Among all of these organizations, Planned Parenthood controls vast amounts of wealth. Of course, they cannot simply use these resources to buy elections. That would be illegal. That’s where Grassroots Campaigns Inc. comes in.
Grassroots Campaigns Inc.
One of the most influential groups you’ve probably never heard of is a for-profit organization founded in 2003 “with the goal of building support for progressive candidates, parties and causes through engaging everyday people in political action.” As a for-profit entity, they have no restrictions on political activity. They count as one of their clients Planned Parenthood’s 501(c)(3) charity.
They credit themselves with some of America’s biggest political success stories. After its first year, Grassroots Campaigns had staff in more than forty cities canvassing on behalf of the Democratic National Committee. According to its website:
In October of 2004, Grassroots Campaigns joined forces with MoveOn.org in order to identify and activate Democratic voters. During this campaign, we recruited a volunteer force of almost 50,000 people and worked in 17 of the most highly contested swing states. Following the election, we helped launch a nation-wide project called Operation Democracy through which we organized grassroots activists to end Republican control of Congress. Operation Democracy laid the groundwork for the 2006 Call for Change Campaign in which we ran massive volunteer phone banks that turned out infrequent Democratic voters in over 50 congressional districts. Our hard work paid off that November when we successfully took back Congress.
For 2008, the organization’s website claims credit for helping organize 7,480 house parties where volunteers made 2.14 million calls and recruited over 90,000 volunteers for Obama in swing states. Additionally, they report registering more than 230,000 new voters in thirteen battleground states, an effort that they say helped to win many states and turned North Carolina Blue for the first time since Jimmy Carter’s election in 1976.
With each election cycle, the claims grow bigger. In 2012, they targeted the western swing states of Nevada and Colorado and ran get-out-the-vote (GOTV) efforts in ten states. In 2014 they knocked on more than 200,000 doors in states with key Senate races with a commitment to “mobilizing the grassroots base of the progressive movement.”
This is an explicitly political organization.
So what service do they provide to 501(c)(3) charities? According to the 990 forms of three major nonprofits, Grassroots Campaigns has earned more than $69 million over the six-year period for which data is available, from just three charities: Planned Parenthood, the Southern Poverty Law Center, and the Nature Conservancy. Not just the advocacy arm of these organizations, but the charity arm. A visit to the Grassroots Campaigns website shows a much longer client list. On the clients page, we see some familiar names:
Current and Former Clients of Grassroots Campaigns Inc.
America Votes
American Civil Liberties Union
Amnesty International USA
CA League of Conservation Voters
Center for American Progress
Colorado State Democratic Party
College Matters
Common Cause
Conservation Law Foundation
D.C. Public Schools
DCCC [Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee]
Democratic National Committee
Doctors Without Borders
Equality California
Equality Maine
Everytown for Gun Safety
Freedom to Marry
League of Conservation Voters
Media Matters
MoveOn.org Political Action
Nevada State Democratic Party
Obama for America
Oxfam America
Pennsylvania Coordinated Campaign
People for the American Way
Plan International USA
Planned Parenthood of NYC
Repower America
Respect ABQ Women
Sierra Club
Southern Poverty Law Center
Media Fund
Nature Conservancy
UNICEF
VoteVets.org Political Action
WA State Coordinated Campaign
WETA
What kind of work do these nonprofits need from a political canvassing organization? Some of it is consulting. It’s unclear what consulting a for-profit political canvassing organization provides to 501(c)(3) charities. But much of the work Grassroots Campaigns is paid to do is what they’re calling fund-raising. It involves hiring entry-level staff to knock on doors or man tables at public events asking people to donate to the nonprofit.
If Grassroots Campaigns fund-raisers are working for Planned Parenthood, they show up at the door in a Planned Parenthood T-shirt asking you to donate to Planned Parenthood. You might naturally assume that the money you contribute will be used to do the work of the organization to which you donated—funding abortions, for example. You would be wrong about that. Because at the end of the day, Grassroots Campaigns is paid significantly more money than it raises for its nonprofit clients.
Ultimately, that donation results in a net loss to the charity, not a net gain. It’s right there in the 990 forms filed with the IRS. That means your donation is funding Grassroots Campaigns, not Planned Parenthood, the Southern Poverty Law Center, the Nature Conservancy, or any other client engaged in this sleight of hand.
Planned Parenthood Federation has been engaged in this scheme since 2009. Notably, only the charity side of Planned Parenthood engages with Grassroots Campaigns, Inc. Though the social welfare, or 501(c)(4), entities also do fund-raising, they don’t use this particular company. Why? Could it be that they don’t actually hire Grassroots Campaigns for the fund-raising? Is it just a scheme to direct charity funds to partisan political activities?
Planned Parenthood Federation Losses to Grassroots Campaigns Inc.
