07-02-2025
Former Republican state senator Dean Tran sentenced to 18 months for COVID unemployment fraud
In a prepared statement, Tran claimed he was the victim of a 'politically motivated witchunt' launched by former Democratic US Attorney Rachael Rollins to interfere with his 2022 congressional campaign 'and prevent me from seeking future office.'
He accused federal agents of violating his rights and called on US Attorney General Pam Bondi to 'investigate these people and fire them.'
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Leah B. Foley, a Republican recently appointed US Attorney for Massachusetts by Trump, defended the government's prosecution of Tran.
'He chose to violate the public's trust not once, but twice by defrauding the government out of unemployment benefits and willfully omitting his taxable income,' Foley said in press release after Tran was sentenced. 'His fraud and calculated deception erode the public's trust in elected officials and diverted money away from those who truly needed it.'
Tran is currently awaiting federal trial on
In September, a federal jury found Tran guilty of 20 counts of wire fraud and three counts of filing false tax returns.
Prosecutors presented evidence that Tran was denied traditional unemployment benefits after failing to win reelection, then fraudulently collected $30,120 in pandemic unemployment benefits while working as a paid consultant for a New Hampshire-based auto parts company. They alleged that Tran concealed $54,700 in consulting income he received from the company on his 2021 federal income tax return; and
that he
concealed thousands of dollars in rental income he received from property in Fitchburg on his federal tax returns from 2020 to 2022.
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'There was no defrauding, stealing, or scheming of pandemic unemployment assistance,' Tran said Friday.
Tran, a father of four, was born in Vietnam and emigrated to the United States with his family when he was 4. After serving 12 years as a Fitchburg city councilor, he became the first Vietnamese-American elected to the Massachusetts Senate when he won a 2017 special election in the Fitchburg-based Worcester and Middlesex District. In 2022, he ran unsuccessfully against US Representative Lori Trahan, a Westford Democrat.
His attorney, Michael C. Walsh, argued that the government suffered no loss from Tran's actions and urged the judge to sentence him to two years probation, including five months of 'home confinement.'
Prosecutors urged the judge to sentence Tran to two years in prison and argued in a sentencing memorandum that 'greed was at the center of Tran's crimes and he showed no remorse.
'Tran stole unemployment benefits from a program that was intended for the most vulnerable members of our community, who, unlike Tran were suffering true economic hardship during the COVID-19 Pandemic,' Assistant US attorneys Dustin Chao and John T. Mulcahy wrote in a court filing.
'Tran, as a former elected official, knew better than anyone else the importance and purpose of such government assistance programs and he exploited his unique knowledge and background for his own selfish motives.'
Tran is awaiting trial in a separate federal case brought in federal court last year June charging him and his sister with obstruction of justice and making false statements as part of a related scheme to collect pandemic unemployment benefits. A trial date has yet to be set.
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Tran is also
27tran - Senator Dean A. Tran, Republican of Worcester and Middlesex in 2018. (Sam Doran/State House News Service)
Sam Doran/State House News Service
continuing to fend off two criminal cases in state court.
He is slated to stand trial March 10 in Worcester Superior Court on charges that he
In a 2023 case brought by Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Campbell, Tran was indicted for allegedly
judge denied Tran's motion to dismiss that ndictment and he appealed to the state Supreme Judicial Court, where the case is now pending.
Shelley Murphy can be reached at
