Conservative Think Tanks Get Mega Millions

They may not have won Powerball of Mega Millions, but a pair of conservative think tanks is getting a huge injection of funds from generous donors.

The Heritage Foundation is getting a $43 million bequest from the estate of Judge Allison and Dorothy Rouse.  It is one of the largest gifts in the think tank's 45-year history.

Heritage is also establishing the Grover M. Hermann Center for the Federal Budget from a separate $5 million grant that coincides with the sunsetting of The Grover Hermann Foundation.

The Hudson Institute is also getting a few million dollars:

Hudson Institute announced the creation of the Ravenel B. Curry III Chair to be held initially by Hudson distinguished fellow Walter Russell Mead for a five-year period. The position is made possible by a $3 million gift to the Institute by Ravenel B. Curry III.

Ravenel Curry III is the managing director and chief investment officer of Eagle Capital Management LLC. He co-founded the investment firm in 1988 with his wife, Elizabeth Curry, who passed away in 2015. Previously, Curry served as a portfolio manager at the Duke Endowment, and as a partner at H.C. Wainwright. He is a member of Hudson Institute’s Chairman’s Advisory Board and is also a trustee of the American Enterprise Institute, the Manhattan Institute, and The New York Historical Society. 

Both Heritage and Hudson have very close ties to the Trump Administration and have played an influential role in terms of policy.

Amid Tarnished Image Rubenstein Gives Brookings $20 Million Boost

Billionaire David Rubenstein has just injected $20 million into the Brookings Institution.  Here is more from a press release:

Brookings Institution President Strobe Talbott announced today the establishment of the David M. Rubenstein Fellowships. As part of the Institution’s strategic plan for its second century, which includes a key goal of advancing diversity in its scholarly community, Brookings will appoint outstanding early-and mid-career scholars and experts from the United States and abroad. The work of the Rubenstein Fellows will significantly augment and diversify the independent policy research and analysis of Brookings’s more than 100 resident scholars. The first class of Rubenstein Fellows will take up their positions at Brookings by September 2017.

This new program is made possible by a generous multi-million dollar gift from David M. Rubenstein, co-chair of the Brookings Board of Trustees, and co-founder and co-chief executive officer of the Carlyle Group.

Following a rigorous and competitive application process, the Rubenstein Fellows will be appointed for two-year terms in one or more of Brookings’s five research programs.

Although the press release does not mention the exact amount of the donation, other entities have reported that Rubenstein gave $15 million for the new fellowship program and $5 million to the think tank's foreign policy department.

Inside Philanthropy writes about the new donation, saying that it is "hard to see think tanks overseen by corporate leaders and heavily funded by business as truly impartial."  It also notes that it is one of the biggest gifts made to a think tank in recent years.

Anyone interesting in applying for the fellowship can do so here (salary is commensurate with experience).

In 2014, billionaire Daniel D'Aniello (also from the Carlyle Group) gave the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) $20 million.

In 2013, the Heritage Foundation received a $26 million gift from the family of the late  Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis.

Billionaire's Daughter Throwing Big Money at Think Tanks

In the think tank world, it pays to be friends with billionaires.  The latest example comes from The Washington Post:

Mitt Romney had just lost the 2012 presidential election, and a group of wealthy donors assembled in New York's University Club was trying to figure out what had gone wrong.  Suddenly, a young woman stood up before the largely male crowd and delivered an unsparing critique of the Republican's technology and canvassing operations.

Thomas Saunders III, chairman of the Heritage Foundation's Board of Trustees, was impressed.  "Who is that?" he asked the man next to him.

Soon, there would be few in conservative policy and political circles who did not know the name Rebekah Mercer.

Galvanized in part by the Republicans' 2012 White House loss, the middle daughter of billionaire hedge fund magnate Robert Mercer has rattled the status quo by directing her family's resources into an array of investments on the right.  In the past six years, the Mercers have poured tens of millions into Republican super PACs, Washington think tanks, state policy shops, a film-production company, a data analytics operation and one of the country's most provocative online conservative news outlets.

The article goes on to note that Rebekah Mercer jointed the board of the Goldwater Institute and her family foundation gave nearly $1 million to the think tank between 2011 and 2014.  The family foundation have nearly $35 million to conservative think tanks and policy groups between 2009 and 2014.  And she is now on the board of trustees of the Heritage Foundation.

