Biden Donors are Backing Protests That Could Harm His Re-Election Chances!
On the complexity of political funding.
A bizarrely dangerous and misleading POLITICO report by Shia Kapos is headlined “Pro-Palestinian protesters are backed by a surprising source: Biden’s biggest donors.”
President Joe Biden has been dogged for months by pro-Palestinian protesters calling him “Genocide Joe” — but some of the groups behind the demonstrations receive financial backing from philanthropists pushing hard for his reelection.
The donors include some of the biggest names in Democratic circles: Soros, Rockefeller and Pritzker, according to a POLITICO analysis.
Shocking! So, the right-wing conspiracy guys are actually right?!
Well . . . no.
Two of the organizers supporting the protests at Columbia University and on other campuses are Jewish Voice for Peace and IfNotNow. Both are supported by the Tides Foundation, which is seeded by Democratic megadonor George Soros and was previously supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. It in turn supports numerous small nonprofits that work for social change.
[…]
Another notable Democratic donor whose philanthropy has helped fund the protest movement is David Rockefeller Jr., who sits on the board of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund. In 2022, the fund gave $300,000 to the Tides Foundation; according to nonprofit tax forms, Tides has given nearly $500,000 over the past five years to Jewish Voice for Peace, which explicitly describes itself as anti-Zionist.
Several other groups involved in pro-Palestinian protests are backed by a foundation funded by Susan and Nick Pritzker, heir to the Hyatt Hotel empire — and supporters of Biden and numerous Democratic campaigns, including $6,600 to the Biden Victory Fund a few months ago and more than $300,000 during the 2020 campaign.
So . . . two organizing groups got money from a foundation which in turn was “seeded” by billionaire megadonors who fund lots of foundations? Yup.
The trail of donations shows a series of blurred lines when it comes to liberal causes and Democratic politics. Often those missions are aligned, but they also sometimes have different and — particularly when it comes to Gaza — conflicting agendas and tactics. And a small group of wealthy heavyweights are often playing an outsize role funding many of them.
The Tides Foundation is itself massive, funding all manner of progressive causes. It’s been around since 1976 and has spun off projects ranging from “Campaign to Defend the Constitution, Higher Education Recruitment Consortium, People for the American Way, Pew Internet and American Life Project, Rockridge Institute, Social Venture Network, Urgent Action Fund, and V-Day.”
It’s quite possible to support the general thrust of its donations and yet not be on board with every single effort it sponsors. But, yes, there’s naturally going to be blowback:
But as protester tactics have grown more intense, like taking over university buildings and shouting antisemitic remarks, the groups behind them are now attracting criticism from prominent donors on the left.
“Why [is the Rockefeller Fund] giving significant grants to Jewish Voice for Peace, [which] blamed the horrific Oct. 7 attacks on Israel and the United States rather than Hamas?” said Elisha Wiesel, a Democratic donor who chairs the Elie Wiesel Foundation, an organization that supports anti-genocide work.
Jewish Voice for Peace, which did not return a request for comment, has been a leader in disruptive protests against Biden, including shouting “genocide supporter” at his glitzy fundraiser at Radio City Music Hall in New York in March. It protests on campuses across the country, and its statement immediately following the Oct. 7 attacks said that “the source of all this violence” was “Israeli apartheid and occupation — and United States complicity in that oppression.”
Presumably, to the degree doing this sort of thing pisses off donors, they’ll quit donating. But, again, when an organization is as big as Tides, it’s almost certainly going to do things that any donor will object to.
It’s not until paragraph eleven that this is made explicit:
The complex funding system in the nonprofit space sometimes means that groups are funded by grants — or even subgrants — from a larger organization that isn’t involved in granular, day-to-day management of an activist group’s work. In a statement to POLITICO, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund noted it cannot support political activity or campaigns and is not involved in the personal political giving of trustees.
“Our grantees in all three portfolios support a broad range of policy ideas—some align with the Biden administration’s agenda and others conflict. This complexity is part and parcel of our nonpartisan work,” said Sarah Edkins, the fund’s communications director, in a statement.
Some advisers to left-leaning causes say that’s just part of the way things work when it comes to philanthropic giving.
“There may be times where a donor may give to an organization or candidate that sometimes does something that clashes with their personal view,” said Kevin Conlon, who has been a bundler for Biden as well as for Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, and now advises nonprofits.
