Financial Secrecy

Publishers of donor-advised fund data are including hundreds of thousands of workplace giving accounts in their averages. That skews the picture.

While federal lawmakers fail to pass dark money donor disclosure, voters in Arizona have an opportunity to reveal who’s exerting outsize influence in their elections.

Barre Seid’s record-breaking $1.6 billion donation to the Marble Freedom Trust boosts right-wing advocacy efforts. This kind of dark money giving allows multi-millionaires to buy influence and set the public agenda — avoiding taxes in the process.

As inequality has grown in the U.S., the nation’s charitable system is in danger of becoming a taxpayer-subsidized platform of private power for the ultra-wealthy. This poses risks to the independent nonprofit sector and our society as a whole. It's time for reform — and we have some ideas.