Amount Fund-Raised
Amount Charged by Grassroots
Loss by PPF
2016
$2,686,919.00
$4,599,074.00
$(1,912,155.00)
2015
$1,954,196.00
$3,400,000.00
$(1,445,804.00)
2014
$909,925.00
$2,273,485.00
$(1,363,560.00)
2013
$1,049,817.00
$2,261,872.00
$(1,212,055.00)
2012
$1,849,612.00
$3,493,461.00
$(1,643,849.00)
2011
$1,569,663.00
$3,776,470.00
$(2,206,807.00)
2010
$902,515.00
$2,420,841.00
$(1,518,326.00)
2009
$97,079.00
$370,874.00
$(273,795.00)
$11,019,726.00
$22,596,077.00
$(11,576,351.00)
Source: 990 tax filings
Let’s take a look at the success of Grassroots Campaigns Inc. in fund-raising for Planned Parenthood Federation. The chart above shows Grassroots Campaigns hasn’t come close to raising the amount of money Planned Parenthood is paying them. In fact, in the eight years for which I was able to see records, Planned Parenthood’s 501(c)(3) charity has paid out more than $11.5 million to the canvassing organization above and beyond the amounts they have received for fund-raising.
To a nonprofit auditor, these numbers would make no sense. In the real world, if a nonprofit pays a fund-raiser, that fund-raiser had better raise at least enough to cover the cost of the contract. In the real world, if a fund-raiser costs more than the amount raised, the nonprofit would hire someone else the following year. But Planned Parenthood doesn’t. Note that the amounts fund-raised by Grassroots Campaigns each year (column two) are consistently exceeded by the amounts charged for fund-raising (column three). Normally, after a single year of failing to raise
the amount of the fee, we would expect a nonprofit to fire the fund-raiser and hire someone who can raise at least as much as he or she is paid. But Planned Parenthood doesn’t. They have continued to use Grassroots Campaigns each year since 2009. The last column shows the loss incurred each year—the difference between what was paid and what was raised. In addition to the money Grassroots Campaigns was paid for fund-raising, they were also paid for consulting.
While most nonprofits of its size do their fund-raising in-house, the Planned Parenthood Federation has consistently rehired Grassroots Campaigns for both consultancy and fund-raising services over the most recent six-year reporting period, paying out a total of $38 million (including consulting) and raising less than $6 million during that time.
The for-profit organization Grassroots Campaigns is making millions of dollars each year from the contract with Planned Parenthood alone. Where is that money going? Well, let’s revisit their website and look at what Grassroots Campaigns says it does.
“In addition to running ongoing small-donor fund-raising canvasses throughout the U.S., Grassroots Campaigns also has more than a decade of experience running cutting-edge voter contact, volunteer organizing, and grassroots advocacy campaigns on behalf of progressive political groups and candidates. The services we provide include:
Fundraising
Paid Voter Contact and GOTV
Volunteer Voter Contact and GOTV
Voter Registration
Volunteer Recruitment and Organizing
Advocacy
Phone Services
Training”
What happens to your donation when Grassroots Campaigns knocks on your door? We’ve already established it isn’t going back to the nonprofit organization—they’re paying more for the fund-raising service than the donations given. It appears to be used, directly or indirectly, to fund these other services—services that the nonprofit itself, particularly the charity arm, cannot legally fund.
As a for-profit organization, Grassroots Campaigns doesn’t have to report how this money—the money that came from a 501(c)(3) charity—is used. This would be an easy way to access those deep reserves for political purposes. Is that why those reserves seem to increase so dramatically after an organization pays Grassroots Campaigns for “consulting” services? Is Grassroots helping get the word out to donors that political donations to the nonprofit charity will not only be tax deductible, but will also be used to help fund the resistance? That’s a question that deserves much greater scrutiny.
Southern Poverty Law Center
Planned Parenthood Federation is just one of many clients of Grassroots Campaigns, although it is perhaps the largest. Another large client is the troubled but prosperous Southern Poverty Law Center.
According to the 990s filed with the IRS for the period between 2010 and 2017, the pattern we saw at Planned Parenthood held true for Southern Poverty Law Center. Once again, Grassroots Campaigns collected significantly more than it raised, taking in nearly $12 million over eight years, and raising just over $4 million.
Like Planned Parenthood, Southern Poverty Law Center grew considerably during the years for which we found public data—in both its revenue and its reserves. The amounts are staggering.
Southern Poverty Law Center Losses to Grassroots Campaigns Inc.