To the degree that one views a second Trump term an existential threat, spending money supporting causes that could potentially make it harder for Biden to get re-elected is unwise. But the war in Gaza is a divisive issue within the Democratic Party and, indeed, even within the Biden Administration. It’s hardly shocking that progressive activists and megadonors will be split.
Many of the nonprofits that receive grants that are now involved in the protests also have missions that are mostly unrelated to foreign policy. But as the conflict in the Middle East takes up a greater space at the center of the nation’s political debates, nonprofits with other missions have been drawn to the cause.
“A lot of our members are supporting actions that are trying to hold Biden accountable, which is not the same thing as opposing Biden. It’s saying we desperately don’t want the alternative,” said Barni Qaasim, a spokesperson for Solidaire Action, a group that funds social justice movements.
Solidaire has received financial support from the Pritzkers, who also founded the Libra Foundation, which funds smaller nonprofits that address criminal justice, environmental and gender justice issues. Susan Pritzker declined to comment for this story. Some of the groups funded by Libra have also been involved in protests against Israel’s response to the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas.
For instance, The Climate Justice Alliance took part in pro-Palestinian marches that have used the phrase “Genocide Joe.” Black Organizing for Leadership and Dignity, another group backed by the Libra Foundation, promotes pro-Palestinian demonstrations on its website. And a third, the Immigrant Defense Project, was part of a protest in Washington that saw 13 activists arrested by Capitol police after demanding a permanent cease-fire in Gaza.
The Tides Foundation, funded by the Prizkers, has also supported the Adalah Justice Project, which has also been part of protests at Columbia University. The group wrote on X, formerly Twitter, that “universities are hedge funds, deeply embedded with weapons manufacturers.” Tides also supports Palestine Legal, a legal defense fund that is offers legal assistance to “students mobilizing against genocide.”
The Tides Foundation issued a statement about funding groups that protest, saying it is “committed to advancing social justice,” adding that its “community of fiscally sponsored projects, donors, and grantees represent a wide range of perspectives on what social justice looks like.”
Palestine Legal has been a fiscally sponsored project of the Tides Center since 2013, and Adalah Justice Project since 2016, according to a spokesperson. Jewish Voice for Peace and IfNotNow “are grantee partners.”
Some donors may use this moment to reevaluate where their money goes, something that Conlon, the Democratic bundler, acknowledged.
“They might be less inclined to give [in the future] if they feel strongly about it. Inevitably, there will be conflicts,” he said. “You’re not going to sync perfectly all the time.”
Sure. But, again, if you’re giving money to large organizations, you’re going to disagree with how they spend some of that money. That’s especially true if it’s a foundation that supports a wide swath of causes that are only loosely grouped. The Tides Foundation claims to be dedicated to “social justice” and to “believe that a just and equitable future can exist only when communities who have been historically denied power have the social, political, and economic power they need to create it.” That’s a pretty wide remit.
Further, the most politically engaged folks will almost always have passions that don’t neatly align with one party or candidate. While most progressives and progressive donors far prefer Biden to Trump, a large swath of them are nonetheless outraged by his ardent support of Israel in this conflict. Achieving “social justice” is a complicated thing.
The cries of antisemitism thrown so easily in our political culture is made laughable by the fact that George Soros’ name is so easily disparaged. Why? Because George Soros is Jewish and whispering his name as a subversive, anti-American is, in fact, based on antisemitism.
Thousands of Israelis protest to demand hostage return. Are the Israelis protesting in Israel antisemitic also?
Biden has publicly disagreed with and chastised Bibi for his conduct of the war, and yet he is criticized for “his ardent support of Israel in this conflict.” Just within the last couple of days an Israeli official thumbed his nose at Biden and declared Israel, not the United States, will decide how to prosecute the war. Short of cutting off military aid to Israel, which I believe would require Congressional approval, what more Biden supposed to do to show he wants Netenyahu to dial it back? And for Politico to boil down that story to “Biden backers are funding protests” is absurd. It’s the kind of crap that OAN and NewsMax traffic in – a grain of truth inside a ton of bullshit.
The fact that “you can’t always get what you want” doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try to. “The moral arc of the universe bends toward justice” only to the extent that we keep pulling it that direction.
