Politics & Stuff

[Atomiswave 6,072]

20 minutes ago, chippy said:

Yes, and its working and tearing countries apart on political sides like I've never seen in my lifetime.  Only the other week 25 retired French Generals called for a military takeover of France. A bit worrying when we start hearing this kind of stuff.

I don't know what the end game is to  all this, but there are dark forces at work here doing shit well beyond my level of thinking.

BLM is a Soros creation, a vile anti life satanic of a cunt. Yes look closely to movies, games etc, white strong males are down the gutter, males looking like pussies and women much superior, agenda driven to create havoc and inbalance amongs other things. End game is already here, take a look around the world, all chaos. And out of this chaos shall THEIR order come forth. On another note the next superman will be played by a black male, fans are livid I can tell you, not because a black person is playing him, but cuz its forced agenda, like the last of us 2 game.

Edited May 13, 2021 by Atomiswave

[chippy 342]

2 minutes ago, Vesper said:

was speaking about the US, as that is what you were ranting on about

I have been talking about the UK and America and the increasingly dangerous, left right divide in the West.

What I said about Tracey Babin's race baiting lies was just a more recent example of what's happening both here, America and other countries.

Here's another recent one from another Labour MP, who's name I can't remember off the top of my head.

In the commons talking about an "urgent question" brought forward by the Labour MP on the deportation of foriegn criminals.

A Tory MP stood up and asked why they having this urgent question on the deportation of criminals when one had never been asked before on that subject? 

The Labour MP was outraged because the crims were Black and being sent back to Jamaica. The Tory MP read out the stats of the nationalities of crims deported over the years. Less than 3% have been from Jamaica, but yet again, the tiny percentage are seen as being worth more attention and protection than everyone else.

This is not the kind of equality most decent people should be striving for. Its actually going against the very meaning of the word and just another reason why so many ordinary people have deserted the Labour Party.

[Vesper 27,351]

1 minute ago, Atomiswave said:

BLM is a Soros creation

prove it

real evidence

verifiable

or take it down

I am so sick of all the RW conspiracy theory claptrap on here

Soros is a cunt, oh so true, but again he is so often just another pantomime villian used to keep the rw rubes in line for their fleecing

what's next, QANON posts about bamboo ballots?

so RW edgelord to toss out Soros, Gates, etc as the root of all evil  🤢

 

[Atomiswave 6,072]

6 minutes ago, Vesper said:

prove it

real evidence

verifiable

or take it down

I am so sick of all the RW conspiracy theory claptrap on here

Soros is a cunt, oh so true, but again he is so often just another pantomime villian used to keep the rw rubes in line for their fleecing

what's next, QANON posts about bamboo ballots?

so RW edgelord to toss out Soros, Gates, etc as the root of all evil  🤢

 

Vesper I dont give a rats ass about left or right, dont care one bit. Soro has spent more than 150M on BLM.

Edited May 13, 2021 by Atomiswave

[Vesper 27,351]

4 minutes ago, Atomiswave said:

Vesper I dont give a rats ass about left or right, dont care one bit. Soro has spent more than 150M on BLM.

link, proof, with documents

that is how this works

back it up or pull it down

and no, an Alex Jones rant is not proof

[chippy 342]

5 minutes ago, Atomiswave said:

BLM is a Soros creation, a vile anti life satanic of a cunt. Yes look closely to movies, games etc, white strong males are down the gutter, males looking like pussies and women much superior, agenda driven to create havoc and inbalance amongs other things. End game is already here, take a look around the world, all chaos. And out of this chaos shall THEIR order come forth. On another note the next superman will be played by a black male, fans are livid I can tell you, not because a black person is playing him, but cuz its forced agenda, like the last of us 2 game.

Yep! 

Its going even further now with Black actors playing real life, historical white figures. Imagine the uproar if a white actor played MLK or any historical black figure, and rightly so I might add.

Where next with this bollox?  Women playing Men and Men playing Women. Disabled actors playing top sportsmen/women.

Get to the stage where we'll have Dawn French  playing Sammy Davis Jnr in a bio pic.

