Bombshell Federal Investigation Requested: UPTD Director Michaela Hammerson Blows the Whistle on Conspiracy to Destroy Ben Edtl and Rewrite UPTD’s Historic Turnaround
Roseburg, OR – March 1, 2026 – Today, Umpqua Public Transportation District Board Director Michaela Hammerson filed a formal 10-page request with the U.S. Department of Transportation Office of Inspector General and the Federal Transit Administration Region 10 demanding a full federal investigation into the coordinated misconduct of the Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT), its contractor RLS & Associates, and the political insiders who weaponized a sham “compliance review” to smear my reputation and erase the facts of our successful turnaround at UPTD.
This is not some routine bureaucratic spat. This is ironclad proof of the conspiracy I have been exposing for months: ODOT, RLS, Rep. Ed Diehl, and elements of the Oregon Republican Caucus deliberately conspired to breach my contract, fabricate a fraudulent November 25, 2025 RLS report, leak it to the media before the UPTD Board even saw it, and use it as a political weapon in my deposition — all to punish me for turning around a failing agency and refusing to certify a rigged election.
Hammerson’s letter lays it all bare:
The RLS report was a one-sided hit job based almost exclusively on input from two newly elected board members (including Natasha Atkinson, who was “awarded” the stolen seat) and ODOT insiders — while ignoring longer-serving board members and documented history.
It is riddled with factual errors, retroactive findings, misapplied federal procurement rules, and outright false accusations of fraud, Hatch Act violations, and misuse of public funds against me and prior leadership.
RLS — a private contractor with no regulatory authority — used mandatory “must” language 78 times to issue illegal directives and demanded I be turned over to local authorities.
ODOT interfered in hiring decisions, pushed politically connected lobbyists, demanded repayment of already-reimbursed funds creating a cash-flow crisis, and engaged in unethical conduct by its own Compliance Manager David Campbell.
The report was leaked to media and the Douglas County Clerk and immediately used against me in deposition — before the UPTD Board ever received it — in a clear attempt to influence politics and elections.
This was never about compliance. It was retaliation, pure and simple — a coordinated effort by the Oregon establishment to destroy the reformer who dared expose their rigged vote-by-mail system and demand real election security through IP37. They couldn’t beat the facts, so they tried to rewrite history and bankrupt my reputation.
Michaela Hammerson’s courageous federal complaint, copied to the U.S. Attorney General and the White House, now puts the entire corrupt machine under the microscope of the federal government. The same state agencies that protect Oregon’s unsecured elections are the same ones that weaponized federal transit oversight to target political enemies.
This federal investigation request is a massive victory for transparency and accountability. It proves exactly what I have been saying since day one: the Oregon establishment cannot — and will not — prove our elections are secure… because the same people rigging the system are the same ones rigging everything else to silence reformers like me.
The mask is completely off. Legal action continues. The fight for IP37 grows stronger every day.
Oregon must prove our elections are secure. They won’t. They can’t. And now the federal government is being asked to investigate why.
The people are watching. The truth is winning.
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