The Capital Research Center’s most recent report, Infiltrated: The Ideological Capture of Homeless Advocacy, has continued to receive favorable media coverage. And reporters continue to use InfluenceWatch as an important research tool.
We begin our look at recent CRC media coverage with energy journalist Robert Bryce. This week the well-regarded author of the eponymous, paid subscription Substack, wrote a report on billionaire Bill Gates’s abandonment of the climate catastrophe cult. In the report, Bryce cited the work of InfluenceWatch and CRC managing editor Ken Braun. He also developed one of his famous energy policy charts using Braun’s research.
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Robert Bryce—A Tale of Two Bills: Bill Gates’ rebuke to climate catastrophism has thrown the NGO-corporate-industrial-media-academic-climate complex into a sphincter-puckered snit. Why? Follow the money.
Excerpts:
McKibben’s new NGO, Third Act, is aimed at organizing people over the age of 60 “for progressive change.” What does that mean? As Influence Watch notes, the group “advocates for a total transition towards weather-based energy sources.”
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Ken Braun, an analyst with the Capital Research Center, has spent years reporting on the funding that fuels the NGO-corporate-industrial-media-academic-climate complex. In August, he published “America’s Top Ten Anti-Energy NGOs.” As shown above, these 10 NGOs are now spending approximately $1.8 billion per year. Braun wrote that while the 10 NGOs “profess their commitment to a cleaner environment, their shared opposition to low- and zero-emissions fuels exposes them as more ‘anti-energy’ than pro-nature.” Braun also noted that most of the groups on the list “oppose nuclear energy, the world’s only reliable, limitlessly scalable, energy that does not emit greenhouse gases.”
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Washington Free Beacon—Bill Gates, Who Spent a Fortune Warning About ‘Climate Disaster,’ Now Says It ‘Will Not Be the End of Civilization’: Gates says ineffective climate projects are ‘diverting money and attention from efforts that will have more impact on the human condition’
“The Gates Foundation has spent tens of millions of dollars trying to totally reshape farming around the world in the name of saving the planet, and now Mr. Gates is coming forward to say that, actually, there is no existential threat and cooler heads must prevail,” Parker Thayer, an investigative researcher at the Capital Research Center, told the Washington Free Beacon.
“It’s a step in the right direction, but many of the organizations that Mr. Gates funds are the ones stoking the flames of the climate alarmism that he now denounces,” Thayer continued. “If he’s sincere in his beliefs, it’s time for him to look in the mirror and make some major changes at his foundation.”
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E&E News (Politico)— Green groups gird for life in Trump’s crosshairs: The administration’s pursuit of its perceived enemies has compelled environmental groups to take new precautions.
For its part, the Capital Research Center report focuses on fewer organizations, but one group it flags is the Sunrise Movement, which made its name as a youth-driven climate advocacy group.
That report claims Sunrise is part of a network of left-wing groups that promote political violence.
According to the report: “Sunrise, also known as Sunrise Movement, is primarily focused on environmentalism but also helps build financial and popular support for anarchist terrorists, wishes for Israel’s destruction, has some pro-Hamas chapters, seeks the abolishment of police and prisons and condemns tourism to Hawaii as ‘colonization.’”
A Sunrise spokesperson previously told E&E News that “Trump is directing his cronies to concoct baseless allegations against anyone who dares to stand up to him.”
Scott Walter, the president of the Capital Research Center, has met with White House officials to brief them on left-leaning groups, their donors and the way they raise money.
“We think we’ve documented a lot of smoke,” he said in an interview. And he noted that his group has documented instances that could be used by the administration to revoke liberal nonprofits’ tax exempt status. “Authorities can investigate to see if there’s a fire that endangers tax-exemptions,” he said.
Nonprofits cannot “engage in illegal activity, including civil disobedience that violates laws, even if it’s ‘only’ blocking traffic for a few hours,” Walter added. “It’s not hard to show some of the more radical environmental groups like Sunrise and Extinction Rebellion have encouraged that.”
