Boston City Councilor Tania Fernandes Anderson was arrested on federal corruption charges early Friday morning, accused of orchestrating a kickback scheme in her City Hall office and using taxpayer money to rescue herself from financial struggle.
Fernandes Anderson, a second-term Democrat, hired a family member to run constituent services in late 2022, federal prosecutors said. She then paid the person a hefty bonus on the condition that some of the money covertly flowed into her own pocket, according to an indictment unsealed Friday morning.
In June 2023, prosecutors claim, the scheme came to a head when the family member passed Fernandes Anderson $7,000 cash in a Boston City Hall bathroom.
The councilor, who represents parts of the Fenway, Roxbury, Dorchester and South End neighborhoods, is charged with five counts of aiding and abetting wire fraud and a single count of aiding and abetting theft concerning a program receiving federal funds, according to the indictment.
She was arrested outside her Dorchester home around 6 a.m. Friday and is expected to make an initial appearance in federal court at 2:15 p.m.
In a statement Wednesday, following news reports that she was under federal investigation, Fernandes Anderson declined to comment on the matter but committed to staying in office.
“My job is show up and to fight for you,” she wrote to supporters in a post on Instagram. And I will continue to do just that; the people’s work.”
Mayor Michelle Wu on Friday called for Fernandes Anderson to resign. But fellow Councilor John FitzGerald said it was “important to allow the legal process to unfold.”
U.S. Attorney Joshua Levy addresses reporters at a press conference following the arrest of Boston City Council Tania Fernandes Anderson. (Charlie McKenna/MassLive)Charlie McKenna/MassLive
Federal authorities did not name the family member involved in the alleged scheme.
But in July 2023, Fernandes Anderson was hit with a $5,000 civil penalty from the Massachusetts Ethics Commission for hiring her sister and son to full-time positions on her council staff after she took office in 2022.
Fernandes Anderson appointed her sister as director of constituent services with an initial salary of $65,000, later increasing her salary to $70,000 with a $7,000 bonus in June 2022.
Her son was appointed office manager around the same time, with an initial salary of $52,000. Eleven days later, Fernandes Anderson increased his pay to $70,000.
Councilors are barred from hiring immediate family members, and in August 2022, Fernandes Anderson was forced to terminate her sister and son’s employment.
The indictment describes a period of financial difficulty for the councilor in early 2023, which included missing rent and car payments and bank overdraft fees — all while the penalty from the ethics commission loomed.
Under those shadows, authorities said, Fernandes Anderson awarded a $13,000 bonus to the unnamed family member, whom she hired in late 2022.
The unnamed staff member was not an immediate family member of Fernandes Anderson. Yet in an email to a city employee, she maintained that they had no relation, federal authorities said.
The person’s bonus, which had to be approved by the city council, was more than double the bonuses paid to the rest of her staff combined. Fernandes Anderson told her staff the larger bonus was for the person’s earlier volunteer work, according to the indictment.
Over the two weeks after the family member received the bonus, the person made three cash withdraws at three separate bank locations, twice taking out $3,000 and once $4,000.
On June 9, 2023, half an hour after the final bank withdrawal, the family member arranged to meet Fernandes Anderson in a City Hall bathroom, prosecutors said.
“Bathroom,” the person texted, according to the indictment.
“Ready,” the councilor replied seconds later.
Boston City Councilor Tania Fernandes Anderson, left, speaks with then-City Council President Ed Flynn, right, at City Hall in Boston. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)AP
U.S. Attorney for Massachusetts Joshua Levy, whose office is prosecuting the case, described the bonus Fernandes Anderson paid to the staff member as a bribe to ensure they cooperated with the kickback scheme.
Her actions, he said, eroded the public trust.
“When her constituents elected Ms. Fernandes Anderson, she had a fundamental obligation to act with the utmost integrity,” Levy said during a press conference Friday morning. “Public service is a privilege, and all of us in public service have a duty to act with integrity and fairness in all that we do.”
The allegation that Fernandes Anderson received an illegal payment inside a City Hall bathroom only “adds to the egregiousness” of the accusations against her, Levy said.
Stephen Kelleher, the assistant special agent in charge of the FBI Boston division, said Fernandes Anderson enriched herself while pretending her motivations were civic-minded.
“The behavior we allege in today’s indictment is a slap in the face of the hard-working taxpayers in the city of Boston,” he said. “Nobody is picking on Tania Fernandez Anderson and her inner circle. We believe this is a situation of her own making.”
No one else has been charged in connection with the investigation, Levy said. But he declined to say if charges against others involved in the scheme could follow.
Friday’s indictment is far from the first time Fernandes Anderson has come under scrutiny.
Just last month, she was hit with multiple campaign finance violations after what state regulators called a “routine analysis” of campaign finance reports from November 2023 to September 2024.
The state Office of Campaign and Political Finance cited the city councilor for failing to promptly disclose $32,900 of the $34,500 that was deposited into her campaign account during that period.
The office required her to pay a $1,750 fine. She was also ordered to return $100 in excess contributions from another candidate’s committee.
Fernandes Anderson is the first Muslim, first formerly undocumented immigrant and first African immigrant to serve on the city council. She won reelection in 2023 with more than 70% of the vote in her district.
At 10 years old, Fernandes Anderson moved from Cape Verde to Roxbury, according to her biography on the council website. Those two places “formed the foundation of her unwavering commitment to the community.”
Before her election to public office, Fernandes Anderson worked as the executive director of Bowdoin Geneva Main Streets, as a parent advocate in the Boston Public Schools and as program manager for a shelter for homeless women.
She is a mother of two biological children and served as foster mother for 17 kids.
Among her priorities on the council, the biography reads, is to ensure “Municipal Government is actively working for the people of Boston.”
This is a breaking news story and will be updated.