Why Is A 501(c)(4) Allowed Not To Disclose Donors? Sounds Like A Dark Money Pit

‘March For Our Lives’ Now Operating Under Dark Money Nonprofit Advocacy Group

Group will not be required to reveal its donors

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BY: Stephen Gutowski and Joe Schoffstall
March 21, 2018 5:00 am

March For Our Lives, a demonstration involving survivors of the Parkland school shooting that will take place Saturday in Washington, D.C., and across the country, registered a 501(c)(4) nonprofit advocacy organization that is not required to disclose its donors.

The March for Our Lives Action Fund, a 501(c)(4) "social welfare" nonprofit organization, was registered on March 8 with the D.C. Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs, records show. The action fund lists its business address in Encino, Calif., and its agent as CT Corporation System, a D.C.-based firm that offers agent, incorporation, and corporate business compliance services.

Jeri Rhodes, an associate executive secretary for finance and administration at the Friends Committee on National Legislation, a group that "lobbies Congress and the administration to advance peace, justice, opportunity, and environmental stewardship," is also listed as the action fund's executing officer and governor on its registration. Rhodes previously served as chief financial officer for Greenpeace.

While the organization said on its website it is "for kids and by kids" and the "March For Our Lives organizers are the kids themselves," it also said the kids "have brought in support to help ensure it is a success." A coalition of liberal advocacy groups are currently involved in organizing and planning the march. In addition to support from leading gun-control groups like Everytown for Gun Safety, the Brady Campaign, and Giffords, organizers from the Women's March, Planned Parenthood, and Move On are involved with the permitting for the event as well as promoting it.

March For Our Lives is even directing donations to Everytown, which has set up a March For Our Lives Initiative under their own 501(c)(3) operation. Donations to that fund will be tax deductible, and its donors will have to be publicly disclosed.

However, the March For Our Lives Action Fund, as a 501(c)(4) organization, will not be required to disclose its donors, and individuals who send cash to the group can remain anonymous. A 501(c)(4) designated group can be involved in political activity as long as it does not become its primary focus. The organization said on its website it chose to incorporate the group this way because it plans to lobby for new gun-control legislation even after Saturday's march.

"March for Our Lives Action Fund is tax-exempt under section 501(c)(4) of the Internal Revenue Code," it said. "Unlike section 501(c)(3) charitable organizations which have restrictions on their lobbying activities, section 501(c)(4) organizations are permitted to conduct unlimited lobbying for federal tax purposes. This form of entity gives the students maximum flexibility to conduct high-impact legislative advocacy during the Day of Action and beyond."

They said the donations being made to the group now will be used to cover expenses for the march and also future lobbying efforts.

"Donations to the March For Our Lives Action Fund will cover all expenses associated with the march taking place in Washington, D.C., on Saturday, March 24th," the site said. "The funds will also be used to fight for comprehensive gun safety legislation at the local, state, and federal level, and will also include voter education, ballot initiatives, and lobbying state legislatures and Congress to protect America's kids."

Despite the anonymous nature of the group's funding, there is some information on who has given money to the group thus far because a number of celebrities have announced their own donations publicly. Oprah Winfrey, George Clooney, Steven Spielberg, and Jeffrey Katzenberg have each donated $500,000. The fashion company Gucci has also publicly announced their own half-million-dollar donation. Those publicly disclosed donations total $2.5 million.

The group also announced that the proceeds from the GoFundMe fundraiser, which raised $3.3 million in the immediate aftermath of the Parkland shooting, would be split between a separate fund that will help financially support the families of the victims and the March For Our Lives Action Fund. It is unclear how much money the Action Fund has raised since the GoFundMe fundraiser was ended and the group switched to raising money through The Action Network, a fundraising platform designed to assist progressive causes. The group won't be required to file financial disclosures for several months.

Rhodes and March for Our Lives did not immediately return a request for comment.

Anarchists Like Greenpeace Are Losing The War

Greenpeace Unfurls Giant Anti-Trump Banner From Crane. Trump Still President.

Photo by Samuel Corum/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

BY:

 JOSHUA YASMEH

JANUARY 26, 2017

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Members of the anti-science activist group Greenpeace risked their lives
Wednesday for a futile publicity stunt, climbing a 270-foot crane in downtown
 Washington DC to unfurl a giant 35 foot-by-75-foot orange and black anti-
Trump banner that read: “Resist.” The banner was visible from the White House.

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VIDEOAnti-Trump protesters unfurl "Resist" banner atop D.C. crane

In recent months, far-left agitators have appropriated terms like “resist” and
“revolution,” farcically conjuring up the image of jungle-dwelling anti-imperialist
 guerillas intent on detonating makeshift explosives near government buildings,
 to oppose the supposedly “fascist” reign of President Donald J. Trump.

Greenpeace’s “protest” had all the hallmarks of a contemporary leftist exercise
 in moral preening. For one, the disruptive act did nothing to change the reality
 on the ground. Trump is still president. Both houses of Congress are still
controlled by the Republican Party. But more importantly, the self-styled
environmentalist group’s theatrics only managed to harm everyday people,
 rather than those frolicking the halls of powers. The group was allegedly
 protesting the Trump administration's decision to green light the Keystone
 XL pipeline and Dakota Access pipeline projects.

DC residents were blocked from getting to work, thanks to the
 “resistance” fighters.