 

[Vesper 27,351]

13 minutes ago, chippy said:

I have been talking about the UK and America and the increasingly dangerous, left right divide in the West.

What I said about Tracey Babin's race baiting lies was just a more recent example of what's happening both here, America and other countries.

Here's another recent one from another Labour MP, who's name I can't remember off the top of my head.

In the commons talking about an "urgent question" brought forward by the Labour MP on the deportation of foriegn criminals.

A Tory MP stood up and asked why they having this urgent question on the deportation of criminals when one had never been asked before on that subject? 

The Labour MP was outraged because the crims were Black and being sent back to Jamaica. The Tory MP read out the stats of the nationalities of crims deported over the years. Less than 3% have been from Jamaica, but yet again, the tiny percentage are seen as being worth more attention and protection than everyone else.

This is not the kind of equality most decent people should be striving for. Its actually going against the very meaning of the word and just another reason why so many ordinary people have deserted the Labour Party.

truly redress Windrush and we can start to talk

otherwise, spare me the white fragility

[Atomiswave 6,072]

3 minutes ago, Vesper said:

link, proof, with documents

that is how this works

back it up or pull it down

and no, an Alex Jones rant is not proof

Alex jones? Nothing but a fool, a shill.

[Vesper 27,351]

4 minutes ago, Atomiswave said:

Alex jones? Nothing but a fool, a shill.

nice evasion

post yer proof or take it down

[chippy 342]

6 minutes ago, Atomiswave said:

Vesper I dont give a rats ass about left or right, dont care one bit. Soro has spent more than 150M on BLM.

And one of BLM's founders has just spent 3 and a half million dollars on 3 houses. Is she moving to downtown southside of Chicago to be with her "brothers and sisters" ? Is she fcuk! She's moved to a cosy place in an erea of Beverly Hills where there's no Black People.

Sickening, hypocritical,  Marxist cnut.

[Atomiswave 6,072]

1 minute ago, Vesper said:

nice evasion

post yer proof or take it down

Im not taking shit down Vesper, evasive? Im not doging anything. You go and connect the dots Vesper. I get it you are black so its delicate matter and I fully get you, but what we are seeing now is not right, either side of the coin. BLM is a tool and its effectiveness is zero as we can see. Bending the knee is not the answer imo.

[Atomiswave 6,072]

4 minutes ago, chippy said:

And one of BLM's founders has just spent 3 and a half million dollars on 3 houses. Is she moving to downtown southside of Chicago to be with her "brothers and sisters" ? Is she fcuk! She's moved to a cosy place in an erea of Beverly Hills where there's no Black People.

Sickening, hypocritical,  Marxist cnut.

Yup I have seen that.....BLM is a tool sadly.

[chippy 342]

7 minutes ago, Vesper said:

truly redress Windrush and we can start to talk

otherwise, spare me the white fragility.

Dirty trick to try and conflate the legit scandal of Windrush with the criminal scum (included murders, armed robbers and rapists) being sent back to Jamaica.

The Windrush folk will be compensated in time. Hard to put a reasonable figure on what to give tho.

[Atomiswave 6,072]

10 minutes ago, Vesper said:

nice evasion

post yer proof or take it down

"BLM... it is NOT even a real black organization. IT NEVER WAS.

"Anyways, if you do your work you know that BLM is endorsed by the SOROS and the CLINTON family. If you have any kind of a brain, you know that those same people don't give a damn about you... they're exploiting the black plight to make money off of you. They're using your emotions... they're using that against you so you can join these evil, demonic people...

[Vesper 27,351]

6 minutes ago, chippy said:

And one of BLM's founders has just spent 3 and a half million dollars on 3 houses. Is she moving to downtown southside of Chicago to be with her "brothers and sisters" ? Is she fcuk! She's moved to a cosy place in an erea of Beverly Hills where there's no Black People.

Sickening, hypocritical,  Marxist cnut.

