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:

• Vote Solar is a solar energy advocacy group that promotes state-level regulations to create what it calls a “just 100% clean energy future.” Vote Solar has received donations from left-of-center organizations including the Sandler Foundation, the Climate Imperative Foundation, and the Energy Foundation. As of 2024, the group’s proposals include weather-dependent energy initiatives with an emphasis on “equitable access,” and advancing state-level solar energy policies.
• Alianza Americas is a network of advocacy groups that promote expanded immigration into the United States. It has received funding from several left-of-center organizations including the Open Society Foundations, Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, and the New Venture Fund. In addition, it has received federal grants from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). In 2024, Alianza Americas joined the League of United Latin American Citizens and Central American Resource Center for a press conference calling for more federal support for “recently arrived and long-term immigrants.”
• Pennsylvania Values (PA Values) is a Super PAC that supports Democratic Party candidates in the state. PA Values has received funding from the left-of-center group Global Impact Social Welfare Fund, as well as several labor unions and related entities including the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Working for Working Americans, and the Communications Workers of America Working Voices. In 2024, PA Values ran an ad telling “MAGA Patriots” to “stand strong with President Trump” against mail-in voting. The Trump campaign accused PA Values of election interference for running the ad, which law professor Richard Hasen described as “borderline criminal.”
• The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) Minnesota is the state-level affiliate of national Muslim advocacy group CAIR. In April 2024, CAIR Minnesota announced legal action against the University of Minnesota for their firing of campus diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) manager Mashal Sherzad over social media posts, including a picture of her posing in front of an Israeli flag with swastikas painted on it at a pro-Palestine march. CAIR Minnesota board chair Mayzer Muhammad was the former president of the Undergraduate Student Government (USG) at the University of St. Thomas, where he survived a vote of no confidence when antisemitic tweets he had previously made were revealed, including one calling Israel, “the scum of the earth.”
• David’s Legacy is a Texas-based advocacy group that seeks to prevent cyber bullying and protect youth from harmful content online. The group was founded in 2016 after David Bartlett Molak of San Antonio, Texas committed suicide after experiencing cyber bulling. His father Mathew M. Molak serves as president of David’s Legacy. In 2024, ParentsSOS, a project co-sponsored by David’s Legacy, endorsed the federal Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) to limit harmful content available to children on social media platforms. The left-of-center Electronic Frontier Foundation (EEF) argues that KOSA violates the First Amendment.