President Donald Trump has nominated Lee Beaman, a Nashville auto executive, Republican mega-donor, and the subject of sexual misconduct allegations, to the board of the Tennessee Valley Authority. Beaman’s nomination comes as TVA faces a governance crisis, with six out of nine board seats currently vacant.

The nomination must be confirmed by the U.S. Senate, including Tennessee Senators Marsha Blackburn and Bill Hagerty. In a March 2025 POWER magazine op-ed, the senators claimed TVA needed “visionary industrial leaders” with “serious energy expertise.” Yet both have lined up behind Beaman, a nominee with little apparent background in energy, utilities, or infrastructure. 

Beaman seems to have no professional experience in nuclear oversight, utility planning, or grid operations, but, if confirmed, would help govern the largest public power utility in America, an operation that manages over $12 billion in annual revenue and serves electricity to more than 10 million people across seven states. TVA operates one of America’s largest nuclear fleets, and state and federal leaders, including Blackburn and Hagerty, have pushed TVA to lead America’s nuclear future.

Beaman is the former CEO of Beaman Automotive Group, a chain of car dealerships he sold in 2020. He operates Beaman Ventures, a private investment firm, and serves on the board of Belmont University, a private Christian college in Nashville.

Despite apparently lacking experience in the utility industry, Beaman possesses connections to influential Republican politicians and organizations, stemming at least in part from his political contributions and history of working within the Koch brothers’ political network. He is also a member of the Council for National Policy, a secretive, invitation-only, Christian nationalist network whose members have opposed environmental regulation, denied climate science, and pushed to roll back democratic safeguards.

But his nomination also resurfaces prior headlines and reporting of court filings that detailed lewd and criminal behavior.

Beaman did not respond to a request for comment from the Energy and Policy Institute.

Divorce records allege sexual coercion, emotional abuse

Beaman’s public record includes allegations of sexual coercion and abuse filed during his 2018 divorce proceedings. In court documents, his fourth wife described being forced into watching Beaman having sex with a prostitute for her “training”, and being exposed to pornography in the presence of her minor son. Kelly Beaman accused her husband of “degradation, control, manipulation and abuse” in the marriage.

Beaman’s attorneys moved to strike the filings but did not dispute the specific claims. According to Scoop Nashville, the case was later settled, with the court approving a private agreement that awarded his ex-wife a $7.5 million payout and $10,000 per month in child support.

Past allegations of discrimination

Beaman’s involvement with the judicial system in 2018 was not the first time. Beaman Automotive Group was implicated in Coleman v. General Motors Acceptance Corporation (GMAC), a federal class-action lawsuit filed in the late 1990s. The plaintiffs alleged that Beaman’s dealerships participated in discriminatory auto lending practices by GMAC that resulted in higher markups through finance charges for Black customers. The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals revived the case in 2002 after it was dismissed by a lower court. The case was later settled.

Political access and secretive influence operations

Beaman’s troubling background appears not to have stopped his ability to connect with Republican politicians. He owns a $3.7 million Capitol Hill townhouse through an entity called Crockett Ventures. The property has served as a rent-free residence for Speaker Mike Johnson, as well as a hub for closed-door meetings hosted by right-wing activist and pastor Steve Berger, according to reporting from ProPublica. Other lawmakers, including Tennessee Representative Andy Ogles, have reportedly stayed at the house, which appears to function as a quasi–influence project under the radar of campaign finance and ethics disclosure laws.

During the 2022 midterm elections, Beaman served simultaneously as treasurer for Rep. Andy Ogles’ congressional campaign and as a major donor to a super political action committee (PAC) called Volunteers for Freedom. According to Federal Election Commission (FEC) records, Beaman contributed $70,000 to the PAC. Ogles is a fierce Trump ally, having proposed amending the 22nd Amendment to allow Trump to serve a third term as well as adding Trump to Mount Rushmore.

A 2024 report from the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE) found that Ogles’ campaign may have fabricated a loan to “buy the primary.” According to the report, Beaman, who is listed as “Witness 1”, speculated that the loan was inflated for political advantage. The OCE recommended subpoenaing witnesses for sworn testimony, but the investigation has not moved after Rep. Mike Johnson became Speaker.

Beaman has been a prolific Republican donor over the years. Since 2018, he has donated more than $450,000 to PACs affiliated with Donald Trump, $160,000 in support of Senator Marsha Blackburn, and more than $360,000 to 45 different Senate campaigns and PACs, according to FEC records.

Beaman also donated $2,700 to Roy Moore’s 2017 U.S. Senate campaign, just three days after The Washington Post broke the story that Moore allegedly had a sexual encounter with a 14-year-old girl when he was 32.

Nomination undercuts Hagerty and Blackburn’s “expertise” standard

The TVA board is currently operating with only three members, short of the five-member quorum required to approve long-term contracts, capital expenditures, or integrated resource planning decisions. Trump fired three Biden-era board members earlier this year, all of whom brought substantial energy and utility experience to the agency: Michelle Moore, Joe Ritch, and Beth Geer. 

Moore previously served as the White House Federal Chief Sustainability Officer, where she cut the federal energy bill by $11 billion and deployed 3.2 GW of renewable power for the Pentagon, according to her Groundswell bio. Ritch previously served on the TVA board and chaired its Nuclear Oversight Committee. Geer was a long-time chief of staff to former Vice President Al Gore, advising on energy and environmental initiatives and served on Nashville’s Sustainability Advisory Committee.

Header image source: Tennessean via YouTube