Fact check: Missing context in claim about Black Lives Matter co-founder's property purchases

https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2021/04/19/fact-check-misleading-claim-blm-co-founders-real-estate/7241450002/

The claim: Black Lives Matter donations helped bankroll  co-founder's home purchases

Real estate purchased by a co-founder of Black Lives Matter was put under the  spotlight this month after the New York Post reported on what it called a “buying spree” Patrisse Khan-Cullors began in 2016.

Social media users seized on the report as an indication that Khan-Cullors was being enriched by the Black Lives Matter movement. 

“Unbelievable. Big pay day coming soon after the (Derek) Chauvin trial,” read one Facebook post from April 11.

That text accompanied a picture of Khan-Cullors holding up her right fist, and the text “Black Lives Matter co-founder Khan-Cullors reportedly bought four luxury homes.” The post generated hundreds of shares and comments, including from users who suggested that Khan-Cullors was profiting from donations to Black Lives Matter.

The Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation has taken in about $90 million in 2020, when racial unrest exploded nationwide after the killing by police of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, according to the Associated Press.

But there is no evidence to support the idea that Khan-Cullors used donations that poured in amid nationwide protests in 2020 to bankroll the purchase of four homes.

The account that shared the Facebook post did not respond to a request for comment.

 

Real estate purchased

The New York Post reported that Khan-Cullors has purchased four properties in recent years, though two came before 2020 brought a swell of attention and donations to Black Lives Matter. Three of those properties were in the Los Angeles area, and one was in suburban Atlanta, according to the Post.

One of the Los Angeles properties cost $510,000 when Khan-Cullors purchased it in 2016. A second Los Angeles home ran her $590,000 in 2018, the Post reported. A suburban Atlanta property was purchased for $415,000 in 2020.

Public records searches by USA TODAY found Khan-Cullors linked to all three of those properties.

The New York Post story links back to the real estate blog Dirt for information about the purchase of a fourth property. The blog reported that Khan-Cullors purchased the home in Los Angeles’ Topanga Canyon for $1.4 million on March 30 through a limited liability company.

USA TODAY was unable to verify the Topanga Canyon property purchase.

Were purchases connected to BLM?

The core question here is whether Khan-Cullors' purchases are linked to her BLM role, as the post implies.

For this claim, like any others we fact-check, the burden of proof is on the speaker. The post provided no proof of such a connection, the author did not respond to provide any, and we found none in our research, though documents are limited given the nature of the organization and Khan-Cullors' employment history.

The New York Post report, which cited the real estate blog Dirt, touched off a cascade of criticism about the real estate purchases, including from the conservative nonprofit National Legal and Policy Center. 

National Legal and Policy Center Chairman Peter Flaherty said in a prepared statement provided to USA TODAY that "donors to any nonprofit group should know how the organization spends its funds" and pointed out that the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation has not filed public IRS disclosures.

The foundation received its official non-profit designation from the Internal Revenue Service in December, according to the Associated Press, and will be required to file public tax documents in the future. No public financial filings have yet been made.

Khan-Cullors said there's no connection between the home purchases and her BLM role.

“To be abundantly clear, as a registered 501c3, BLMGNF cannot and did not commit any organizational resources toward the purchase of my personal property,” Khan-Cullors said in a prepared statement . “Any insinuation or assertion to the contrary is categorically false.”

In a cease-and-desist letter responding to a press release from the policy center, the BLM foundation responded to demand the National Legal and Policy Center remove the “insinuation” that “funds from the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation’s funds have been used, directly or indirectly, to purchase real estate.”

Poll: Stark divide on race, policing emerges since George Floyd's death, USA TODAY/Ipsos Poll shows

Khan-Cullors said in a prepared statement she has been paid a total of $120,000 from the organization since 2013 for acting as spokesperson and “political education work,” but she has not been paid since 2019.

Khan-Cullors pointed out the myriad jobs she has held. She has two book deals, including authorship of a New York Times best-selling memoir. The Los Angeles Times reported last year that Khan-Cullors signed a production deal with Warner Brothers “to develop scripted dramas and comedies, docuseries and animated programming for children, young adults and families.”

Khan-Cullors also noted that she is a public speaker, owns a gallery, has a deal with YouTube and teaches at a private liberal arts college in Arizona.

