Delta Air Lines Inc. and American Airlines Group Inc. about surveillance pricing; private equity firms, including KKR Group Co. Inc., BlackRock Finance Inc., Brookfield Infrastructure Partners LP and Blackstone Inc., on their involvement in data centers; and corporate landlords on rent costs.

The risks are high for executives compelled to testify.

“A hearing where you testify that goes badly?” Hariharan said. “It’s hard to recover as an individual and sometimes as a company.”

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With assistance from Erik Wasson.

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