@Charley in Cleveland: It’s certainly true that Biden has been pushing back more of late. But he literally flew to Israel and allowed himself to be photographed giving Bibi a hug and has sent a shit-ton of American aid to support the war effort.
@just nutha: Sure. But what does that mean in this context?
Just a reminder that priorities matter. But we’re talking politics, so probably nothing.
Really getting tired of the, ‘if a Jew protests how can protest be anti-semitic?’
It’s not an argument anyone makes in any other context. If a woman supports Trump is Trump not a misogynist? If a Black person supports Trump is he not a racist? There is one standard for Israelis and a different standard for everyone else. Only Israelis have agency. Why? Because we see Israelis as European/White people. As, ‘us.’ And only European/White people have agency. Only ‘we’ can be held to any standard.
No one ever suggests that Hamas could end this horror by stepping out from behind their human shields. Why does no one suggest that? Because we don’t expect anything of Arabs. Why does no one ever ask why Egypt is keeping its Gaza border closed? Because Arabs don’t have agency.
We have standards we apply to Europeans/Whites, and a very different set of standards for everyone else. This is not necessarily anti-semitism, though there is plenty of that, but it is bigotry. We are treating Arabs as lesser, as children, not to be held responsible. Only we of European descent are capable of civilized behavior, very much an imperialist’s point of view. I suppose we’d better send in the missionaries, see if we can’t civilize ‘those’ people, help them develop to the point where they can assume the full burden of adulthood.
The article at this point also has the correction that basically nothing in it is true:
CORRECTION: An earlier version of this report misstated that The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation seeds the Tides Foundation’s work. It no longer has active grants to Tides. It also said POLITICO contacted Gates. POLITICO contacted an agency that has represented the Gates Foundation but did not reach out directly to Gates. And it said IfNotNow was one of two of the main organizations behind the protests. IfNotNow is supporting protests, but students are leading them.
@Michael Reynolds:
Agree but for a different reason. It’s a variation of “I’ve got a black friend so I can’t be racist”. It’s a cheap cop-out to maintain simple black/white mentality in a complex moral issue. There doesn’t need to be a clear “bad guy” for basic facts to be true. Good people can do bad things, bad people can do good things and innocents are suffering because the people in charge are making decisions that harm them. Assholes can show up to well-meaning protests to try and ruin them or even with decent intent while being utterly assholish about it. Moral people can find themselves on the same side as immoral jerks because a clock is right twice a day.
We want clean narratives of good and evil because then we can judge a cause’s worth on that instead of the messy reality behind it. That’s not how reality works and it’s certainly not how you get peace or a better life for all those involved.
The civil war in the Democratic party is growing. When you are a party of special interests there are bound to be conflict between interest groups. But when one group supports the rapists and murders (“We are Hamas”) of another’s family and friends in Israel, well, things bubble to the surface.
And just think it was only a few years ago that the common theme here was that the old, white, rural Republicans would be dead and the Democrats could have one party rule. Yet, now as I predicted, Hispanics are moving to the Republican party. Even many blacks are polled to be moving that way for 2024. Perhaps ideologically, or perhaps they see a way to break out of the Democrat plantation.
@JKB:
You need to quit on that “Democrat plantation” trope. It’s f*kn racist and it’s pretty offensive. And before you play the dumbass and ask how is that racist, see Reynold’s post above.
Michael- We were in Iraq almost 10 years and Afghanistan about 20. Those wars could have ended if ISIS or whichever terror group we were fighting would have come out from hiding behind the population and fought us, but we didnt spend time talking about it because we knew they weren’t going to do it, besides which we had no leverage to convince them to do that. They were religious based terrorists mostly carrying small arms. They would quickly lose if they came out in the open, plus they didnt care about civilian getting killed. So in short, it’s a waste of time trying to talk Hamas to stop hiding.
Then there’s the Palestinians. It is disappointing that they dont “out” Hamas. There has actually been a fair amount written on that so they dont get off scott free. However, this is a universal problem and not just among Arabs. Circumstances vary, but most of the time the general population is afraid of the terrorists. Some nearly always support them, but there is always fear. You have a family with kids, they are religious fanatics with guns. That almost always ends with the peasants caving.
Now, if you want to claim that there is something generally broken about Arab culture that seems to lead to more terrorist groups I think you may have a case, though that’s such a complex topic I am not sure I want to go through that again.