The Hill also notes that Mercer has been a big supporter of the libertarian Cato Institute.

Think Tank Watch recently wrote about a new trend of billionaires starting their own think tanks.  Here is a previous Think Tank Watch post on the favorite think tank of billionaires.

Does Trump Want to Destroy Think Tanks?

For months and months, think tanks were not a target for Donald Trump, but now, some think tanks are fretting after the Trump campaign suggested that a main source of funding for think tanks should be severely limited.  Ironically, the suggestion came from Stephen Moore, a top economic advisor to Trump who happens to work at the conservative think tank Heritage Foundation.

Under Mr. Moore's plan, which calls for higher taxes on rich people who donate to non-profits (i.e., think tanks), many of the very donors who give to his think tank (and many others) will likely reduce their donations to Washington's powerful policy organizations.  After all, Heritage is one of the many think tanks that receives funds from billionaire donors.

Here is more from a recent Hill piece:

Moore said the policy challenge would be writing law that distinguishes between genuine charities, like churches and the Salvation Army, and those that should be subject to taxes.

“The question is: Could you make a distinction between a church, homeless shelter, soup kitchen versus the Brookings Institution?” he said, referring to the nonpartisan think tank. Moore’s employer, the Heritage Foundation, is a conservative think tank.

Our guess is that Moore does not mind shooting himself (and his think tank cohorts) in the foot because if Trump becomes president, he would likely leave think tank land after being given a plum job in the Trump Administration.

Updated List of Atlantic Council Donors

Atlantic Council has recently updated its donors list, and Think Tank Watch has been analyzing the list for interesting tidbits.  Donors include US government agencies, foreign government agencies, corporations (both domestic and foreign), other think tanks and think tankers, universities, foundations, law firms, PR firms, consulting firms, foreign stock exchanges, cultural centers, former government officials, and others.  Here is what we found:

•  US government entities include: US State Department, US Air Force, US Army, US Marines.

• Large corporations: Airbus, Chevron, Google, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, Southern Company, Thomson Reuters, BP, ExxonMobil, General Electric, Northrup Grumman, Panasonic, SAIC, United Technologies, Barclays Capital, Coca-Cola Co., ConocoPhillips, ENI, FedEx, McAfee, Microsoft, Target, Boeing, Bloomberg, Caterpillar, Daimler, Gallup, HSBC, Dow Chemical, Comcast, Rolls-Royce, Bank of Tokyo - Mitsubishi UFJ. 

• Foreign governments: United Arab Emirates (UAE; which gives the think tank at lesast $1 million), Kingdom of Bahrain, City of London, Temasek Holdings (Singapore), Embassy of Hungary, Ministry of Defense of Finland, Embassy of Latvia, Estonian Ministry of Defense, Ministry of Defense of Georgia, Ministry of Defense of Montenegro, Republic of Macedonia Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Embassy of Slovakia, Embassy of Czech Republic.

• Other think tanks and think tankers: Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), Nicolas Veron of Bruegel (formerly at PIIE), Anne-Marie Slaughter (head of New America Foundation), Michele Flournoy (head of Center for a New American Security), Center for Middle East Policy at Brookings Institution.

• Other notable entities: UCLA, Georgetown University Law Center, The Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation, Sandia National Laboratories, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Baker & McKenzie LLP, Scowcroft Group, Edelman, McLarty Associates, Istanbul Stock Exchange.

Here is a Think Tank Watch story from 2013 about Atlantic Council revealing its donors after Chuck Hagel, then-Chairman of Atlantic Council, had to reveal who funded his think tank during his nomination process for Defense Secretary.

The most interesting thing from the latest donor disclosures is probably the number of outside think tanks and think tankers who donate to Atlantic Council.  And just like for other think tanks, colleges and universities donate to Atlantic Council.

