"Dark Money ATM" Pumped Over $137 Million Into Right-Wing Groups in 2020

URL https://Persagen.com/docs/donorstrust-right-wing_funding_2020-exposedbycmd-2021-11-19.html donorstrust-publicintegrity_org-2013-02-14.png
Following the DonorsTrust money trail  [source]
Sources Persagen.com  |  ExposedByCMD.org  |  other sources (cited in situ)
Source URL https://www.exposedbycmd.org/2021/11/19/dark-money-atm-pumped-over-137-million-into-right-wing-groups-in-2020/
Author David Armiak
Date published 2021-11-19
Curation date <2021-11-19/td>
Curator Dr. Victoria A. Stuart, Ph.D.
Modified
Editorial practice Refer here  |  Date format: yyyy-mm-dd
Summary The preferred donor conduits of the Koch political network - DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund - distributed $188.3 million in grants in 2020, $137 million of which was sent to litigation centers, advocacy groups, media outlets, extremists, gun rights groups, climate deniers and other tax-exempt organizations that make up America's right-wing infrastructure.
Main article DonorsTrust
Key points

  • The $137 million in grants distributed is $47 million more than DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund gave for these efforts in 2019, a 52% increase.

  • DonorsTrust's IRS filing details $360.2 million in revenue in 2020, with a staggering $158 million (44%) coming from one unidentified person.

Related Donors Capital Fund
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Contents

Main Article

The preferred donor conduits of the Koch political network - DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund - distributed $188.3 million in grants in 2020, $137 million of which was sent to litigation centers, advocacy groups, media outlets, extremists, gun rights groups, climate deniers and other tax-exempt organizations that make up America's right-wing infrastructure.

The $137 million in grants distributed is $47 million more than DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund gave for these efforts in 2019, a 52% increase. DonorsTrust's IRS Form 990 filing  [local copy] details $360.2 million in revenue in 2020, with a staggering $158 million (44%) coming from one unidentified person. Donors Capital Fund again reported no revenue. The combined assets for the two donor advised funds now tops $619 million, according to the filings obtained by CMD.

CMD reported in March 2021 that DonorsTrust  launched a new funding stream in 2020 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, called the "Growth and Resilience Project," to "serve as a rapid funding catalyst" for speeding up the reopening of the economy, reducing regulations, and countering media and government "narratives" to "ensure the American citizen sees government intrusion into our lives and livelihoods as counterproductive and harmful."

$60 Million to Remake Courts and Law

DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund gave $60.2 million to legal litigation centers, advocacy groups promoting right-wing judges, and amicus organizers in 2020, CMD has calculated.

The largest recipient was Leonard Leo  [Leonard Leo]'s The 85 Fund, formerly the Judicial Education Project  [note: convoluted (obfuscating) naming shell game], which received $48.7 million in grants - more than six times the group's total revenues for 2018. In addition to $19.9 million for general support and $6 million earmarked for judicial nomination fights under the guise of judicial or court "education," The 85 Fund received millions more that appear to be designated for specific projects or regranting to a wide variety of groups, including the Honest Elections Project,   Federalist Society,   Public Interest Legal Foundation,  Independent Women's Forum,   Competitive Enterprise Institute,   Mercatus Center, and Turning Point USA. CNBC first highlighted this funding in a Nov. 18 report.

A project of Leonard Leo's  The 85 Fund, the Honest Elections Project was formed in February 2020 to push for voter restrictions and spread disinformation about voter fraud. The American Legislative Exchange Council  [American Legislative Exchange Council] (ALEC) teamed up with the Honest Elections Project in July 2021 to hold a three-day "Academy" [refer here and here] featuring a veritable who's who of the right-wing leaders behind this year's assaults on voting rights and independent elections across the country, CMD  recently reported.

The next largest DonorsTrust grants in this category went to the Constitutional Defense Fund ($4.4 million), another funding conduit for litigation, and the Institute for Justice ($2.2 million), a long-time litigator and amicus filer on the Right.

$51 Million for Right-Wing Policy and Advocacy

DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund contributed $51.4 million to national and state level policy and advocacy tax-exempt organizations that make up the national right-wing infrastructure strategically built and maintained by Charles Koch and the Bradley Foundation. Of this amount, $15.1 million went to the State Policy Network (SPN) and 45 of its 65 state-based affiliates.

State Policy Network (SPN) groups play an integral role in passing legislation in state houses by providing academic legitimacy when called upon to testify at hearings, through the production of "studies" or model legislation, and in the media. That legislation is sometimes drafted as model bills by corporate lobbyists and lawmakers at SPN's sister organization the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).  DonorsTrust funneled $362,100 to ALEC in 2020.