Steve
@Charley in Cleveland:
He could slow walk the military aid. He could loudly condemn the claims that the protests are antisemetic. Condemn Israel banning Al Jazeera. Meet with or speak to some of the Israeli protesters protesting their own government, or send Blinken to do so. That’s just off the top of my head. Looks like there’s going to be some upcoming stuff with the ICC that the US is already threatening the ICC about — maybe don’t do that.
There are basically an infinite number of actions the president can take that send a message, with various degrees of it being seen and heard domestically and in Israel. Presidenting is hard and it’s the job Biden signed up for and wants to keep.
@Michael Reynolds:
When the husband is beating the shit out of his kids because his wife was fucking the mailman, no one suggests that the wife simply stop fucking the mailman. Why does no one suggest that?
@steve:
The Middle East is a pretty fucked up place because of colonialism, oil, and the like. Islam has spread from there to other pretty fucked up places in Africa, Asia, and Indonesia where you have terrorism and local branches of ISIS and similar groups.
I would be hard pressed to put a cause and effect there, especially when places like North Ireland exist with long periods of terrorism and violence and not a Muslim in sight.
And then there’s the question of which Islam. Looking at Christianity in the US we see a lot of things grafted onto it (capitalism, manifest destiny, white supremacy) that are often directly at odds with the stated tenets of the religion. I would expect that the same thing happens with Islam.
Christianity is the religion of a broken people living under the thumb of the Roman Empire, with a weak messiah that was literally killed by that occupying empire, and which has now been grafted into the religion of occupying empires (late Roman Empire, everything in the Age of Colonialism, however we want to define America as a Superpower). Until you can untangle why and how Christianity leads to imperialism, I would be cautious with assumptions about Islam leading to terrorism.
Islam sure seems to get more suicide bombers though.
(At least of the Abrahamic religions. The Japanese kamikazes also existed.)
@Gustopher:
Because that analogy is stupid and offensive, that’s why.
The ‘wife’ didn’t fuck the mailman, she murdered peaceful people at a concert. She raped and mutilated and imprisoned. There is no other situation, Gus, in which you would equate infidelity with rape and torture and murder. You pooh pooh Hamas atrocities because as I said, you have one set of rules for Israelis, and no rules at all for Palestinians. Why is that? Because you’re a patronizing, paternalistic westerner incapable of escaping your own biases.
In any other situation you’d be the first person to furiously denounce anyone who analogized murder and sex. But you’re blinded by smugness.
@Michael Reynolds: No, I’m associating the civilian population of Gaza with a third party that has very little to do with the attack on October 7th.
And implying that Israel, the occupying force of the Israeli occupied territories, has a duty of care for their occupied population, which they are bombing the shit out of and starving.
@JKB: You spend a LOT of time wish-casting in your posts. The Republican Party has been coming apart at the seams for years, and yet you’re here talking about a Democratic “Civil War.”
Huh? What on EARTH are you talking about?
This has been the case for a long time. Hispanics, particularly those from Central America, are culturally Catholic. This “prediction” of yours is similar to predicting that the wind will blow in West Texas.
@Michael Reynolds:
Poor white peoole. Let’s all cry for the European/White. Such victims. Boo hoo. No other group ever catches heat. No one ever says anything bad about Latinos. Or blacks or Asians. Or Middle Eastern Muslims. No criticism of Hamas has ever been uttered by anyone. It’s only the whites, the real victims, because something something agency.
Lolololol
Netanyahu’s failed leadership and poor decision-making deserves criticism. Trying to play the poor white man card to blunt critique is lame. And will not work.
@JKB:
There’s no tangible evidence for this. Y’all claimed this was happening in 2022, and once the voting dust settled, Democrats won about the same shares Hispanic voters as they always have.
Smearing 90%+ of black voters plantation slaves is a guaranteed way to alienate them. Very dumb strategy. That Republicans still need to be told this exemplifies their problems with voters.
@DK:
You know, your inability to ever engage with what I actually say is very flattering. You’re very smart, good with language, and yet you can only deal with me by lying about my position. And every time you have to resort to bullshit it just inflates my ego, which honestly, is plenty inflated already.
@JKB:
Which Democrat is trying to oust their congressional leader this week, a la Moscow Majorie?