Our rating: Missing context

The claim that Black Lives Matter co-founder Patrisse Khan-Cullors bought four luxury homes is MISSING CONTEXT, because without additional information it could be misleading. While some social media users suggested that the purchases were evidence that Khan-Cullors had been enriched by the movement, our research revealed no evidence that Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation funds were used to purchase property. Khan-Cullors has held several other jobs in addition to her work as the organization’s volunteer executive director, including writing a memoir and developing content for Warner Brothers.

Our fact-check sources:

• The Associated Press, Feb. 23, AP Exclusive: Black Lives Matter opens up about its finances
• Instagram, April 14, Patrisse Khan-Cullors post
• National Legal and Policy Center, April 10, Black Lives Matter Founder Patrisse Cullors Owns Expensive Real Estate
• The New York Post, April 10, Inside BLM co-founder Patrisse Khan-Cullors’ million-dollar real estate buying binge
• Patrisse Collors website, accessed April 19, About Patrisse Cullors
• The Los Angeles Times, Oct. 15, 2020, Black Lives Matter co-founder Patrisse Cullors lands Warner Bros. TV production deal

 

 

 

No Evidence BLM Co-Founder Patrisse Cullors Used Donations To Buy House

Let's talk about home prices in Los Angeles.

https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/patrisse-cullors-topanga-house/

Origin

On April 7, 2021, the real estate gossip website Dirt reported that Black Lives Matter co-founder Patrisse Cullors had purchased a home in Topanga, an eccentric neighborhood located in the western portion of Los Angeles, for $1.4 million.

Categorized under real estate purchases by “politicians,” Dirt’s headline reported, “Black Lives Matter Co-Founder Patrisse Khan-Cullors Lands Topanga Canyon Compound.” (Cullors is a political activist, but she isn’t a “politician” in the sense that she holds public office.)

The story sparked a tsunami of spinoff articles and commentary with the aggregate effect of creating a cloud of doubt over the finances of the nonprofit organization associated with the Black Lives Matter movement, the peak of which was a claim in a meme that baselessly accused Cullors of using donations to Black Lives Matter to purchase the house:

But Dirt’s article, which is the source that all of the stories and posts about the Topanga home purchase are based on, didn’t report that Cullors purchased the home with BLM donations. It said the home was sold “to a corporate entity that public records show is controlled” by Cullors, but didn’t name the corporation.

 

 

Cullors is a fairly high-profile public figure. Aside from being an activist and organizer, she makes frequent media appearances. She is the co-author of a best-selling book, “When They Call You a Terrorist: A Black Lives Matter Memoir.” She also signed a deal with Warner Brothers in late 2020 to create programming for the network’s various platforms.

We sent Dirt an email asking if they would disclose the name of the business entity the home was sold to, but didn’t receive a response in time for publication.

We haven’t been able to independently verify Dirt’s report that Cullors purchased the home in Topanga. Her name didn’t come up in our own public records search.

In a statement sent to Snopes by email, the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation (BLMGNF) directly denied the allegation:

To be abundantly clear, as a registered 501c3, BLMGNF cannot and did not commit any organizational resources toward the purchase of personal property by any employee or volunteer. Any insinuation or assertion to the contrary is categorically false.

Since the organization’s inception in 2013, the Foundation said Cullors received compensation totaling $120,000 for work that included serving as spokesperson and engaging in political education. Since 2019, Cullors’ role with the Foundation has been voluntary and unpaid. She currently serves as the executive director, per the Foundation’s statement.

The organization also characterized the narrative as a “right-wing offensive” against a high-profile Black activist that “not only puts Patrisse, her child and her loved ones in harm’s way, it also continues a tradition of terror by white supremacists against Black activists.”

We’ll break down some of the dialogue and reporting around this story, but the important points are these: If it’s true that Cullors purchased the Topanga home, no evidence has been presented that proves she did so with donation money. This claim is based on supposition. Important additional context is that while many stories about the home portray it as a lavish purchase, those portrayals are exaggerated.

 

Is the Home a ‘Mansion’ That Is ‘Near Beverly Hills’?