 Below is the full list that Atlantic Council has disclosed, lumped into categories by donation amount:


**********
 ǂ denotes a sponsor of the 2014 Wroclaw Global Forum
◊ denotes a sponsor of the 2014 Energy and Economic Summit
† deceased

$1,000,000 and above

Adrienne Arsht Bahaa Hariri United Arab Emirates

$250,000 - $999,999

Airbusǂ BMCE Bank Bromak EOOD Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions Chevron◊ Corporate Commercial Bank Hunton & Williams Kingdom of Bahrain George Lund MNG Holding Company, Inc.◊ Dinu Patriciu Brent Scowcroft Smith Richardson Foundation Turkiye Halk Bankasi A.S.◊ US State Department

$100,000 - $249,000
Actidea Anonymous Atlantic Advocacy Fund Inc. Thomas L. Blair Bob Woodruff Foundation Central Europe Energy Partners AISBL (CEEP)◊ Cheniere Energy, Inc.◊ Chopivsky Family Foundation Defense Ministry of Norway Dentons LLP◊ Genel Enerji◊ Googleǂ Istanbul Stock Exchange◊ Lockheed Martin Corporationǂ	Macarthur Foundation Alexander Mirtchev OCP S.A. Ploughshares Fund Raytheonǂ Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Inc. SAAB Southern Companyǂ TECRO The Morganti Group Thomson Reuters Ukrainian World Congress Olin Wethington

$50,000 - $99,000

ACE Group African Rainbow Minerals Tewodros Ashenafi Audiovisuelle International Bank of America Corporation BOTAS - Boru Hatlari Ile Petrol Tasima Anonim Sirk◊ BP◊ Calik Enerji Sanayi Ve Ticaret A.S.◊ Michael Calvey CEZ Group◊ City of London DRS Technologies, Inc. ETH Zurich ExxonMobil ◊ Julie Finley Ronald M. Freeman Frontera Resources Robert S. Gelbard General Electric ◊ Infosys Peter Kovarcik† Krauss Maffei Wegmann John Macomber McGraw Hill Financial

Meads International, Inc.ǂ Georgette Mosbacher Northrop Grumman Corporation Ahmet Oren Panasonic Corporation of North America W. DeVier Pierson PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP Republic of Cyprus RTI International Metals, Inc. SAIC SICPA S.A. Skoll Global Imperatives Standard Chartered Bank Temasek Holdings James C. Temerty Textron The Blackstone Group Tishman Speyer Properties LP TPAO◊ Transatlantic Policy Network Tupras◊ United Technologies Corporationǂ Zorlu Enerji◊

$25,000 - $49,999

Allianz SE◊ American Water Bank of Tokyo - Mitsubishi UFJ Barclays Capital Victor L. Chu Coca-Cola Company ConocoPhillips Steven and Roberta Denning DEPA Public Gas Corporation of Greece◊ Markus Dohle Conrado Dornier Edelman Ekkou VP SRL◊ Embassy of Hungary ENI FedEx Corporation Fluor Corporation Garanti Bank◊ C. Boyden Gray Grupa Lotos S.A. Grupo Salinas Guggenheim Partners, LLC Gulf Keystone Petroleum Ltd.◊ James L. Jones, Jr. Leidos, Inc. LexisNexis Group Lucky Cement Limited Mannheim LLC MBDA Incorporated

McAfee, Inc. McLarty Associates Microsoft Corporation Ministry of Defence of Finland Mol Group◊ Moroccan-American Cultural Center MVM Magyar Villamos Muvek Zrt.◊ William H. Nixon Novartis Corporation OMV Petrol Ofisi A.S.◊ Andrew Prozes Publicis Groupe Renaissance Strategic Advisors Jeffrey A. Rosen SAS Scowcroft Group Alan J. Spence Stfa Yatirim Holding A.S.◊ Target Corporation Thales USA The Boeing Company Thermo Fisher Scientific Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) AG◊ Turkerler Holding, A.S.◊ US Air Force US Army US Chamber of Commerce US Marines

$10,000 - $24,999

Odeh Aburdene Accuron Technologies Limited Baker & McKenzie LLPǂ Bloomberg L.P. Caterpillar Inc. Center For Strategic & International Studies John Chapoton C. Diane Christensen CISCO - Basic Solutions Corp. Daimler DBS Bank Deloitte Services Embassy of Latvia Estonian Ministry of Defence Alan H. Fleischmann Futurewei Technologies, Inc. Gallup, Inc. Sherri Goodman Gokhan Gundogdu Stephen J. Hadley Ian Hague Brian C. McK. Henderson

Henry Schein, Inc. Mary L. Howell HSBC Instititue of International Education Franklin D. Kramer Loews Corporation Hilda Ochoa-Brillembourg Arnold L. Punaro Rockefeller & Co. Charles O. Rossotti Shearman & Sterling, LLP Stroock & Stroock & Lavan LLP Syngenta Corporation TD International LLC The Dow Chemical Company The Soufan Group Enzo Viscusi Water Standard Company LLC John C. Whitehead†

