The Voter Participation Center Deserves to Be Grilled

In a recent bombshell, the Washington Free Beacon exposed yet another way the Voter Participation Center (VPC) has been abusing its tax-exempt 501(c)(3) status. The VPC has a long and well-documented history of blatant partisanship, one that the Capital Research Center has researched thoroughly. The Free Beacon’s latest report, though, surpasses all the group’s previous scandals by presenting compelling evidence of direct partisan intent and raising serious questions about VPC’s future as a tax-exempt organization.

The Facebook Bombshell

The Washington Free Beacon article is so damning because, for the first time, it presented direct evidence that the VPC was actively taking steps to ensure that their voter registration work had a partisan effect. Reporters found that VPC had purchased ads with Meta—the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and Threads—that used customizable audience filters to avoid showing voter registration ads to users that might be Republicans.

According to data in Meta’s politics and elections ad library, VPC “spent more than $760,000 on a staggering 8,235 Facebook ads” targeting users in Nevada, Arizona, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Georgia while instructing Meta to exclude the ads from users whose Facebook profile had previously expressed interest in topics like “PGA Tour,” “Indianapolis 500,” “Daytona 500,” “Tom Clancy,” “Modified Jeeps,” “Duck Dynasty,” and many similar topics colloquially associated with conservative or rural Americans. At the same time, VPC directed Meta to include users who were interested in a variety of topics commonly associated with urban and liberal Americans like “African-American Literature,” “Jordan Peele,” “Taylor Swift,” “Patagonia,” and “hot yoga.”

The intent of these filters is not subtle.

An Exchange of Fire

The VPC has been scrutinized and criticized by conservative media and watchdog groups before, but nothing has ever really threatened to clearly implicate VPC before. For the most part, VPC has been allowed to keep its open secret open, unmolested by any serious threat of punishment. With these Facebook Ads the VPC may have finally overplayed its hand.

In response to the Free Beacon’s report, Rep. Claudia Tenney (R-NY) sent a letter to the IRS expressing “serious concern about the Voter Participation Center’s (VPC) adherence to federal tax rules for tax-exempt charitable organizations engaged in voter registration activities.” Tenney noted that “As a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization, VPC is required to conduct voter registration activities in a neutral and non-partisan manner” and claimed that report “suggests that VPC is deliberately violating these requirements by selectively targeting its advertisements and intentionally excluding conservative audiences.” Tenney then asked the IRS to commit to investigating VPC for possible violations of its tax-exempt status, and she asked for clarification as to how the IRS determines whether tax-exempt voter registration groups are abiding by the law and what the penalties would be if a violation occurred.

On the same day, VPC issued a public statement responding to Rep. Tenney’s letter claiming that the ad filters were applied to ensure that VPC’s voter registration ads reached “underrepresented populations including people of color, young people, and unmarried women.” In defense of the excluded audience filters VPC wrote:

To reach these underrepresented populations, VPC uses digital ads to identify prospective voters, and incorporate their likely or known interests into our targeting to engage them online. For example, we used digital interest categories on Facebook to include prospective voters interested in “College Football,” “College,” “Fraternities in North America,” “Dorm Life,” and other terms to find likely young voters. We also used other popular interests, including “Taylor Swift,” “I love to Salsa,” “Meet the Browns (TV series),” “Goya Foods,” and “Black History,” to engage with Black and Hispanic would-be voters. We also exclude interest categories like “Luxury Travelers” and “Luxury Shoppers” that are likely to reach people who are likely to be registered to vote already. This is standard procedure in the digital advertising industry used to reach specific demographics. These practices are not partisan and are fully in line with federal tax rules for tax-exempt charitable organizations. Our one and only goal is to make sure that eligible, underrepresented Americans are able to engage in our democracy, regardless of how they choose to vote.