Compared with other properties listed on Dirt, the home reportedly purchased by Cullors is relatively modest. Other posts on the site detail multi-million dollar estates bought by the likes of pop music icon Madonna, tennis champion Serena Williams, and pop star Ariana Grande.

Even if it’s true that Cullors purchased a single family home in Los Angeles for $1.4 million, we note that because of overall home prices in L.A., that amount doesn’t go as far as it would in other areas.

Dirt reports that the home in Topanga has three bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a guest house and sits on just over a quarter of an acre-sized lot. It’s not small but to call it a “mansion” as Fox News did in an April 13 headline is a stretch.

Right-leaning Media Research Center tweeted, “The liberal media won’t cover this: [Black Lives Matter] co-founder Patrisse Cullors bought a 1.4 MILLION dollar house near Beverly Hills.”

Everything in the city of Los Angeles could technically be described as being “near Beverly Hills” just as easily as it could be described as being “near Disneyland.” The Topanga community is about 20 miles from Beverly Hills.

Did Cullors Go on a ‘Million-Dollar Real Estate Buying Binge’?

Many of the reports touched on tensions among some activists within the Black Lives Matter movement itself by quoting comments given by Hawk Newsome, a BLM activist in New York, who told the New York Post he thought the nonprofit’s finances should be investigated.

 

Aside from getting record numbers of feet on the street in demonstrations across the country in the spring and summer of 2020, Black Lives Matter organizers told The Associated Press that it brought in $90 million in donations to the nonprofit organization associated with the movement, the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation.

The Post story published on April 10 also reported Cullors went on a “million dollar real estate buying binge” and claimed she spent $3.2 million “snagging four high-end homes.”

When you read past the headline and leading language, the Post story really describes two modest home purchases, one in South Los Angeles (formerly known as South Central) and the other in Inglewood. Both homes are in working class communities and were purchased for $590,000 and $510,000 respectively. Like most homes in Los Angeles, they have appreciated in value since their most recent purchase date.

The Post also reports Cullors’ wife bought a home in rural Georgia and that the couple “eyed” luxury property in the Bahamas, without purchasing it.

Was this a “buying binge”? We don’t have enough information from the Post story to answer questions like: Were these homes consecutively purchased, lived in and sold? Were other parties involved in the reported purchases? Were they lived in by family members? Did any of the addresses crop up due to errors in public records databases?

Black Lives Matter and Historical Context

Black Lives Matter was founded in 2013 by three women: Cullors, Alicia Garza, and Opal Tometi. It was originated as a response to the acquittal of George Zimmerman, a Florida neighborhood watch volunteer who shot and killed Black teenager Trayvon Martin. But the phrase and its underlying civil rights cause have been the rallying cry for a national racial justice movement in response to the killing of Black people by police, and racism embedded in the criminal justice system.

The spring and summer of 2020 saw the movement’s biggest demonstrations in its history, with millions of Americans braving the COVID-19 pandemic to take to the streets, touched off by the killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor.

As the movement reached critical mass and thus scored social and political wins, which included major companies affirming their commitment to racial justice and the election of progressive leaders, Black Lives Matter has also been a regular target for right-wing media and commenters.

 

Black Lives Matter Opens Up About Its Finances

The foundation widely seen as a steward of the Black Lives Matter movement says it took in just over $90 million last year.

https://www.snopes.com/ap/2021/02/23/black-lives-matter-opens-up-about-its-finances/

NEW YORK (AP) — The foundation widely seen as a steward of the Black Lives Matter movement says it took in just over $90 million last year, according to a financial snapshot shared exclusively with The Associated Press.

The Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation is now building infrastructure to catch up to the speed of its funding and plans to use its endowment to become known for more than protests after Black Americans die at the hands of police or vigilantes.

“We want to uplift Black joy and liberation, not just Black death. We want to see Black communities thriving, not just surviving,” reads an impact report the foundation shared with the AP before releasing it.

This marks the first time in the movement’s nearly eight-year history that BLM leaders have revealed a detailed look at their finances. The foundation’s coffers and influence grew immensely following the May 2020 death of George Floyd, a Black man whose last breaths under the knee of a white Minneapolis police officer sparked protests across the U.S. and around the world.