$5,000 - $9,999

Alliant Techsystems Operations LLC Aspen Healthcare Services British High Commission CH2M Hill Charles F. Wald Comcast Corporation Corsair Capital Dov S. Zakheim DynCorp Ellen O. Tauscher Frederick Kempe and Pamela Meyer Globis Capital Partners Harlan K. Ullman Jan M. Lodal Jay Walker John Gastright Judith A. Miller Litespeed Management, LLC Michael V. Hayden Ministry of Defence of Georgia Ministry of Defense of Montenegro

Movalis New Mountain Capital Paul Twomey Peter J. Tanous Republic of Macedonia Ministry of Foreign Affairs Robert Hormats Robert M. Kimmitt Rodel Charitable Foundation of DE Rolls-Royce of North America John Megrue Semnani Family Foundation The Asan Institute For Policy Studies The Hand Foundation The Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership Thomas Nides Thomas J. Edelman VT Systems William E. Mayer Wolfgang Friedrich Ischinger

$1,000 - $4,999

John R. Allen David D. Aufhauser Elizabeth F. Bagley Sheila C. Bair Base Per Altezza Peter Behr Margaret Bennett Bertelsmann Foundation Susan M. Blaustein Julia Chang Bloch Harold Brown R. Nicholas Burns Byron Callan Capital Alpha Partners, LLC James E. Cartwright Peter Cunniffe Cyber Conflict Studies Association Ivo H. Daalder Paula J. Dobriansky Christopher J. Dodd Stuart E. Eizenstat Embassy of Slovakia Embassy of the Czech Republic eNGO Network on CCS Formiche Lawrence P. Fisher II Michele Flournoy Paul R. S. Gebhard Georgetown University Law Center Rita E. Hauser Robert Hunter Timothy Adams George A. Joulwan Stephen R. Kappes

Zalmay M. Khalilzad Henry A. Kissinger Geraldine S. Kunstadter Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory Richard L. Lawson Lotus International Magellan Aerospace Corporation Wendy W. Makins Eric D.K. Melby Franklin C. Miller George E. Moose Virginia Mulberger Joseph S. Nye Official Monetary and Financial Institutions Forum Raul Perea-Henze Thomas R. Pickering Pioneer Natural Resources Quincy Jones Productions, Inc. Kirk A. Radke Joseph W. Ralston Nanako Sakai Sandia National Laboratories Anne-Marie Slaughter Walter B. Slocombe Paula Stern John S. Tanner Texas Water Recycling Association The Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation UCLA Philip Verveer Mary Yates

Up to $999

Michael Allen Kurt Amend Daniel J. Arbess Stuart Archer Cresencio S. Arcos Victor H. Ashe Noris D. Balabanian Robert M. Beecroft J.D. Bindenagel Martin Bollinger Arnaud de Borchgrave† Christopher Bott James Bowen David Buffaloe Theodore Hopkins Bunzel Edward J. Burger, Jr. Keith Ross Butler CD Global Strategies Group LLC Center for Middle East Policy at Brookings Sandra L. Charles Frances D. Cook James De Francia Rob de Wijk Mary B. DeRosa Joseph J. Drach, Jr. Glenn D. Dunmire William Ebert Pantea Fiuzi Farkhan Francis Finelli Lucy Reilly Fitch Randall Fort Andrew D. Frank Laurie Fulton Alice Gast Glenn Gerstell Carol Giacomo Richard W. Graber James Greene Michael Hanna Harry Harding, Jr. David P. Harris Scott Harris† Steven Hefter E.C. Michael Higgins Jeffrey Hoffman James R. Hogg Barry B. Hughes Brian A. Hunter Institute for Critical Technology and Applied Science Bobby R. Inman Jason Jarrell Roger Kirk Kurt J. Klingenberger Martin Klingst Steven B. Klinsky Stefan Kornelius Tom C. Korologos Matthew Lauer Eric L. Lewis Malcolm Lovell, Jr. Clay Lowery Gerhard Mally Ronald Marks Margarita Mathiopoulos Jules Frank Mermoud

