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Showing posts with label DONORS. Show all posts
Showing posts with label DONORS. Show all posts

Monday, October 11, 2021

Here’s Who Funds the Right-Wing American Legislative Exchange Council

 


In a July interview with the Salt Lake Tribune preceding its annual meeting, Lisa Nelson, the CEO of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), claimed that her organization is fully transparent about its finances.

“We fill out the same 990 [tax form] that every other organization does…They’re available on our website.”

Asked if the tax records include “all the funders,” Nelson replied, “That goes through all our funding.”

The tax records do not include the identities of all of ALEC’s funders. In fact, they include no information whatsoever about its donors. As a nonprofit, ALEC is not required to disclose its donors’ identities to the public, and the 990s available through its website redact the sections that would disclose these funders, if ALEC wanted to.

The most recent 990 that ALEC makes available through its website is from 2018. However, the Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) has obtained its 2019 tax return.

CMD has identified the donors behind over $15 million that ALEC raised from 2014-19, or roughly one-third of its contribution revenue.

Among the biggest donors are a handful of family foundations that disperse the wealth of right-wing oligarchs. The foundations of the Bradley ($3.9 million), Koch ($2.7 million), Searle ($1.7 million), Thomas W. Smith ($625,000), and Coors ($325,000) families donated $9.2 million during that time period, or 60% of the known donations to ALEC.

Other top donors to ALEC include both mainstream and ideological donor-advised fund sponsors. Sister funds DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund, which political megadonors such as Koch and the Mercers have used to anonymously donate to right-wing organizations, combined to donate $2.8 million. Commercial donor-advised fund sponsors, including the Schwab Charitable Fund ($335,000) and the Vanguard Charitable Endowment Program ($95,000), have also passed along their clients’ funds anonymously to ALEC.

Also high on the donor list are trade groups, including the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America ($672,000) and the Edison Electric Institute ($85,000), as well as the foundation of the Tea Party-affiliated activist group FreedomWorks ($203,000).

The lion’s share of the remaining roughly $40 million million ALEC raised between 2014-19 likely came from ALEC’s corporate sponsors, the names of which are not disclosed. Companies such as AT&T, Comcast, ExxonMobil, Eli Lilly, Reynolds American, and UPS have funded ALEC in the past. Center for Political Accountability data show that Celgene and Pinnacle West Capital each gave ALEC between $10,000 and $22,000 in each of several recent years.

ALEC has raised between $8 million and $9 million in contribution revenue per year for the past several years, with another roughly $1 million coming from conferences, seminars, and membership dues. ALEC’s legislative members pay $100 per year in dues. Based on ALEC’s claim of 2,000 members, that would amount to $1.2 million over the six-year period. However, ALEC’s 2019 tax records show only $49,000 in membership dues, which means that ALEC is likely substantially inflating the number of legislative members.

More Lies From ALEC
Nelson's mischaracterization of its degree of transparency is one of several lies she has told the public in recent months.

As CMD exposed, Nelson falsely claimed that ALEC does not work on voting issues, while in reality ALEC has been working behind the scenes on voter suppression policies. And contrary to ALEC's assertion that, after blowback stemming from its work on racist voter ID laws and "stand your ground" gun law, it stays out of social issues, ALEC is working hard to attack critical race theory.

One ALEC donor of note is Thomas W. Smith ($625,000 from 2014-19), a Florida-based hedge fund founder who may be the biggest funder behind the anti-critical race theory movement, according to Popular Information. Smith is also one of the only known donors to the foundation behind The Federalist, a website that publishes far-right content including vigorous defenses of Donald Trump, coronavirus conspiracy theories, a slew of anti-critical race theory diatribes, and other racist posts that previously fell under a "black crime" tag.
https://www.datawrapper.de/_/YGybF/

https://www.exposedbycmd.org/.../heres-who-funds-the.../...



Donor Amount
Bradley Foundation$3,882,000
Charles Koch Foundation$2,513,784
DonorsTrust$1,946,321
Searle Freedom Trust$1,699,500
Donors Capital Fund$894,300
Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America$671,650
Thomas W. Smith Foundation/TWS Foundation$625,000
Energy Foundation$350,000
Schwab Charitable Fund$334,850
Adolph Coors Foundation$325,000
FreedomWorks Foundation$203,050
Charles Koch Institute$193,089
Allegheny Foundation$170,000
American Legislative Exchange Council$110,000
Sarah Scaife Foundation$100,000
PAGE 2
Donor Amount
Vanguard Charitable Endowment Program$95,000
Edison Electric Institute$84,875
CTIA-The Wireless Association$84,000
Education Freedom Alliance$77,800
Holman Foundation$75,000
Alliance for a Free Society$70,000
Retirement Security Initiative$64,268
American Property Casualty Insurance Foundation$58,750
Fidelity Charitable$56,215
American Natural Gas Alliance$55,000
Arizona State University Foundation for a New American University$50,000
New Venture Fund$50,000
American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers$48,600
U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation$42,000
National Association of Broadcasters$36,000

 

PAGE 3 

Donor Amount
The Seattle Foundation$32,500
National Federation of Independent Business$30,000
Institute for Justice$29,000
Ed Uihlein Family Foundation$25,000
Foundation for the Carolinas$25,000
NCTA-The Internet and Television Association$22,880
Wodecroft Foundation$22,500
Dabney Point Fund$20,000
Conservative Energy Network$17,000
Job Creators Network$15,000
Mississippi Power Foundation$15,000
American Institute of Architects$14,500
International Franchise Association$14,500
American Gaming Association$12,000
Foundation for Advancing Alcohol Responsibly$12,000

 PAGE 4 


Donor Amount
Bradley Impact Fund$10,500
American Petroleum Institute$10,000
Conservative Energy Network$10,000
Wisconsin Bankers Association$10,000
National Christian Foundation$8,500
Roe Foundation$8,500
Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce Foundation$6,500
Florida Internet and Television Association$6,500
Dupage Community Foundation$5,000
TOTAL$15,348,432



 


 


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