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“D.C. police waited out the seven protesters, shutting down traffic at a major
 intersection through the morning commute and into the evening and suspending
work on new offices for Fannie Mae at 15th and L streets NW,” reports The
 Washington Post. “The action is one of several protests in the District since
just before the presidential inauguration, and more are planned in the coming
weeks.” Great job sticking it to the man.

The protesters were apparently all expert climbers equipped with safety
 harnesses and helmets, according to Greenpeace.  They remained suspended
 270-feet in the air for several hours until all seven activists finally came
down from the crane only to be arrested by police waiting down below.
“They were charged with second-degree burglary, unlawful entry, and
destruction of property,” notes The Post.

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When the protest finally ended at 10 pm, taxpayer-funded emergency
services, including firemen, paramedics, and police officers, had been
stuck playing the waiting game for 18 hours.

Fortunately, nobody was hurt during the stunt.

Despite the seemingly impish nature of Wednesday’s stunt, Greenpeace’s
 usual modi operandi are far from innocuous.

Indeed, the activist group is infamous for its “resistance” against genetically
modified organisms, or GMOs. Propagating anti-science rhetoric and
 alternative facts, Greenpeace has waged a war against the scientific
community and its unequivocal endorsement of GMOs as a safe and sustainable.

Perhaps the most vocal votary of the anti-science Left, Greenpeace has
attempted to infect the body politic with ignorance and fear-mongering to
peddle a conspiratorial agenda about “Frankenfoods.”

Unfortunately, the group’s activism isn’t just restricted to rhetoric.

Comprised of mostly over-privileged and well-fed white Westerners,
Greenpeace has worked to disrupt the development and distribution
of Golden Rice, a Vitamin A-infused GMO rice product that was hailed by
 scientists as a panacea to curing children in underdeveloped regions of
 the world, including sub-Saharan Africa, of blindness and death due to Vitamin A deficiency.

Vandalizing farms and harassing impoverished Golden Rice
 farmers in the Philippines and elsewhere, Greenpeace activists
delayed the developmental process only to deprive desperate, dying children
 of the life-saving product.

In addition, the group initiated a PR war against NGOs and charities, like the
Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, devoted to distributing the product to
 the poorest regions of the world.

“By 2002, Golden Rice was technically ready to go. Animal testing had
 found no health risks. Syngenta, which had figured out how to insert the
 Vitamin A–producing gene from carrots into rice, had handed all financial
 interests over to a non-profit organization, so there would be no
resistance to the life-saving technology from GMO opponents who resist
 genetic modification because big biotech companies profit from it,”
 explains Scientific American’s David Ropeik. “Except for the
 regulatory approval process, Golden Rice was ready to start saving
 millions of lives and preventing tens of millions of cases of blindness in
people around the world who suffer from Vitamin A deficiency.”

Today, the distribution of Golden Rice is limited, largely due to the disruptive
 actions of anti-GMO groups like Greenpeace.

No More Off Shore Drilling. Will Obama Soon Outlaw All Drilling?

DICTATOR: Obama Makes Mad Power-Grab, Puts Offshore Drilling Out of Trump’s Reach

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“Millions of people around the world will be grateful to President Obama for permanently protecting much of the Arctic and the Atlantic coasts from catastrophic oil exploration and development,” Greenpeace spokesman Travis Nichols stated. “Decisions like these are crucial.”

Liberals love power grabs — until someone they don’t like is in power.

The incoming Congress may not be among the millions of people who laud Obama’s move, and instead will likely see it as a loss for potential job opportunities. Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski has already said: “Arctic development is one of the best ways to create jobs, generate revenues and refill the Trans-Alaska Pipeline … Why the president is willing to send all of those benefits overseas is beyond explanation.”

There is an explanation though … it’s called the liberal agenda.

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What do you think about Obama's power grab? 

NSA Spying Brings Together Eclectic Group.

Documentary By Acclaimed Filmmaker Explains How Unlikely Alliances Formed To Battle NSA

August 5, 2014 by Personal Liberty News Desk 

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On June 27, The Electronic Frontier Foundation, Greenpeace and the Tenth Amendment Center joined forces to fly a 135-foot-long airship bearing a downturned arrow and the words “Illegal Spying Below” over the National Security Agency’s $1.2-billion data center in Bluffdale, Utah.

The action was an attempt to draw attention to government spying andStandAgainstSpying.org, a group trying to stop it. According to organizers, the airship protest was a success.

“More than 30 articles were written about the airship, and those articles were collectively shared more than 51,000 times over social media within 72 hours,” EFF reported.

Documentarian Brian Knappenberger (The Internet’s Own Boy), explained that the large data center jutting out of the small Utah community made it a perfect target for the protest.

“While it is only one of several data centers, for many people the Bluffdale facility has become a symbol out-of-control, unconstitutional, dragnet surveillance, as well as a threat to the environment,” he said. “I thought it was important to document this audacious attempt to raise awareness of this secretive facility and pressure Congress to rein in the NSA.”

The effort, according to organizers, should serve to illustrate how Americans, no matter their political differences, should join forces to protect their privacy.

“This video shows how a common threat to the freedom of association drew our three organizations together, despite very different missions,” EFF Activism Director Rainey Reitman said. “Now it’s time for Congress to build a diverse coalition to pass meaningful reform. We launched an airship, they need to land a bill on the president’s desk.”