Readers might notice that the VPC statement provided no actual evidence for the claim that people interested in “Luxury Travelers” and “Luxury Shoppers” were more likely to be registered to vote. The statement also made no mention of the exclusion of users interested in “PGA Tour,” “Indianapolis 500,” “Daytona 500,” “Tom Clancy,” “Modified Jeeps,” and “Duck Dynasty” and did not clarify whether VPC believed people interested in those topics were also more likely to be registered to vote.

At the same time, the VPC waved about its inclusion of “College Football” as if this was somehow proof that their filters were nonpartisan, even though the filter was obviously included only to catch the Democrat-leaning audience of college students. It’s a poorly constructed cover story and an insult to the intelligence of Rep. Tenney, the IRS, and everyone who read the Free Beacon’s report.

The Second Volley

Now that the VPC is on the ropes, with its fig leaf disguise on nonpartisanship shredded, this is the moment for watchdogs and the media to press the advantage. To aid in this effort, here is a list of awkward question that the VPC should be asked by anybody interesting in ending their abuse of the tax-exempt charitable system. The VPC is also more than welcome to respond to these questions directly at any time by emailing the Capital Research Center or publishing a statement in response to this article.

• Is VPC aware that the exclusion filters used on your organization’s Meta voter registration ads are nearly identical to the exclusion filters selected by Democratic candidates, political action committees (PACs), and Super PACs?
• In its statement the VPC made mention of only two exclusion—“luxury travelers” and “luxury shoppers”—neither of which was mentioned by Claudia Tenney or the Washington Free Beacon. Why did VPC not address the particular exclusions that were the actual subject of the report and letter?
• Does VPC have any data showing that fans of NASCAR, Duck Dynasty, Daytona 500, Jimmy Buffet, John Wayne, Baywatch, Clint Eastwood, and Hall & Oates are registered at a rate higher than the rest of the population? Does VPC have any data at all on the voter registration proclivities of people interested in these particular topics?
• Did the VPC hire consultants or conduct research to choose its particular Meta ad filters? If so, can VPC explain the methodology?
• Meta’s ad library shows that VPC chose to market its ads to dozens of particular states and zip codes. How were these states and zip codes chosen?
• During the 2020 election cycle, a Democrat-aligned Super PAC called Mind the Gap published a memo recommending that donors fund the VPC, claiming that funding for the VPC is “2 to 5 times more cost-effective at netting additional Democratic votes than the tactics that campaigns will invest in.” Was VPC aware of this memo during the 2020 election, and has VPC ever communicated with Mind the Gap or its representatives?
• Does VPC agree with Mind the Gap’s characterization of its work as highly effective at producing partisan results, and if so, why?
• During 2022, VPC reported paying $12.9 million to the Pivot Group. Since 2016, VPC has paid the Pivot Group over $55 million. The Pivot Group describes itself as a “woman-majority owned political mail firm” that “is committed to electing Democrats up and down the ballot.” How does the VPC ensure that the work contracted to the Pivot Group is not conducted in a partisan manner?
• When a person registers to vote with VPC’s help, does VPC give or sell the voter’s information to—or allow the voter’s information to be used by or added to—outside voter databases like NGP VAN or Catalist. If so, is the VPC aware that NGP VAN and Catalist sell voter data exclusively to Democratic Super PACs and campaigns for the purposes of partisan fundraising and electioneering?
• VPC claims to be committed to registering underrepresented minority populations, particularly people of color. According to the 2020 census, Mississippi has the largest per capita black population of any state, and yet the VPC’s 2020 impact report (see graphic below) showed that VPC had no program in Mississippi that year. Louisiana has the second highest black population per capita, and yet VPC recorded no programs in Louisiana either. The same goes for Maryland (4th), Alabama (5th), and Delaware (8th). Why does VPC not register voters in these states, and does it have anything to do with their status as non-swing states?

Credit: Voter Participation Center. Source: https://www.influencewatch.org/app/uploads/2024/09/VPC_2020-Programs-Impact-Note_V3.pdf.