Best of CRC Media Hits for October 2021

A highlight of October 2021 was the appearance of two separate op-eds in the respected Washington Examiner on the same day. Not only did our Research Director Mike Watson share a byline with Heritage Foundation’s Hans Von Spakovsky on a piece detailing the marriage of redistricting and politics, but our senior investigative researcher Hayden Ludwig also had a piece in the same outlet discussing the left’s obsession with using Biden’s “build back better” agenda to soak the rich (or so they say).

We fleshed out our media hits for the rest of the month with some great quotes in the Chronicle of Philanthropy, New York Post, and National Review.

As usual, we kept pushing the mainstream press to consider covering issues related to the funding of influencers in our politics. Below are the best from October 2021:

“Multi-Million Dollar Tax-Free Activists Want to Soak the Rich with Biden’s Agenda”
Washington Examiner, Hayden Ludwig (Op-ed), October 25, 2021

Groups secretly representing the Left’s most powerful and well-heeled “dark money” network are pressuring Congress to pass President Joe Biden’s expansive “Build Back Better” agenda, claiming it’ll force the rich to pay their fair share.

Who are they kidding?

Tax March , which calls itself “a grassroots effort to demand accountability and tax fairness,” launched a $2 million advocacy campaign last month demanding Republicans support the Biden agenda, accusing them of shielding the wealthy and big companies at the expense of the poor and middle class. [Bullet-point formatting omitted]

“Politics and Redistricting: An Inevitable Marriage”
Washington Examiner, Mike Watson/Hans Von Spakovsky (Op-ed), October 25, 2021

How can we eliminate gerrymandering?

One proposal is to let independent officials, rather than state legislators, draw the boundary lines for congressional districts. These officials would be obligated not to let political considerations influence their work.

It sounds very objective and nonpartisan — very sensible, in fact. Except it isn’t.

“Facts About Zuck Bucks: How He Swung the Electorate in 2020”
New York Post, Mollie Hemingway, October 13, 2021

How the “nonpartisan” Center for Tech and Civic Life helped sway the election for Democrats, according to ­Mollie Hemingway’s book “Rigged: How the Media, Big Tech, aand the Democrats Seized Our Elections.”

The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, an organization led by Mark Zuckerberg’s wife Priscilla Chan, gave more than $350 million to CTCL in 2020. In 2018, CTCL’s budget had been only $1.4 million.

Democratic counties in Pennsylvania also were targeted for Zuck Buck infusions. The Capital Research Center determined that Biden won eight of the 10 highest-funded CTCL counties in the state, which together received $21,047,163, or more than 95 percent of all grants statewide.

“The 2020 Election Wasn’t Stolen, It Was Bought by Mark Zuckerberg”
The Federalist, William Doyle, October 12, 2021

The Center for Technology and Civic Life (CTCL) and The Center for Election Innovation and Research (CEIR) passed a staggering $419.5 million of Zuckerberg’s money into local government elections offices, and it came with strings attached. Every CTCL and CEIR grant spelled out in great detail the conditions under which the grant money was to be used.

This is not a matter of Democrats outspending Republicans. Private funding of election administration was virtually unknown in the American political system before the 2020 election.

Big CTCL and CEIR money had nothing to do with traditional campaign finance, lobbying, or other expenses that are related to increasingly expensive modern elections. It had to do with financing the infiltration of election offices at the city and county level by left-wing activists, and using those offices as a platform to implement preferred administrative practices, voting methods, and data-sharing agreements, as well as to launch intensive outreach campaigns in areas heavy with Democratic voters.

Mollie Hemingway: Twitter
Tucker Carlson Show, September 28, 2021

I’ll be on Tucker tonight to discuss Rigged! https://amazon.com/dp/168451259X/ref=cm_sw_r_tw_awdb_imm_549CR65K6QRC8Y9FTZNN… via

@amazon

“As Charitable Giving Rates Sag, Foundations Back Ambitious New Effort to Ignite Generosity by All Americans”
Chronicle of Philanthropy, Alex Daniels, October 12, 2021

In a new effort backed by more than $2 million in grants from the nation’s biggest foundations, a group of philanthropy leaders today announced the public kickoff off a campaign to drive greater giving of time and money, especially from middle- and low-income Americans. Noting that financial donations dropped to an all-time low — just 50 percent of people give — and anger at billionaires and income inequality is growing, organizers of the effort said it is crucial to “reignite generosity — and engage every American in the process.”

In a document outlining the commission’s work, organizers said they worried that in a time of growing division in the United States, one of the key indicators of connectedness crucial to a functioning democracy — support of nonprofit efforts — faced an “uncertain” future.

“Capital Research Center Expert: Democrats’ Alternative Voting Rights Act Could Federalize Nation’s Elections”
DC Business Daily, W.J. Kennedy, September 28, 2021

A telling sign of the true intent of the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act (House Resolution 4), the congressional Democrats’ alternative effort at making sweeping changes to the country’s election laws, is the support it has garnered from left-leaning activist groups, writes Hayden Ludwig, senior investigative researcher for the Capital Research Center.

The center says it supports “the principles of individual liberty, free market economy and limited constitutional government.”

Ludwig says the legislation would federalize the nation’s elections “almost as effectively” as House Resolution 1, the so-called For the Peoples Act (stalled in a Senate split 50-50), which is why “many professional activist groups are trying to push it through the Senate.”