In 2020, many of the State Policy Network (SPN organizations pushed back against public health restrictions to stop the spread of COVID-19 pandemic, often through lawsuits. American Juris LinkSPN for litigators," coordinated legal strategies and held a "regularly scheduled COVID Litigation Roundtable" for strategizing and collaborating against COVID-related public health orders. American Juris Link also partnered with Ballotpedia to create a COVID-19 lawsuit tracker of every court case challenging public health orders due to the pandemic. DonorsTrust gave $361,000 to American Juris Link and $2.8 million to Lucy Burns Institute, the organization that manages Ballotpedia, in 2020.

Following funding to State Policy Network, the next largest grant of $5.5 million went to the Catholic Association Foundation  [website]. Although Leonard Leo no longer serves on the board of the Catholic Association Foundation, the Catholic Association Foundation pays him $120,000 per year for "consulting" and another $123,000 per year to Leonard Leo's Creative Response Concepts (now CRC Advisors).

DonorsTrust also gave $1.4 million to Fair Lines America Foundation, the sister organization of Fair Lines America  [Fair Lines America]. Fair Lines America conducts redistricting trainings with state lawmakers, such as the "Mapping America" series it did for American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) lawmakers in 2020, and weighs in on redistricting litigation.

Republican Party megadonor and Koch operative, Art Pope, is president and treasurer of Fair Lines America Foundation, CMD  revealed.  [James Arthur "Art" Pope is also the founder of the Civitas Institute, a State Policy Network member organization mentioned above.]

$15 Million for Right-Wing Media

DonorsTrust doled out $14.6 million in grants to right-wing media outlets in 2020, CMD found.

Top among all outlets was the $2.8 million the Lucy Burns Institute received. In addition to publishing Ballotpedia and tracking litigation to assist its allies, the Right's favorite pollster, Scott Rasmussen, serves as Ballotpedia's editor-at-large.

In 2020, Rasmussen was also given a platform at the secretive Council for National Policy's November meeting after the election to discuss "What Happened, Why & What now?" Lawson Bader, president of DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund, is also a Council for National Policy member.

The next three largest media recipients of DonorsTrust are American Independent Media ($1.3 million), Metric Media Foundation ($1.3 million), and Franklin News Foundation ($1.1 million).

John Tilman, a right-wing Illinois activist and CEO of Illinois Policy  [Illinois Policy], chairs both American Independent Media and the Franklin News Foundation. Franklin publishes "The Center Square," a rebrand of its predecessor Watchdog.org.

In 2020, Metric Media grew its network to 1,200 "politically backed 'local news websites' designed to promote partisan talking points and collect user data," the Tow Center for Digital Journalism reported.

James O'Keefe's Project Veritas also received over $1 million from DonorsTrust in 2020. Project Veritas used undercover stings in order to undermine absentee and mail-in voting in the lead-up to the 2020 election.

$5 Million for Extremists

Extremist and gun rights nonprofits continue to be listed on DonorsTrust's "board-approved charities," and the donor advised fund moved over $4.6 million to them in 2020.

The anti-Muslim Middle East Forum again received the largest grant among these groups at $1.8 million. Middle East Forum "is one of the major roots of the Islamophobia network in America and a notable promoter of false facts about Islam," according to Islamophobia.

DonorsTrust gave another anti-Muslim group, the Center for Security Policy, $1.1 million, and granted $600,000 to the New Century Foundation, which promotes theories about the superiority of whites, and Solutionary, Inc. $400,000 for its anti-gun control campaign, "Black Guns Matter."

$4 Million for Youth and Women Influence Efforts

DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund gave $3.8 million to right-wing nonprofits working to expand the Right's influence among youth and women.

Young Americans for Liberty Foundation topped all groups in this funding area with a grant of $1.4 million. Its sister organization, Young Americans for Liberty, identifies and trains youth leaders on university campuses, and also organizes get out the vote for state-level candidates it endorses.

Charlie Kirk's pro-Trump youth group Turning Point USA's also received a grant of $580,000. Turning Point USA is seeking to raise another $43 million to wage a culture war on campuses and in K-12 public schools across the United States, CMD  reported.

DonorsTrust gave $862,500 to the Independent Women's Forum in 2020. The Independent Women's Forum called paid leave proposals to allow workers time off during an unprecedented global pandemic "radical," and democratic governors "Little Tyrants" for issuing stay-at-home orders urged by public health experts, True North Research   reported.

$3 Million for Climate Denial

DonorsTrust gave $2.8 million in grants to climate misinformation groups in 2020. The largest grant, $564,000, in this area went to the Heartland Institute, an Illinois-based climate change denial. In 2020, the Heartland Institute   was exposed for its climate misinformation activity in Europe.

Right-wing billionaire Peter Thiel's "Inference: The International Review of Science" received $525,000 from DonorsTrust for its "journal" that publishes articles that cast doubt on climate change and evolution.

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