That growth also caused longstanding tensions to boil over between some of the movement’s grassroots organizers and national leaders — the former went public last fall with grievances about financial transparency, decision-making and accountability.

 

 

The foundation said it committed $21.7 million in grant funding to official and unofficial BLM chapters, as well as 30 Black-led local organizations. It ended 2020 with a balance of more than $60 million, after spending nearly a quarter of its assets on the grant funds and other charitable giving.

In its report, the BLM foundation said individual donations via its main fundraising platform averaged $30.76. More than 10% of the donations were recurring. The report does not state who gave the money in 2020, and leaders declined to name prominent donors.

Last year, the foundation’s expenses were approximately $8.4 million — that includes staffing, operating and administrative costs, along with activities such as civic engagement, rapid response and crisis intervention.

One of its focuses for 2021 will be economic justice, particularly as it relates to the ongoing socioeconomic impact of COVID-19 on Black communities.

The racial justice movement had a broad impact on philanthropic giving last year. According to an upcoming report by Candid and the Center for Disaster Philanthropy, 35% of the $20.2 billion in U.S. funding dollars from corporations, foundations, public charities and high-net-worth individuals to address COVID-19 was explicitly designated for communities of color.

After the 2013 acquittal of George Zimmerman, the neighborhood watch volunteer who killed 17-year-old Trayvon Martin in Florida, BLM’s founders pledged to build a decentralized movement governed by consensus of a members’ collective. In 2015, a network of chapters was formed, as support and donations poured in. But critics say the BLM Global Network Foundation has increasingly moved away from being a Black radical organizing hub and become a mainstream philanthropic and political organization run without democratic input from its earliest grassroots supporters.

BLM co-founder Patrisse Cullors told the AP that the foundation is focused on a “need to reinvest into Black communities.”

“One of our biggest goals this year is taking the dollars we were able to raise in 2020 and building out the institution we’ve been trying to build for the last seven and a half years,” she said in an interview.

 

Cullors, who was already active in her native Los Angeles, where she created her own social justice organization, Power and Dignity Now, became the global foundation’s full-time executive director last year.

Fellow co-founders Alicia Garza, who is the principal at Black Futures Lab, and Opal Tometi, who created a Black new media and advocacy hub called Diaspora Rising, are not involved with the foundation. Garza and Tometi do continue to make appearances as movement co-founders.

In 2020, the foundation spun off its network of chapters as a sister collective called BLM Grassroots. The chapters, along with other Black-led local organizations, became eligible in July for financial resources through a $12 million grant fund. Although there are many groups that use “Black Lives Matter” or “BLM” in their names, less than a dozen are currently considered affiliates of the chapter network.

According to foundation records shared with the AP, several chapters, including in the cities of Washington, Philadelphia and Chicago, were notified last year of their eligibility to receive $500,000 each in funding under a multiyear agreement. Only one BLM group in Denver has signed the agreement and received its funds in September.

____

CHAPTERS CALL FOR MORE TRANSPARENCY

A group of 10 chapters, called the #BLM10, rejected the foundation’s funding offer last year and complained publicly about the lack of donor transparency. Foundation leaders say only a few of the 10 chapters are recognized as network affiliates.

In a letter released Nov. 30, the #BLM10 claimed most chapters have received little to no financial resources from the BLM movement since its launch in 2013. That has had adverse consequences for the scope of their organizing work, local chapter leaders told the AP.

 

The chapters are simply asking for an equal say in “this thing that our names are attached to, that they are doing in our names,” said Black Lives Matter DC organizer April Goggans, who is part of the #BLM10 along with groups in Indianapolis, Oklahoma City, San Diego, Hudson Valley, New York, and elsewhere.

“We are BLM. We built this, each one of us,” she said.

Records show some chapters have received multiple rounds of funding in amounts ranging between $800 and $69,000, going back as far as 2016. The #BLM10 said the amounts given have been far from equitable when compared to how much BLM has raised over the years. But Cullors disagreed.

