Politico’s editors are “surprised” to find the far-left demonstrations overwhelming college campuses this spring are funded by the same sources fighting to keep President Joe Biden in power. On Sunday, the Beltway magazine published an exposé on the financiers bankrolling the campus protests, for which demonstrators trained for months.
“Pro-Palestinian protesters are backed by a surprising source: Biden’s biggest donors,” the headline reads.
“President Joe Biden has been dogged for months by pro-Palestinian protesters calling him ‘Genocide Joe’ — but some of the groups behind the demonstrations receive financial backing from philanthropists pushing hard for his reelection,” Politico reported. “The donors include some of the biggest names in Democratic circles: Soros, Rockefeller and Pritzker.”
The paper highlighted two organizations in particular, Jewish Voice for Peace and IfNotNow. Both are backed by the Tides Foundation, which got its start with funding George Soros and has received money from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
Politico also reported a $500,000 donation to Jewish Voice for Peace by David Rockefeller Jr. through the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, where he sits on the board. “Rockefeller Brothers has separately given grants to both the Tides Foundation and the Tides Center,” the paper says.
Several other groups involved in pro-Palestinian protests are backed by a foundation funded by Susan and Nick Pritzker, heir to the Hyatt Hotel empire — and supporters of Biden and numerous Democratic campaigns, including $6,600 to the Biden Victory Fund a few months ago and more than $300,000 during the 2020 campaign.
Politico was immediately mocked online for describing the far-left donor networks behind the outbreak of pro-Palestinian demonstrations as “surprising.”
“Surprising to who?” wrote Rep. Jim Banks, R-Ind., on X.
“This is only ‘surprising’ if you’re brand new to following Democrat money in politics,” wrote Republican communications consultant Matt Whitlock.
Far-left funding for pro-Hamas demonstrations are “no surprise to anyone who’s been paying attention,” wrote The New York Post editorial board. “These protests are very much part and parcel of today’s total progressive package, which very much includes the prez.”
“The Post has been beating that drum for a long time, only to be denounced for it,” the editorial board added.
Politico’s editors were also apparently surprised to learn Hunter Biden’s laptop, which the obtained the Post four years ago, was authentic. Nearly a year after the presidential election, Politico published a story claiming to have verified the laptop hard drive that the magazine had previously sought to discredit as an instrument of Russian interference. The Post’s election-year reporting on the hard drive exposing the Democrats’ presidential nominee as “compromised” by the Chinese Communist Party led one of the nation’s oldest papers to be locked out of its own Twitter account for weeks.
Four years later, The New York Post’s editorial board is mocking the Beltway magazine for its journalistic gymnastics to protect the president.
“While Politico deserves credit for telling the truth about the Soros-seeded Tides Foundation, David Rockefeller Jr. and Susan and Nick Pritzker, the magazine is still bending over backward to accommodate Joe Biden — why else did its headline cast these revelations as ‘surprising’?” the board wrote.
The far-left organizers of the sustained demonstrations on college campuses disrupting classes and degrading education have drawn the attention of lawmakers on Capitol Hill. According to the Wall Street Journal last week, protestors have spent months training for the campus takeovers with the support of leftist groups. On Tuesday, Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., sent a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland demanding a federal investigation.
“This is not just spontaneous student unrest,” Hawley wrote. “It is coordinated and funded by a powerful network of anti-Israel advocates.”
Hawley is demanding the Department of Justice (DOJ) probe violations of tax-exempt rules under the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) by the non-profits financing the unrest.
“As IRS Revenue Ruling 75-384 established, no organization may retain its tax exemption if it backs protests at which members are urged to commit acts of civil disobedience,” Hawley wrote. “…[B]y supporting illegal acts while enjoying tax-exempt status, dark money groups and foundations are defrauding the American people and putting Jewish students and faculty at risk.”
