May 31, 2011 was a perfectly nice day in Los Angeles, California—a few patchy clouds on the horizon, but nothing to worry about. It's unlikely that the staff of the Wilshire Boulevard-based Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) saw the thunderstorm approaching as they submitted commentary to Julius Genachowski, Chair of the Federal Communications Commission, in support of AT&T's plan to buy T-Mobile USA for $39 billion.

"The LGBT community is a mirror of America's larger society and it is through that prism that we view this proposed merger," GLAAD's letter declared. "What our community wants in wireless phone and Internet service is exactly what Americans in general want: more access, faster service, and competitive pricing. On all three counts, we believe that the facts strongly favor the merger."

However GLAAD thought this document would be received, it almost instantly caused an uproar within the LGBT activist world. By the time the smoke cleared, the letter's main signer—GLAAD President Jarrett Barrios—had resigned amidst a frenzy of blogging and finger pointing. Six board members quickly followed suit.

"In the end, the attention from inside and outside the LGBT media became too much and Barrios resigned despite signals 24 hours earlier that he wasn't going to," media columnist Michael Triplett observed as the bloodbath took place. "The story had a crowd-sourcing feel to it, with many journalists and activists poring over letters to the FCC, GLAAD and AT&T financial records, and other data in order to determine what happened between AT&T and GLAAD."

GLAAD's backing of the proposed AT&T/T-Mobile marriage may have shocked LGBT activists, but it didn't surprise us. We've been following these merger proceedings for years. Every one of them—AT&T/BellSouth, Sirius/XM, Comcast/NBCU—was accompanied by a flurry of yea sayings from influential nonprofits which, like GLAAD, take thousands or even millions of dollars from the merger applicants.

And when the FCC considered its net neutrality rules, the nonprofit commentaries flowed like high speed data. Our examination of a letter written by 19 civil rights groups questioning open Internet rules found that most were recipients of Comcast, AT&T, or Verizon money. In the case of LULAC, a single grant came to $1.5 million. Groups that we have spoken with always deny any sort of outright opinion selling.

What startled us in this latest case was that a critical mass of regular people (as opposed to the usual policy wonks) actually noticed and objected to one of these endorsements. Given the heightened sensitivity to this issue, are there precautions that non-profits can take when approached to make one of these statements?

There are at least three. But first, the rest of this story.

Thank you

"The LGBT community has a longstanding commitment to all forms of social justice," the GLAAD letter continued. "That is why we look at the deployment of faster wireless Internet options not only from financial and technological viewpoints but also in terms of how this improves society." New healthcare options, more opportunities for the arts—these were some of the potential benefits of the union, said the group.

Thanks to the FCC's upgraded and far more accessible comment database system, GLAAD's statement was quickly discovered by LGBT activists across the country. One of the first to notice was John Aravosis of the hugely popular Americablog.

"GLAAD endorses AT&T/T-Mobile merger after AT&T screwed us in TN," ran Aravosis' outraged post.

"What is a gay rights organization doing weighing in on a phone company merger?" he rhetorically asked. "I have an AT&T iPhone and the coverage sucks and is getting worse, so hey, I'm all for AT&T improving the quality of their service. But my sexual orientation has exactly zero to do with my phone service."

"Well, that's not entirely true... " Aravosis added. The gist of his protest was that AT&T, like many big corporations, belongs to the Tennessee Chamber of Commerce, which successfully lobbied for a bill that would limit civil rights protections for LGBT citizens of that state.

"That AT&T," the post continued. "The AT&T that weighed in early with a statement, when we asked the 13 companies to disavow the legislation and call on the governor to veto, but then whose statement pretty much didn't say anything. The AT&T then that e-mailed me multiple additional statements AFTER the governor signed the hateful bill into law."

These remarks were huzzahed by a long string of bitter comments. "Step right up! Step right up!" declared one. "Fake gay organizations for sale! Low, low prices!"

"This is a perfect example of an LGBT organization that is inherently self-important and corrupted by the cocktail party circuit," added another post.

Why the hell?

Much of the LGBT press quickly followed suit. "Why The Hell Is GLAAD Supporting The AT&T And T-Mobile Merger?" asked QUEERTY a day later. The commentary noted that one of GLAAD's board members is an ex-AT&T lobbyist. Politico reports that the board member in question may have approached GLAAD and other gay rights groups with the letter (he has also resigned).

"A case of secret backroom circle-jerking?" QUEERTY caustically wondered. "Most interestingly, AT&T is against Net Neutrality—the principle stating that all information on the web should get delivered at the same speed, not at different speeds and prices depending on who owns the service)."

