InfluenceWatch Podcast #152: Aggressively Political Philanthropy

In recent years, American big business, big labor, and other “bigs” have gotten aggressively more aligned with progressive liberalism—even those bigs, like Big Philanthropy, that are technically required by law not to intervene in elections. While Big Philanthropy might always have been liberal-leaning ideologically, it has gotten so openly Democratic that as conservative philanthropic scholar Bill Schambra noted, “it’s no longer suspect, or even noteworthy, to treat nonprofits and foundations as anything other than useful tools to ‘build a Democratic Party that can translate [progressive values] into public policy as a true governing majority.’”

Joining me to discuss how we got here and the consequences of philanthropy losing its nominal political neutrality is Mike Hartmann, head of Capital Research Center’s Center for Strategic Giving and editor of the Giving Review blog at Philanthropy Daily.

Listen to “Episode 152: Aggressively Political Philanthropy” on Spreaker.