Hoovering Up Henry Ford’s Money: Revolutions and Bullhorns

Hoovering Up Henry Money: A Guide to Ford Foundation Grants (full series)
Free Money Versus Free Enterprise | Revolutions and Bullhorns
Crime and Democracy | Shaping the News

Revolutions and Bullhorns

The main page of the NAKASEC website also includes videos of street protesters using bullhorns.

For nonprofits that really want the Ford funding spigot wide open, it is difficult to understate the importance of portraying supporters shouting through bullhorns, engaging in street demonstrations, and preaching revolution. At least $103.7 million of the grants since the start of 2023 went to groups prominently showing this behavior on their main webpages.

The home page of the People’s Action Institute goes the extra mile, with a cartoon image of a bullhorn-toting protester near the top, and further down the page are similar images (both cartoons and real) of demonstrators. At the very top of the page was an endorsement of Kamala Harris for president. People’s Action has received more than $1.1 million from Ford since April 2023.

The main page of the Groundswell Fund features multiple images of protestors with bullhorns, protesters shouting while raising fists, and protesters still wearing their COVID masks. Groundswell has received at least $5 million from Ford since March 2023.

Family Values @ Work, a Big Labor advocacy group, was approved for a $4 million Ford grant in May 2023. The top of the main page of the website shows a woman speaking into a bullhorn, and several additional images portray sign-bearing demonstrators.

A bullhorn-toting demonstrator appears next to a tab declaring “our strategy” on the main page of the TechEquity Collaborative. Since April 2023 the group has received cumulative grants from Ford totaling more than $2.6 million.

Ford grant officers have pumped at least $4.1 million into the National Domestic Workers Alliance since the beginning of 2023. The alliance’s main webpage and other pages show multiple real and cartoon images of street demonstrations and shouting through bullhorns.

Fiscally sponsored projects run by Community Change received at least seven grants from Ford after April 2023, for a total of $1.9 million. The Community Change main page shows Ohio demonstrators in matching clothing, fists raised, with signs declaring “CARE! NOT CUTS!” The page also explains that Community Change aims to bring about “a multiracial democracy and a fair economy where everyone can thrive.”

America is already a representative democracy where citizens of all races can and do vote, so it’s unclear how a “multiracial democracy” would be different. Nonetheless, clinging to that phrase or variations of same is another way for would-be grantees to hoover up Henry Ford’s fortune.

Borealis Philanthropy has received more than $5 million from Ford since January 2023. An August 2024 feature on the Borealis website included a photo of masked protesters and an essay imagining a future America where there is “an inclusive and loving multi-racial democracy.”

The Union Theological Seminary received $650,000 in Ford grants during the fall of 2023. In one grant description a Ford philanthropoid wrote: “Project support to organize a series of convenings to develop strategies and partnerships for a multiracial democracy.”

The description of  December 2023 grant of $650,000 to the RISE Together Fund said the loot was for “movements to build a just, inclusive, and multiracial democracy in the U.S.” RISE is a fiscally sponsored project of the Proteus Fund, which has received at least $3.8 million from Ford since April 2023.

“Realizing a Multiracial Democracy” is a program hyperlink on the main page for PolicyLink, which also features a protester photo. Since August 2023 the nonprofit has received at least three Ford grants totaling more than $1.3 million.

The Institute for Policy Studies has received at least $400,000 from Ford since March 2023. A link on the IPS main page promotes a video titled: “A blueprint for countering American fascism” that supposedly  demonstrates “how to fight for a multiracial democracy.”

Some recent Ford grant descriptions read as if the only Americans who can vote are rich, white men.

Ford gave a $450,000 grant in December 2023 to the TakeAction Minnesota Education Fund and instructed them to use the money “to organize individuals and other organizations for a gender-inclusive, multiracial, cross-class democracy.”

PowerSwitch Action is described by its executive director as a network of people who are creating a “multiracial feminist democracy and economies in our cities and towns.” PowerSwitch received a $225,000 Ford grant in March 2024, and the first thing a visitor to the PowerSwitch website sees is a large image of demonstrators, one of which is shouting into a bullhorn.

Since August 2023, Ford has given UltraViolet at least $1.3 million. The top item on the webpage is a promotion for UltraViolet Action, which claims they are hard at work “building a multi-racial, multi-generational political home for feminists.” The accompanying photo portrays a street protest, with signs that say, “Stop Making Fascism Happen” and “The Revolution Will Not be Televised.” The next, far larger photo below it, is of a bullhorn-blaring demonstrator.

In the next installment, Ford grants to “protect democracy” include a bizarre mix of defunding the police and left-wing prosecutors who refuse to prosecute crime.