Actually, AT&T's position on net neutrality goes hot and cold with changing circumstances. The company agreed to honor open Internet principles when it received FCC permission to buy BellSouth, then opposed them, but of late has more or less acceded to the Commission's latest (and modest) provisions--or at least it doesn't loudly denounce them.

But GLAAD quickly responded that the merger endorsement didn't indicate that it agreed with AT&T's perceived position on net neutrality:

This morning reports ran regarding GLAAD's position on a merger between AT&T and T-Mobile and put forth false accusations that GLAAD is unable to effectively work with media entities that we also receive corporate sponsorships from. We take these characterizations of our work extremely seriously. It was also wrongly reported that GLAAD endorses AT&T's position on net neutrality. GLAAD does not endorse AT&T's position. GLAAD believes that equal, fair and universal access to the internet is vital to our community and to our national dialogue.

QUEERTY's updated response was unimpressed by this statement.

"GLAAD says it doesn't share AT&T's stance on Net Neutrality which is a bit like Target saying it doesn't share a Minnesota Republican's anti-gay views while still supporting his pro-business campaign," the post declared. "GLAAD can't support one without also supporting the other, whether they disagree or not."

Two weeks of blogospheric frenzy later, GLAAD disclosed that President Barrios had quit.

"I have been pained by the difficulties that have beset GLAAD over the last three weeks," Barrios' e-mail statement to the board noted:

As you know, they concern GLAAD's endorsement of the AT&T / T-Mobile merger—and inaccurate but effective characterizations that suggest GLAAD has supported this merger because of our relationship with them as a corporate sponsor. As many of you have observed to me, this entire situation is wrought with miscommunication and assumptions. Be that as it may, I respect the function and responsibility of my position, and know this is the right course of action.

New rules

Whatever you think of this brouhaha, it suggests that non-profits won't be endorsing these merger transactions in the future without heightened scrutiny from their activist members and allies. Few such activists appear to believe board chairs who say that the corporate money their organizations receive play no factor in issuing a merger statement. While many groups will be able to continue signing boilerplate blessings to whatever anti-trust waiver their benefactor seeks, some outfits will discover, like GLAAD, that the price tag for this sort of cooperation is dangerously high.

If you oversee one of these outfits, here are three ways to head off a GLAAD-like denouement.

1. Take the in-your-face business/tech reporter test. Imagine that a couple of days following the release of your endorsement letter, some journalist from the business press buttonholes you at a benefit dinner or similar event. "Can you elaborate on why you think this merger will deliver technological improvements that will help your members?" she asks.

Do you see yourself stumbling through some awkward commentary, wishing that you had more carefully read the merger FAQ you were given by the letter's requester? In that case, you might want to consider telling your corporate benefactor that you are a Luddite, this matter is beyond your comprehension, and your organization doesn't weigh in on subjects that you don't understand. The confession might be embarrassing, but you'll only be admitting to an ignorance shared by most board presidents who send these documents to the FCC.

2. Bureaucratize the problem. Put provisions in your non-profit's procedural guidelines or by-laws that make it more difficult to write these sort of letters. They should stipulate that your group only weighs in on government issues that are immediately relevant to its stated purposes. Or they should require some kind of dialogue with the membership for any endorsement that strays beyond core principles.

Then, whenever these regulatory requests comes in, you can plead that your hands are tied. Damned red tape! Who wrote those rules anyway? Sorry.

3. Speak for yourself. If a telco or ISP that has given your group money comes knocking, and you don't think that you can turn down an endorsement request (or turn down the group's donation), at least write your statement as narrowly as possible. GLAAD's letter, with its "our community" rhetoric, implied that the organization saw itself as speaking for LGBT people everywhere. In retrospect, this clearly was not the case.

Instead, try to frame your endorsement as coming from a few individuals on your board, such as your president, CEO, or some technical subcommittee within your organization. Keep the broad language about your membership or the population that your nonprofit represents out of the picture. By portraying the merger blessing as coming from just a few people, you can at least protect yourself from the charge that you are putting unwelcome words in the mouths of your constituents.

It would be a great thing if the big ISP, telco, and media conglomerates that ask for these letters from their grant recipients stopped doing so. Judging by the lengthy merger orders that the FCC releases when it makes final decisions, the Commission rarely takes these missives into consideration anyway, and the informed public invariably sees them as quid pro quo documents.

But until corporate America reconsiders this tactic, the GLAAD episode suggests that nonprofits have to stop seeing these endorsements as the mere cost of raising money, and instead come up with better strategies for handling such requests.