Amount Fund-Raised
Amount Charged by Grassroots
Loss by SPLC
2017
$317,336.00
$1,028,324.00
$(710,988.00)
2016
$787,881.00
$2,530,660.00
$(1,742,779.00)
2015
$623,596.00
$1,811.174.00
$(1,187,578.00)
2014
$757,182.00
$2,028,857.00
$(1,271,675.00)
2013
$581,478.00
$1,712,158.00
$(1,130,680.00)
2012
$770,211.00
$1,926,976.00
$(1,156,765.00)
2011
$731,694.00
$1,601,380.00
$(869,686.00)
2010
$142.899.00
$355,113.00
$(212,214.00)
$4,394,941.00
$11,966,318.00
$(7,571,377.00)
Source: 990 tax filings
Numbers released in March 2019 indicate that the organization’s total assets now top half a billion dollars. Of those assets, some $121 million is held in offshore accounts. Assets have doubled since 2011, when SPLC reported $256 million and an increase of $41 million in the twelve-month period since the previous filing. Total revenues in 2018 were $121 million. On top of that $518 million in assets, the organization reported an endowment fund, which was valued at a healthy $281 million in 2011 and is now worth $471 million as of 2018.
For each of the six years of reports we studied, Southern Poverty Law Center has engaged the services of Grassroots Campaigns both as consultants and as fund-raisers.
And still, remarkably, whatever Grassroots Campaigns may have been telling donors, Southern Poverty Law Center did not actually receive any funds directly from Grassroots Campaigns. The IRS asks nonprofits to report whether funds raised remained in the control of the fund-raiser or whether the organization had control. Each year, Grassroots Campaigns was described as maintaining control over contributions, unlike other fund-raisers used during this same time.
Even as SPLC’s 501(c)(3) is paying Grassroots Campaigns for so-called fund-raising services, the group has joined the trend of forming a 501(c)(4) entity to engage in political campaigns. SPLC claims its Action Fund focuses on “critical ballot initiatives” and “legislative battles at every level of government.”
I can tell you what that looks like in my state. In 2018, progressive groups funded ballot initiatives to impose policies that could not pass in Utah’s conservative state legislature. With marijuana legalization, Medicaid expansion, and redistricting reform on the ballot, and with large infusions of cash and volunteers from outside the state, Democrats managed to spike turnout among progressives and political agnostics, resulting in big wins for their party. Already these groups have a carbon tax ballot initiative on tap to help spike turnout among their voters in 2020. Such efforts can potentially benefit Democrat candidates up and down the ballot. All of this is being done with the help of deep-pocketed nonprofits that pay no taxes, do little real charity work, send their money offshore, and in many cases allow rich donors to write off the contributions to offset high tax bills. Taxpayers quite literally subsidize the work of the Democratic Party.
What is Grassroots Campaigns doing with the millions they are being paid? Again, the clues are on their website. They do political canvassing. One page explains “Why we canvass.” In their own words, they do it to build organizations: “Canvassing builds lists of new members and supporters. These lists of supporters are an invaluable resource for Progressive groups.” They do it to “deepen Democratic participation,” to “win elections,” and to “train activists.” That’s all very legal, but if the point is to help win elections, then it’s not the kind of activity a 501(c)(3) can legally engage in.
According to their website, Grassroots “collectively knocked on over 1.3 million doors to get out the vote in 2016. Our work was concentrated in a few key swing states and important Senate battlegrounds.”
Notice where they worked in the presidential election year of 2016:
Totals by State
Shifts
Knocks
Contacts
Totals
19,783
1,334,941
288,859
Ohio
1,028
72,593
16,764
Pennsylvania
4,739
332,179
85,226
Florida
6,606
436,853
/> 84,638
Missouri
374
27,408
6,397
Nevada
986
64,838
14,913
Connecticut
388
22,172
5,224
Colorado
5,237
346,282
70,781
North Carolina
425
32,076
4,916
Source: grassrootscampaignsinc.tumblr.com
American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)
With the information about these three nonprofits in hand, my team and I decided to compare them to numbers for another left-leaning nonprofit—the ACLU. The ACLU operates both types of nonprofits at every level. In other words, the national and affiliate organizations all have a charitable 501(c)(3)—usually with significant reserves—and a separate 501(c)(4) for political activism.
The trend toward operating two separate entities allows nonprofits to have their cake and eat it, too. It’s all completely legal, but it most certainly blurs the lines between charity and political activism. Given the ability of nonprofits to work within both sets of rules, there is no excuse for engaging the charitable entity in partisan political activities. That’s what the social welfare nonprofit side is doing.
Of course, the ACLU is adamant that the organization is nonpartisan, writing in a 2016 Medium op-ed: “The ACLU is a staunchly non-partisan organization. For 96 years, we have fought to defend the rights enshrined in our Constitution. We have never opposed or supported any candidate for office. And we are not starting now.”
When you visit the ACLU website, the first thing you see is a large image of Donald Trump with the words, “THE FIGHT IS STILL ON” and a red box that says, “Give Monthly.” A pop-up appears that reads, “SEE YOU IN COURT, PRESIDENT TRUMP. We’re fighting to protect democracy and we need your support” followed by the big red “Donate Now” button. Certainly this is an organization that is raising money off of opposition to President Trump rather than support for its core mission of protecting civil liberties. Is the ACLU’s top priority to defend our constitutional rights or to be a front for the Democrat Party? They might tell you both are priorities. But what happens when their two priorities conflict with each other?
Power Grab Page 5