Donors Capital Fund and Donors Trust

Donors Capital Fund is dedicated to funneling large sums of money to right-wing, and in many cases Islamophobic organizations. According to Donors Capital Fund’s website, the organization is a “501(c)(3), 509(a)(3) supporting organization that is associated with DonorsTrust, a public charity and donor-advised fund formed to safeguard the charitable intent of donors who are dedicated to the ideals of limited government, personal responsibility, and free enterprise.”

The board of Donors Capital Fund has several well-known conservatives, including Arthur C. Brooks, the president of the American Enterprise Institute, and John A. Von Kannon, vice president and senior counselor at the Heritage Foundation.  

Donors Capital Fund is most famous for contributing more than $17 million in 2008 to the Clarion Project - formerly Clarion Fund and the largest recipient of Donors Capital’s largesse. Indeed, Donors Capital Fund’s contributions made up 96 percent of all the funding Clarion Project received that year. The $17 million, provided by a single anonymous source helped pay for a DVD Clarion distributed called “Obsession: Radical Islam’s War Against the West,” to more than 28 million swing-state voters before the 2008 presidential election.

DonorsTrust started contributing to the Islamophobia network in 2005 and has contributed $353,000 between 2005 and 2012.  

In total, Donors Capital Fund and DonorsTrust have contributed $27,042,600 between 2005 and 2012 to groups promoting Islamophobia.

 

Source: Center for American Progress research is based on 990s filed with the U.S. Internal Revenue Service.