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The Daily Signal—New Report Exposes Billions in Funding for the ‘Homeless Industrial Complex’
“Fringe groups in the Homeless Industrial Complex like to characterize homelessness as a symptom of societal injustices, such as systemic racism, police violence, or capitalism,” Scott Walter, president of the Capital Research Center, which released the report, told The Daily Signal in a statement Tuesday. “Anyone who disagrees with their tried-and-not-true policy recommendations is called uncompassionate or greedy.”
The report, “Infiltrated: The Ideological Capture of Homelessness Advocacy,” focuses on the 759 organizations that filed amicus briefs in the Supreme Court case Grants Pass v. Johnson (2024), arguing that laws against camping on the sidewalk violate the Eighth Amendment prohibition on “cruel and unusual punishment.” The Supreme Court disagreed, but the nonprofit support for this claim illustrates how organizations founded to help solve the homelessness crisis engage in activism that arguably exacerbates it.
The Capital Research Center report finds that the nonprofits collectively have $9.1 billion in total revenues and received at least $2.9 billion in government grants (32% of their revenues), according to IRS filings.
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(The Daily Signal report was also reposted by Off the Press.)
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The National News Desk—New report claims some organizations prioritize ideology over solutions to homelessness
Joining The National News Desk to discuss these findings is Scott Walter, president of the Capital Research Center.
“There definitely are truly radical groups that don’t actually care at all for the homeless; they just want them as props,” Walter said. “They want to say, ‘America’s a horrible country and the proof is the people suffering on the streets,’ but of course, they’re not actually helping the people suffering on the streets.”
Walter also discussed the ‘Housing First’ initiative, which he said many groups try to push rather than addressing the root of the problem such as mental illness and substance abuse.
“Majority of Americans understand, that’s not going to fix your fentanyl problem… that’s not going to fix your schizophrenia” Walter said. “It’s literally crazy to think that.”
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Fox News— A new study just exposed the corruption behind America’s homelessness crisis: New investigation reveals how taxpayer money meant for homeless aid bankrolls anti-American political agendas
Now, at last, we have some answers for why homelessness has exploded even amid a tripling of public spending.
A groundbreaking investigation, “Infiltrated” – backed by more than 50 pages of documentation from the Capital Research Center in cooperation with Discovery Institute – pulls back the curtain on a vast system of corruption. It reveals how billions in taxpayer funds intended to lift people out of homelessness have instead bankrolled radical activism and anti-American political agendas, betraying both the taxpayers who fund it and the homeless they were meant to help.
Despite unprecedented resources, homelessness in the United States now stands at its highest level in U.S. history. “Infiltrated” details how the nation’s most prominent “homeless advocacy” organizations have been weaponized against the very people they claim to serve – redirecting compassion into ideology and dependency into power.
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(The Fox News report was also reposted by AOL and at Legal Insurrection.)
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The National News Desk—Fact Check Team: Is America solving homelessness or simply financing it?
A study released by the Capital Research Center (CRC), a conservative policy group, claims the nation isn’t short on compassion or cash. Instead, it says the problem lies in how that money is managed. Researchers reviewed 759 nonprofits that filed briefs in a 2024 Supreme Court case over public camping and found they collectively took in $9.1 billion, including $2.9 billion in government grants. According to CRC, many of these organizations have evolved from front-line service providers into advocacy operations, channeling more time and resources into lobbying, public relations, and court battles than into housing or rehabilitation.
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The Patriot Post—When ‘Helping’ the Homeless Is Harmful: A new report reveals that much of the money spent helping people living on the streets actually ends up funding a left-wing “Homeless Industrial Complex.”
Cue the “Homeless Industrial Complex” that uses your hard-earned tax money that’s supposed to “combat homelessness” to support political activism instead. A report by the Capital Research Center reveals the vast network of nonprofit organizations, legal activists, and ideological entrepreneurs that has built a sophisticated structure around homelessness. Groups like the Southern Poverty Law Center, the National Homelessness Law Center, the Western Regional Advocacy Project, and the National Low Income Housing Coalition have all made themselves appear to be helping with the homelessness problem, when in fact they are perpetuating it.
