 | |
| Formation | 1999 |
|---|---|
| Type | Nonprofit (IRC §501(c)(3))[1] |
| 52-2166327 | |
| Location |
|
| Coordinates | 38°48′20″N77°03′37″W / 38.8056°N 77.0603°W /38.8056; -77.0603 |
| Services | Donor-advised fund |
CEO | Lawson Bader[2] |
| |
| Affiliations | Donors Capital Fund |
| Revenue | $158 million[4] (2023) |
| Expenses | $358 million[4] (2023) |
| Endowment | $1.29 billion in assets[4] (2023) |
| Website | donorstrust |
DonorsTrust is an American nonprofitdonor-advised fund that was founded in 1999 with the goal of "safeguarding the intent oflibertarian andconservative donors".[5] As a donor-advised fund, DonorsTrust is not legally required to disclose the identity of its donors, and most of its donors remain anonymous.[6][7] It distributes funds to variousconservative andlibertarian501(c)(3) organizations.
It is affiliated with Donors Capital Fund, another donor-advised fund. In September 2015, Lawson Bader was announced as the new president of both DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund. Bader was formerly president of theCompetitive Enterprise Institute and vice president at theMercatus Center.[2]
DonorsTrust is a501(c)(3) organization.[1] As a public charity and a donor-advised fund, DonorsTrust offers clients a variety of tax advantages compared to a private foundation.[8]
DonorsTrust accepts donations from charitable foundations and individuals.[9] Grants from DonorsTrust are based on the preferences of the original contributor, and the organization assures clients that their contributions will never be used to support politicallyliberal causes.[10][11] As a donor-advised fund, DonorsTrust can offer anonymity to individual donors, with respect to their donations to DonorsTrust, as well as with respect to an individual donor's ultimate grantee.[10][12][13][14]
As a donor-advised fund and public charity, DonorsTrust accepts cash or assets from donors, and in turn creates a separate account for the donor, who may recommend disbursements from the fund to other public charities.[13] DonorsTrust requires an initial deposit of $10,000 or more.[15][16] DonorsTrust is associated withDonors Capital Fund. DonorsTrust refers clients to Donors Capital Fund if the client plans to maintain a balance of $1 million or more.[17][18] DonorsTrust president Lawson Bader said the goal of the organization is to "safeguard the intent of libertarian and conservative donors," ensuring that funds are used only to promote "liberty through limited government, responsibility, and free enterprise".[5]
DonorsTrust was established in 1999 by Whitney Lynn Ball.[19] It and Donors Capital Fund have been described as spinoffs of thePhilanthropy Roundtable, a coordinating group for conservative foundations, where Ball had been executive director.[20][21][22] According to DonorsTrust, the organization was founded by a group of donors and nonprofit executives who were "actively engaged in supporting and promoting a free society as understood in America's founding documents."[11] A major selling point to donors is that even after their death, their money will continue to fund conservative/libertarian goals, and not change based on the attitudes of their heirs or trustees as a family foundation might.[6]: 1
In early 2013, DonorsTrust was the subject of reports byThe Independent,[23]The Guardian,[9][10][24]Mother Jones,[16][25] and theCenter for Public Integrity.[8] Calling it the "dark money ATM" of the political right, the progressive magazineMother Jones said DonorsTrust had funded a conservative public policy agenda against labor unions, climate science, public schools, and economic regulations.[16][26]
DonorsTrust raised over $1 billion in 2021, with two separate donations, each exceeding $425 million, being anonymous.[27]
As of 2013, DonorsTrust had 193 contributors, mostly individuals, and some foundations.[8]
TheCharles G. Koch Foundation has contributed millions of dollars to DonorsTrust.[23][28]Charles andDavid Koch were the top contributors to DonorsTrust in 2011, according to an analysis by theColumbia Journalism Review.[29]
DonorsTrust account holders have included theJohn M. Olin Foundation, theCastle Rock Foundation, theSearle Freedom Trust, and theBradley Foundation.[8][30] The Bradley family contributed $650,000 between 2001 and 2010.[16] The DeVos family foundation contributed $1 million in 2009 and $1.5 million in 2010 to Donors Trust.[16]
Robert Mercer andRebekah Mercer contributed nearly $20 million through DonorsTrust in 2020.[31]Marble Freedom Trust, led byLeonard Leo, gave $41 million to DonorsTrust in 2021 after a donation fromBarre Seid.[32]
From its founding in 1999 through 2013, DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund distributed nearly $400 million, and through 2015, $740 million, to various nonprofit organizations, including numerous conservative and libertarian causes.[8][33][34] DonorsTrust requires that recipients are registered with the USInternal Revenue Service as a 501(c)(3) public charity. Whitney Ball, the former president of the Trust, toldThe Guardian in 2013 that it has about 1,600 grantees.[35] In 2014, Ball said that 70 to 75 percent of grants go to public policy organizations, with the rest going to more conventional charities such as social service and educational organizations.[36]
In 2010, theAmericans for Prosperity Foundation[37] received a DonorsTrust grant of $7 million, nearly half of the Foundation's revenue that year.[8] Other DonorsTrust recipients have includedThe Heritage Foundation,Americans for Tax Reform, theNational Rifle Association Freedom Action Foundation, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, theCato Institute, theFederalist Society, theFreedomWorks Foundation, theNational Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, and theCenter for Class Action Fairness.[16][25][38]
