InfluenceWatch Friday

InfluenceWatch, a project of Capital Research Center, is a comprehensive and ever-evolving compilation of our research into the numerous advocacy groups, foundations, and donors working to influence the public policy process. The website offers transparency into these influencers’ funding, motives, and connections while providing insight often neglected by other watchdog groups.

The information compiled in InfluenceWatch gives news outlets and other interested parties research to use in reporting on significant topics that are often overlooked by the American public.

CRC is pleased to present some of the most significant additions to InfluenceWatch in the past week:

• The HistoryMakers is a nonprofit organization that maintains an oral and visual archive of testimonials from African-American individuals, housed at the Library of Congress. Since its founding in 2000, the group claims to have collected over 3,000 interviews consisting of 10,000 hours of recordings from individuals including the late actor James Earl Jones, then-Illinois state senator Barack Obama, and left-wing activist Angela Davis. The HistoryMakers has received funding from several left-of-center grant makers including the Ford Foundation, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the MacArthur Foundation.
• SustainUS is an environmental activist group that opposes traditional sources of fuel such as coal and oil. It trains activists and organizes youth delegations to attend international symposiums, including United Nations climate conferences and World Bank meetings, in order to build support for weather-dependent sources of energy. It has received funding from left-of-center grant makers including the Amalgamated Charitable Foundation, Patagonia Org, and Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors.
• Summer Strategies is a consulting firm that provides “crisis management, narrative development, rapid response communications and tactical execution” services for clients. The firm was founded in 2015 by Melanie Sloan, a former Democratic congressional staffer and the former executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW). Though Summer Strategies does not disclose clients on its website, nonprofits which have reported hiring the firm for consulting services including the Hopewell Fund, American Oversight, and the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence.
• The Carole Kneeland Project for Responsible Television Journalism is a networking group that provides training programs for journalists and others who work in media. Its funders from have included the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and Donor Advised Charitable Giving. The Kneeland Project’s website lists other funding partners including CBS News and Stations, NBCUniversal, News-Press and Gazette, the Scripps Howard Foundation, Sinclair Broadcasting, and Univision.
• The Citizens Foundation (TCF) is a Pakistan-based organization that helps develop schools in rural parts of the country. In 2019, it partnered with the government of the Sindh province in Pakistan to operate a “Sindh Basic Education Programme,” funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). TCF has received funding and support from the Open Society Foundations, founded by billionaire philanthropist George Soros.