“Fringe groups in the Homeless Industrial Complex like to characterize homelessness as a symptom of societal injustices, such as systemic racism, police violence, or capitalism,” said Scott Walter, president of the Capital Research Center. When you have groups like the SPLC and other allies accuse Trump of “human rights violations” for signing an executive order to address the root causes of homelessness, then you know something’s off. Isn’t that something they claimed they wanted to fix? SPLC Deputy Legal Director Kirsten Anderson went so far as to accuse Trump of “resurrecting unlawful and outdated approaches to housing that are rooted in racist stereotypes and bias against people with disabilities.”
Her statement reveals that part of the issue is the ideologies these organizations have bought into. They advocate for “housing first,” the idea that housing programs should accept people regardless of their drug use status; “harm reduction,” the idea that housing programs cannot prevent drug use and therefore should normalize it; or “housing justice,” the amalgamation of left-wing activist causes on race, transgender ideology, and other housing issues. The biggest problem is that these organizations believe people have a “right” to housing instead of having to earn it.
Walter correctly points out that they are treating “homeless people as pawns in ideological wars.”
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PJ Media—Court: Antifa Uses Portland Homeless People as Expendable Cannon Fodder
Historian Victor Davis Hanson says that the nation is watching a pitched battle between these anti-Western, atheist, and anti-American revolutionaries and the normies. That’s us. We’re the counter-revolutionaries.
We’re at a civilizational inflection point.
And this? This is what revolution looks like.
Watch my discussion with Ryan Mauro of the Capital Research Center about his study of how Antifa has “infiltrated” the Homeless Industrial Complex. Do you doubt it?
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The Federalist—Seattle FBI Probed Conservative CEO For Being ‘Anti-Biden’ While Ignoring Antifa Violence
A report published earlier this month by the Capital Research Center and the Discovery Institute details how members of Antifa have embedded themselves within the homeless industrial complex in cities like Seattle. As described by NewsNation, the analysis found that these left-wing “militant activists intentionally disrupt homeless encampment clearances and perpetuate street disorder to advance [their] antigovernment objectives.”
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Financial Issues (Mark Minella podcast)— Dark money, protests, and the left’s fight against reality
From Indivisible and their no kings protests to “local” non profits based out of DC offices. CRC President Scott Walter sits down with Mark Minnella, host of Financial Issues, to discuss the issue of left-wing dark money.
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Fort Worth Star-Telegram—Republicans Seek Subpoena Power for New Oversight Panel
A Capital Research Center report alleged Open Society Foundations had funded groups tied to violent protests, which the foundation has denied. Capital Research Center President Scott Walter said, “For the most radical types, they tend to be … little loosely organized splinter groups coming off of bigger groups.”
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The Denver Gazette—Colorado voters to decide fate of additional funding for school meals program, SNAP
A second issue committee, Community Change Action-Colorado, has spent about $24,000 to support the ballot measures. The Washington, D.C.-based group is a 501(c)(4), which means it doesn’t disclose its funders.
Influence Watch reported that the group is funded by the Service Employees International Union, which is tied to the Colorado state employee union, Colorado Wins. Community Change Action is also backed by the Democracy Alliance, AFL-CIO and Planned Parenthood Action Fund.
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Alaska Watchman—Self-professed ‘EnviroQueers’ boast of ‘outsized impact’ on future of Fairbanks
According to Influence Watch, Native Movement reported revenue of $7.2 million in 2022 with expenses exceeding $4.3 million. Native Movement is one of several nonprofits that conflate Alaska Native politics with environmentalism, LGBTQ initiatives and abortion activism. While not all of its money goes directly to FCAC, Native Movement sustains FCAC as a fiscal sponsor.
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Full Measure (podcast interview with CRC president Scott Walter)
Follow the Money: NGO’s, or non-governmental organizations, feed the hungry and provide medical care to victims of disasters in the US and around the world. but your tax dollars help fund them, and many use that to push political agendas. Scott Thuman investigates.