“Because the BLM movement was larger than life — and it is larger than life — people made very huge assumptions about what our actual finances looked like,” Cullors said. “We were often scraping for money, and this year was the first year where we were resourced in the way we deserved to be.”

Still, the #BLM10 members said reality didn’t match the picture movement founders were projecting around the world. In its early years, BLM disclosed receiving donations from A-list celebrities such as Beyoncé, Jay-Z and Prince, prior to his death in 2016.

Leaders at the BLM foundation admit that they have not been clear about the movement’s finances and governance over the years. But now the foundation is more open about such matters. It says the fiscal sponsor currently managing its money requires spending be approved by a collective action fund, which is a board made up of representatives from official BLM chapters.

After Floyd’s killing in Minneapolis, the surge of donations saw the foundation go from small, scrappy movement to maturing institution. Last summer, leaders sought nonprofit status with the IRS, which was granted in December, allowing the organization to receive tax-deductible donations directly. In the near future, that also will require the foundation to file public 990 forms, revealing details of its organizational structure, employee compensation, programming and expenses.

Brad Smith, president of Candid, an organization that provides information about philanthropic groups, said there are other ways for nonprofits to be transparent with the public besides federal disclosure forms. He said a philanthropic organization’s website is its best tool to show how willing it is to be held accountable.

“In exchange for getting tax exempt status, you as an organization committed to providing a greater level of transparency to confirm you are fulfilling your mission,” he said.

It’s because of Cullors, Garza and Tometi’s vision, along with the work of so many Black organizers in the ecosystem, that the BLM movement finds itself at a new phase of its development, said Melina Abdullah, co-founder of BLM’s first ever chapter in Los Angeles.

“We’re turning a corner, recognizing that we have to build institutions that endure beyond us,” Abdullah told the AP.

 

 

 

Fact-check: Do donations to Black Lives Matter go to a ‘Democrat Super PAC’?

---

https://eu.statesman.com/story/news/politics/elections/2020/06/16/fact-check-do-donations-to-black-lives-matter-go-to-lsquodemocrat-super-pacrsquo/42498563/

Since protests over the death of George Floyd erupted in late May, donations to civil rights organizations have surged. But some conservative commentators say not all the money is going toward the cause.

In a since-deleted June 11 Facebook post, Ryan Fournier, co-founder of Students for Trump, claimed that donations to Black Lives Matter were actually being funneled to Democratic campaigns.

"All money donated to Black Lives Matter goes directly to ActBlue, a Democrat Super PAC that then feeds the money to Democrat candidates," he said. "Congratulations, you played yourself."

The post was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. Fournier deleted the post after we reached out to him, but the Twitter version remained posted.

Other conservative commentators, such as Candace Owens and the Hodgetwins, Instagram posts have made similar allegations. So we looked into them.

The post is inaccurate. ActBlue is a platform for people to contribute to Democratic campaigns and other causes like Black Lives Matter. It passes along donations to organizations that use its fundraising platform — it doesn’t pocket the money itself.

Claim came from Instagram story

We reached out to Fournier for the source of his claim and haven’t heard back. His assertion appears to stem from a video circulating on social media.

The video shows a screen recording of an Instagram story from a user in Miami. He attributed the information to a conservative Instagram account called "Telerevela," which started posting in February and publishes conspiratorial posts about the coronavirus pandemic and protests over police brutality in Spanish. Telerevela posted an identical video, albeit in Spanish, on Facebook around 1 a.m. on June 11.

The video, which has nearly 2 million views on Twitter, lays out a false trail for Black Lives Matter donations.

In it, the user tries to donate to Black Lives Matter. When they tap the donate button on the movement’s website, they’re directed to a web address that has ActBlue in it. The donation page also has a disclosure about the nonprofit.

Then, they open up a page from OpenSecrets.org — the website of the nonprofit Center for Responsive Politics, which tracks money in politics — to see how ActBlue spends its money. They highlight what appear to be several multi-million dollar contributions to Democratic presidential candidates like Sen. Bernie Sanders and former Vice President Joe Biden.

