Anti-Kavanaugh Groups Could Lose Non-Profit Status for Disrupting Hearings

Several groups that organized people to disrupt Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court confirmation hearings could be at risk of being stripped of their tax-exempt status for violating Internal Revenue Service rules, based on a review of the agency’s applicable rules.

The groups encouraged protesters to commit acts of civil disobedience by disrupting the hearings. The IRS prohibits giving tax-exempt status to organizations that plan or encourage illegal activities, which, in past practice, included civil disobedience.

Over 200 people were arrested during the four days of hearings, held Sept. 4 to 7, for disrupting the hearings. They were organized by Women’s March and Center for Popular Democracy Action (CPDA), both holding 501(c)(4) tax-exempt status as social welfare organizations, as well as Housing Works, which holds the 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status reserved for charitable organizations.

A CPDA representative was photographed handing money to some participants in the disruptions. Another CPDA representative, Jennifer Flynn Walker, said on record the money, $50, was meant to cover fines the participants were expected to incur for disrupting the hearings. The participants were supposed to return unused cash.

The website, set up by Women’s March, asks willing participants to register and the online form asks, “Can you participate in civil disobedience/risk arrest?”

It gives two options: “CD participant!” and “Providing support onsite, but not getting arrested.”

That appears to be exactly what the IRS prohibits.

IRS Rules

“Not only is the actual conduct of illegal activities inconsistent with exemption, but the planning and sponsoring of such activities are also incompatible with charity and social welfare,” a 1985 IRS document stated (pdf).

The document cites a previous IRS ruling, which stated that an organization “that planned and sponsored protest demonstrations at which members were urged to commit acts of civil disobedience did not qualify for IRC 501(c)(3) or (4) exemption.”

In fact, the organizations that planned the hearing disruptions violated IRS rules even before the protests took place, according to the document.

“Because planning and sponsoring illegal acts are in themselves inconsistent with charity and social welfare it is not necessary to determine whether illegal acts were, in fact, committed,” it stated.

No Sign of Stopping

On Sept. 17, the three groups held a conference call where they encouraged activists to continue “civil disobedience” as well as an intent to “shut down” the Sept. 24 Senate Judiciary Committee meeting, according to The Daily Caller News Foundation, which reported Sept. 20 that it listened in on the call.

The committee was scheduled either to vote on the nomination or hear testimony from Dr. Christine Blasey Ford, the California professor who has accused Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her in 1982. As of 2:30 on the afternoon of Sept. 22, Ford had accepted Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley’s invitation to testify sometime in the upcoming week.

The groups plan to continue to cover the fines.

“If you do not have access to your cash we will certainly be able to arrange to get it to you before the action,” said Housing Works national advocacy coordinator Paul Davis, during the call. CPDA national field organizer Darius Gordon also participated.

Money Trail

CPDA’s Walker said the group crowdfunded the money used to cover fines for the hearing disruptors. The estimated $10,000 in bail money would hardly set the group back though. Progressive billionaire George Soros alone has given the CPDA Fund over $900,000 since 2016 and about another $1.3 million to its sister organization, CPD, since 2014. Its other major contributors included the Ford and Wyss foundations (pdf).

The CPDA Fund finished the fiscal year 2016 (the last available data) with close to $700,000 in cash.

Women’s March raised close to $200,000 on CrowdRise to “Cancel Kavanaugh.” The group offered to pick up travel, accommodation, legal training, and bail costs for the activists, its senior adviser, Winnie Wong, told CNN.

Women’s March has over 500 partners of whom 100 received a combined total of nearly $250 million from Soros between 2000 and 2014, according to the conservative Media Research Center.

The CPDA, Women’s March, and Housing Works, as well as the IRS, didn’t respond to requests for comment.