Democratic California Attorney General Rob Bonta, in a letter sent in late August, demanded that Black Lives Matter Grassroots file tax disclosures for 2022 that will reveal what it did with millions in unaccounted-for charitable funds.
If Black Lives Matter Grassroots declines to comply with Bonta’s request, its nonprofit status will be revoked and it will be taxed as if it were a corporation, according to the letter. The issue revolves around Black Lives Matter Grassroots’ failure to file 2022 disclosure documents even though a large liberal charity called the Tides Foundation had reportedly given it $8.7 million at that point, making it unclear to the public how those funds were used.
Black Lives Matter Grassroots leader Melina Abdullah kept the expenditures “intentionally private” by declining to file tax disclosures because “she didn’t want folks to know how the money was moving,” Black Lives Matter sources told the Washington Free Beacon in May.
While the group didn’t file a tax return in 2022, it did file a document containing inconsistencies in 2023.
The Tides Foundation, for instance, transferred $8.7 million to Black Lives Matter Grassroots between 2020 and 2022, the Free Beacon reported. Despite this, the organization’s 2023 tax forms claim that 2023 was the first year it operated as a nonprofit.
Notably, Black Lives Matter Grassroots reported having about $4 million in assets at the beginning of 2023, meaning it offloaded a considerable portion of the $8.7 million transferred to it by the Tides Foundation and provided no paper trail as to how that money was spent, according to its 2023 tax forms.
“In my 20 years of watchdog work, this is one of the sloppier tax filings I have seen,” CharityWatch executive director Laurie Styron told the Free Beacon, in reference to the group’s 2023 tax forms. “There aren’t one or two mistakes here. This document is unusable for its intended purpose of providing the public with a means of holding the charity accountable. It’s unethical.”
Bonta’s letter also stipulated that Black Lives Matter Grassroots is barred from “soliciting or disbursing charitable funds” until it provides documentation of its finances. The group, however, has an active ActBlue page soliciting donations as of publishing.
“California is one of the handful of states that has a very aggressive charitable enforcement arm in its Attorney General’s office,” tax law specialist Patrick Sternal told the Free Beacon. “I imagine Black Lives Matter Grassroots will have to reckon with them.”
Black Lives Matter Grassroots has until Oct. 27 to comply with California’s demands.
The broader Black Lives Matter movement is no stranger to accusations of financial impropriety. BLM PAC has paid out hundreds of thousands of dollars to a firm run by its treasurer, Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation consistently doles out funds to its officers’ loved ones and former BLM leader Patrisse Cullors infamously spent millions in charitable funds on mansions in Canada and Los Angeles.
Black Lives Matter Grassroots and ActBlue did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
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