DonorsTrust paid the legal fees of the Project on Fair Representation, a Washington, D.C.–based legal defense fund that assembled the plaintiff's legal team inFisher v. University of Texas, a 2013 United States Supreme Court case concerningaffirmative actioncollege admissions policies.[39] In 2011, theFranklin Center for Government and Public Integrity, an online conservative news organization, received $6.3 million in DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund grants, 95 percent of the center's revenue that year.[40][41]
Other DonorsTrust recipients have included theBecket Fund for Religious Liberty,[42] theConservative Partnership Institute,[43]Consumers' Research,[44]Families Against Mandatory Minimums, theFoundation for Jewish Camp, theJames Randi Educational Foundation, theMarijuana Policy Project,[36][45][46] theNew Century Foundation,[31][47]PragerU,[48]Project Veritas,[49] andVDARE.[31][47]
DonorsTrust CEO Bader toldInside Philanthropy in 2021 that his fund had seen "a noticeable uptick of account rollovers" from non-ideological donor-advised funds he said had slowed or stopped grant-making to political causes.[50]
DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund have been major sources of funding for conservative groups withcontrarian stances onclimate change.[51][52][10][16]
The Guardian reported DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund distributed nearly $120 million to 102 think tanks and action groups "which have a record of denying the existence of a human factor in climate change, or opposing environmental regulations" between 2002 and 2010.[10] According to an analysis byDrexel Universityenvironmental sociologistRobert Brulle, between 2003 and 2010, DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund combined were the largest funders of organizations opposed to restrictions on carbon emissions.[16][53] By 2009, approximately one-quarter of the funding of what Brulle calls the "climate change counter-movement" came from grants via DonorsTrust and Donors Capital Fund.[17]
As of 2010, DonorsTrust grants to conservative and libertarian organizations active in climate change issues included more than $17 million to theAmerican Enterprise Institute, a think tank; $13.5 million to theHeartland Institute, a public policy think tank; and $11 million toAmericans for Prosperity, a political advocacy group.[24] In 2011, theCommittee for a Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT), a conservative Washington, D.C.–based nonprofit organization, received $1.2 million from Donors Trust, 40 percent of CFACT's revenue in that year.[12] Climate change writerWei-Hock "Willie" Soon received hundreds of thousands of dollars from DonorsTrust.[54][55] In 2015,The Guardian reported that Donors Trust gave $4.3 million to the Competitive Enterprise Institute over three years.[56]
Between 2008 and 2013, DonorsTrust granted $10 million to theState Policy Network (SPN), a national network of conservative and libertarian think tanks focused onstate-level policy. SPN used the grants to incubate new think tanks in Arkansas, Rhode Island and Florida. DonorsTrust also issued grants to SPN's affiliates at the state level during the same period. TheAmerican Legislative Exchange Council, a nonprofit organization of conservativestate legislators andprivate sector representatives that drafts and shares model state-level legislation, is a DonorsTrust recipient.[8]
In 2018, the organization funded more than 99% of theJudicial Education Project, a legal alias for Honest Elections Project andThe 85 Fund.[57][58][59]
The board of directors of DonorsTrust includes:[3]
In 2011, fully 95 percent of the Franklin Center's revenues came from a charity called Donors Trust, whose top contributors were the Koch brothers.
In 2019, the Donors Trust, sent donations to groups such as Turning Point USA, which is led by vocal Trump supporter Charlie Kirk; and the VDARE Foundation, which the Southern Poverty Law Center labeled a hate group.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)A 2022 investigative report revealed that DonorsTrust — a fundraising operation known as the "dark money ATM" of contemporary conservative politics — had funneled millions of dollars into religious liberty legal organizations. Among the recipients was the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, an organization renowned for its litigation against LGBTQ+ rights and the Affordable Care Act's (ACA) contraceptive mandate as well as its legal support for overturning the constitutional right to an abortion.
The organization, known as Donors Trust, has been described as a "dark money ATM" for the political right...
As Bader tells it, DonorsTrust has gotten a definite boost from fears of so-called 'cancel culture' coming to the DAF world. "The fact that Fidelity Charitable (and some community foundations) [are] refusing to honor grant recommendations (or at least slowing down the process) to various 'conservative policy' groups, combined with the recent decision by the Goldman Sachs DAF to cease grantmaking to all perceived 'policy' groups—on left and right—has resulted in a noticeable uptick of account rollovers from these groups," Bader said. The concern is that such a pattern could spread further afield to Schwab, Vanguard and the like. "Fortunately," Bader said, "in this market, there are alternative choices, and DonorsTrust is benefiting from that."
Notably, prominent contrarian CTTs such as the Heartland Institute are heavily dependent upon these key donors and, in particular the "donor-advised" funding flows from Donors Trust and Donors Capital Fund, which ensure anonymous funding to conservative causes
Donors Trust and DCF alone account for 13.7% of grants.