InfluenceWatch Friday

InfluenceWatch, a project of Capital Research Center, is a comprehensive and ever-evolving compilation of our research into the numerous advocacy groups, foundations, and donors working to influence the public policy process. The website offers transparency into these influencers’ funding, motives, and connections while providing insight often neglected by other watchdog groups.

The information compiled in InfluenceWatch gives news outlets and other interested parties research to use in reporting on significant topics that are often overlooked by the American public.

CRC is pleased to present some of the most significant additions to InfluenceWatch in the past week:

• Code for Science and Society is an advocacy group based in Portland, Oregon that proposes using coding and data analysis to address economic issues. It has hosted events and workshops advocating for left-of-center concepts including “intersectionality,” unionization within the technology industry, and climate change. Code for Science and Society has received funding from left-of-center organizations including the Open Society Foundations (OSF), the MacArthur Foundation, and the Rockefeller Foundation.
• Dalberg Catalyst is a nonprofit program incubator that advocates for left-of-center policies towards healthcare, the environment, and international development. It is affiliated with Dalberg Global Development Advisors (DGDA), a policy advisory firm that consults for government and nonprofit groups, while both groups and five similar for-profit firms are collectively known as the Dalberg Group. Dalberg Catalyst has received funding from left-of-center organizations including the Gates Foundation, ClimateWorks Foundation, Open Society Foundations (OSF), the Rockefeller Foundation, and the UN Development Program.
• Syrian American Medical Society Foundation (SAMS Foundation) is a relief organization that provides medical treatment and financial support for Syrian communities impacted by the country’s ongoing civil war. Following the October 7, 2023 Hamas terrorist attacks against the State of Israel and the ensuing Israel-Hamas war, SAMS Foundation co-signed a letter sponsored by Save the Children calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. In 2023, the SAMS Foundation received nearly $14 million in federal grants from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the U.S. Department of State.
• Global Americans is a think tank that publishes research on U.S. relations with countries in the Western Hemisphere. It has written reports criticizing the Nicolas Maduro regime in Venezuela, arguing that its “willingness to engage in blatant theft of the vote, has divided Latin America’s democratic left, which in past elections had largely stood behind the chavista.” Global Americans has received funding from left-of-center organizations including the Ford Foundation and the Foundation to Promote Open Society.
• End It for Good is a health advocacy group that promotes alternative methods to treat addiction while arguing against prosecution as a method of combating drug abuse. The group’s board chair is Beau Rudder, a criminal defense attorney who is a regional director of the Bail Project and a founding member of the Mississippi Bail Fund Collective. End It for Good has received funding from the Susquehanna Foundation, DonorsTrust, and the Atlas Economic Research Foundation.