"And that my fellow Americans is how ‘white collar’ money laundering is done," reads some text at the end of the video. "BLM is just another corrupt arm of the (Democratic National Committee)."

The video misrepresents what ActBlue does, as well as where donations to Black Lives Matter actually go.

Video misrepresents ActBlue platform

Black Lives Matter is using ActBlue’s fundraising platform to take donations. But ActBlue isn’t pocketing the money.

ActBlue told us in an email that it passes along contributions from its fundraising platform directly to the 501(c)(3) charities or 501(c)(4) nonprofits that asked for them. Its function is similar to PayPal or Stripe, which are conduits for online purchases.

OpenSecrets also clarified that point in a tweeted response to Candace Owens’ post, saying that "a donation to BLM through ActBlue goes just to BLM, not any other group."

OpenSecrets compared ActBlue with WinRed, a fundraising platform for Republican campaigns and causes that was launched in 2019 to compete with ActBlue. Both organizations facilitate fundraising for aligned political groups.

Despite being classified as political action committees by the Federal Election Commission, ActBlue and WinRed have "non-contribution accounts," meaning they have separate bank accounts that "will not be used to make contributions, whether direct, in-kind or via coordinated communications, or coordinated expenditures, to federal candidates or committees," according to the FEC.

Democratic and Republican presidential candidates are listed as "top vendors/recipients" on ActBlue and WinRed’s OpenSecrets pages not because the organizations have directly donated to them, but rather because the organizations act as "middle men" between the donors and the candidates.

For example, if you were to go to Biden’s donation page, you would be redirected to a page on ActBlue’s fundraising platform to complete the transaction. Similarly, if you tried to donate to President Donald Trump’s re-election campaign, you’d be redirected to a page from WinRed.

As the Center for Public Integrity reported when WinRed was launched, the idea is to make it easier for political campaigns to fundraise small-dollar donations.

"Take the 2018 midterm elections, when Democratic House and Senate candidates outraised Republicans more than two to one in contributions from individuals," the center wrote. "Republicans pointed to ActBlue, which helps donors more easily give money to Democratic candidates and liberal political groups, as a big reason why."

We reached out to Black Lives Matter for a comment, but we haven’t heard back. Black Lives Matter Global Foundation, Inc., the organization that operates the Black Lives Matter website, is a nonprofit. The Internal Revenue Service stipulates that 501(c)(3) organizations are "absolutely prohibited" from making contributions to political campaigns.

Our ruling

A popular claim on social media asserts that donations to Black Lives Matter go directly to ActBlue, which uses them to fund Democratic campaigns.

It’s wrong. ActBlue is a nonprofit technology organization that provides a platform for people to contribute to Democratic campaigns and causes. Black Lives Matter and Democratic presidential candidates use the platform to fundraise.

ActBlue does not pocket donations that are facilitated by its platform — it routes donations to organizations in a similar way to the Republican fundraising platform WinRed.

The Facebook post is inaccurate. We rate it False.

[Vesper 27,351]

6 minutes ago, Atomiswave said:

"BLM... it is NOT even a real black organization. IT NEVER WAS.

"Anyways, if you do your work you know that BLM is endorsed by the SOROS and the CLINTON family. If you have any kind of a brain, you know that those same people don't give a damn about you... they're exploiting the black plight to make money off of you. They're using your emotions... they're using that against you so you can join these evil, demonic people...

in other words, you have NOTHING

you are just talking out yer arse

done here

👎🏽👎🏽

Edited May 13, 2021 by Vesper

[Atomiswave 6,072]

14 minutes ago, Vesper said:

in other words, you have NOTHING

you are just talking out yer arse

done here

👎🏽👎🏽

I have plenty, called common sense. We will have to agree to disagree Vesper, no reason to fight over it......its all good take care ✌️

[ZAPHOD2319 3,881]

Not all associated with the movement are wonderful people. I would not judge the intentions of the collective whole by the actions of a few. I can like where the movement is going and understand there will always be people taking advantage of any situation.

 

I think Earth Day has merit, even though the founder of the idea murdered his girlfriend and kept her in a box in his house until the stench became so bad the police arrested him.

https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna42711922