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:

• The National Committee on United States-China Relations (NCUSCR) is a nonprofit organization that encourages cooperation between the United States and the People’s Republic of China (PRC). In November 2023, the NCUSCR co-hosted a dinner in San Francisco for PRC president Xi Jinping. Those in attendance included Apple Inc. CEO Tim Cook, Tesla CEO Elon Musk, BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, and former California Governor Jerry Brown (D).
• The Suwinski Family Foundation is a private grantmaking foundation founded by Cornell University professor Jan Suwinski and his wife Susan Suwinski. It heavily funds abortion provider Planned Parenthood, donating over 10% of its donations in 2022 to the provider and several of its affiliates. Other groups it donated to that year include 350.org, Amnesty International USA, Doctors Without Borders, the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), and Oxfam America.
• Women 7 (W7) is a collection of feminist activist groups which advocate for feminist policies within G7 member countries, with a focus on policies relating to increased abortion access and gender identity. During its meeting within the G7’s 2023 summit in Japan, the W7 discussed topics including women’s empowerment, economic justice, abortion and gender identity, feminist foreign policy, and financing gender equality.
• The Union of Southern Service Workers (USSW) is a cross-industry labor union that is affiliated with the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). Formed in 2022, the group supports the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement while advocating for critical race theory-inspired concepts of economic justice and anti-racism. The USSW is also a continuance of Raise Up, the southern chapter of the left-of-center Fight for $15 campaign to raise the minimum wage.
• The Stanford Internet Observatory (SIO) is a research project, located within Stanford University’s Cyber Policy Center for the Study of Information Technology, that focuses on the concepts of “misinformation” and “disinformation.” A 2023 staff report by the U.S. House of Representatives’ Select Committee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government claimed that the U.S. Department of State and the U.S Department of Homeland Security (DHS) outsourced censorship operations to the SIO in an effort to, “monitor and censor Americans’ online speech in advance of the 2020 presidential election.”