Which Democrat took 15-20% of the party’s primary votes away its leader, a la Nikki Haley?
Sensationalism is fun for out-of-touch people who consume too much news media, but no.
@Jen:
@DK:
You need to understand modern conspiracy epistemology. there’s no need to go anomaly hunting, or misrepresent data, or demand a level of detail impossible to attain, or anything like that. these days, one merely asserts a conspiracy and that’s that.
And it works for just about everything else. justa make the assertion.
See what Republiqans claim about the Joe Biden impeachment inquiry, and what evidence they came up with. They backed down, or withdrew to regroup, because they do need evidence. And not just real evidence, but actual damning evidence.
Did they not have such needs, Biden would have been impeached like six times by now.
@Michael Reynolds:
Bullshit like waaaaa boo hooo “only European/White people have agency” waaaaaaaa?
I guess I didn’t have to add anything else. Trumpesque whining about whites being uniquely victimized by a bigoted double standard works as a standalone joke. MAGA!
The criticism Israel is facing for its post 7 Oct Gaza campaign (and Palestinian policy more broadly, esp. in West Bank) is similar to the criticism the United States faced for our post 9/11 Middle East military misadventures. The idea Israel is some super special unique victim ‘Because White/European agency’ is inaccurate. It’s just a red herring, a transparent attempt to stop the criticism, a la Bush’s “They hate us for our freedom.”
It’s not going to work. At home and abroad, Israel will continue to be criticized. As will Hamas, the PLA, Iran, Russia, China, India, the United States of America, Biden, Trump, Germany, Hungary, Myanmar, France, and all other governments and players major and minor. With power comes critique.
@DK:
I’ll write you a check for a grand if you can show me where I suggested we should pity whites or Europeans.
See, the thing is, you’re a lawyer, so you know you presented ‘facts not in evidence.’ You know you were grandstanding for the peanut gallery. Your inability to deal with me honestly is disappointing. It suggests we’ve found your intellectual limits.
@Gustopher:
I assume everyone’s seen the reports that Hamas has accepted a ceasefire deal. Now it’s in Israel’s court.
Yesterday there was a report, unconfirmed as far as I know, that Biden cut off ammunition shipments to Israel last week. I suspect that Biden has been leaning on Netanyahu pretty heavy, but mindful of the maxim that you can accomplish anything as along as you don’t ask for the credit.
(Irrelevant here, but Israel needs ammunition from us, Ukraine needs ammunition from us, Russia needs ammunition from China and North Korea, and we don’t have spare ammunition. What’s the deal with not stockpiling ammunition? (rhetorical question – developing weapons is way more profitable than just stamping out shells.))
@Michael Reynolds:
Bullshit. Everyone takes that as given. So what? They aren’t going to do it, and we can’t make them do it. They also aren’t all going to commit suicide in a fit of remorse, or all move to Australia and farm wallabies. Next idea.
When it comes to the human shields, either they are volunteers or they are victims. If they are victims, they are victims of both Hamas and Likud. Hamas is using them as shields; Likud is bombing them anyway, and herding them out of their homes, and destroying their hospitals, and deliberately starving them to death. Which Likud also could stop doing at any time. Likud are not Hamas, so there’s still a small chance they might choose that course.
@gVOR10: Apparently it’s not, though. See top post here.
@DK: JJB sees the world in Black and White, measured with calipers. Hispanics are the margin of error.
But, on Democratic divisions, however, I am not convinced that the lefty kids are going to fall in line this year and vote for Biden, which with the razor thin margins of the past few elections, might result in a Trump presidency. (The righty kids will vote for Trump, and the moderate kids… do they vote?)
It’s stupid to not vote for Biden if you’re in a swing state, but there’s a lot of pressure campaigns to vote 3rd party for the idiot du jour (Russian backed propaganda? Useful idiots? Both? Useless idiots?)
A lot of them don’t understand (yet) that voting for the lesser of two evils is voting for less evil.
I’m not young, but I won’t be voting for Biden. I live in Washington, and he doesn’t need that vote. If he loses Washington, he’s lost every swing state. It’s a no-consequence purity stand.
(I also like to point that out to anyone I meet or know online, as most people can then do the math and figure out that if they live in a swing state, a purity vote isn’t consequence free, and they should think twice. Also it annoys the Vote Blue No Matter Who crowd, which is a bonus)