Mark Meyer R. Garrett Mitchell Michael Moore Powell Moore David Morey Dambisa Moyo Varoges Muradian Terence Murphy Eugene L. Nardelli Sandra Navidi Mark Nihols William A. Nitze Norman F. Oblon Eileen O'Connor Peter Pace Sally Painter Walter Parchomenko Jesper Pedersen Yannis Perlepes Mary Ann Peters Philip Pilevsky William A. Plapinger Joseph A. Presel John Price Pamela Quanrud Henrik Fogh Rasmussen Charles Ries Christina Rocca Zvi S. Rome Ann E. Rondeau Daniel A. Russell Steven E. Schmidt Mark Schwendler Andrew Shapiro Stephen Shapiro Matthew T. Sherman Cenk Sidar Jeffrey M. Siegal Pamela H. Smith Daniel Speckhard Solveig B. Spielmann Walter E. Stadtler James Steinberg Patrick Stephenson Eric Stewart Francesco Stipo Nigel J. Sutton Frank A. Tapparo John F. Tefft Jay Timmons Olesya Tkacheva Mamuka Tsereteli USAID Colombia Marten H.A. van Heuven David Van Buren Nicolas Veron Samuel S. Visner Mark Vlasic Don Wallace, Jr. Leigh Warner Ruth Wedgwood James Wildman Samuel Zega

**********

Exxon Has Spent $30+ Million on Think Tanks?

Corporations are the glue that keep most large think tanks intact, as a whole spending hundreds of millions of dollars each year for think tank studies and access to scholars.  One specific example is ExxonMobil Corporation, which has reportedly spent tens of millions of dollars on think tanks over the past few decades.  Here is more from a Herald & Tribune op-ed:

...for decades thereafter, the company [Exxon] nevertheless spent $30 million on think tanks and researchers...

According to The Huffington Post, in 2014 alone Exxon spent $1.9 million on 15 think tanks, advocacy groups, and trade associations.  Here is a list from around 2005 of the various think tanks that Exxon was funding.  Think tanks on that list include Cato Institute, Heritage Foundation, Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), Hoover Institution, and Hudson Institute.

Exxon's corporate website does not list the think tanks it currently funds but says that it "provides support to a variety of think tanks, trade associations and coalitions in order to promote informed dialogue and sound policy on matters pertinent to its interests."  Today, Exxon funds think tanks such as the Center for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS) and the Brookings Institution.  [Chevron is also a donor to those two think tanks.]

Other think tanks that have received Exxon money include: Resources for the Future (RFF), New America Foundation (NAF), and Center for a New American Security (CNAS).

In 2007, it was reported that Exxon had been funding the conservative think tank American Enterprise Institute (AEI).  At that time, AEI was sending letters to scientists offering them up to $10,000 to critique findings in a climate report from the United Nation's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

It is also important to remember that in 2009, Exxon head Rex Tillerson came to the Wilson Center in Washington, DC to announce for the first time that Exxon was supporting a carbon tax.

Here is more about big oil companies' funding of think tanks.

Here is a previous Think Tank Watch post on the Bipartisan Policy Center's (BPC) connection to Exxon.

Exxon has also given large amounts to colleges and universities, often considered the largest competitors to think tanks.

In related news, a recent New York Times piece entitled "Emails Reveal Academic Ties In a Food War" outlines the large sums of money that Monsato has given to academics.  That piece does not mention Monsanto's funding of think tanks, but it is public knowledge that Monsato has donated to think tanks like the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) and Hudson Institute.

Heritage Scores $2.7 Million Gift for Family/Marriage Promotion

The conservative think tank Heritage Foundation has just received a $2.7 million gift from Ms. Betty A. Anderlink.  Here is more from Heritage:

Betty A. Anderlik of Clearwater, Fl. has made a $2.7 million gift to The Heritage Foundation, the prominent Washington, D.C., think tank announced today.

The gift is being made to support Heritage's efforts to design and promote public policies that "place marriage and the family at the center of civil society," as Heritage describes its efforts, and increase opportunity for all Americans. 

In recognition of her support, a fellowship will be established at Heritage in honor of Mrs. Anderlik and her late husband. The title of Joseph C. and Elizabeth A. Anderlik Fellow will go to the Vice President of Heritage’s Institute for Family, Opportunity and Culture. As the current Vice President of the Institute, Jennifer A. Marshall works to promote and defend a vibrant civil society with both a national and international audience. The Institute for Family, Opportunity and Culture performs both independent and integrated analysis in order to promote a stronger civil society.

David Callahan of Inside Philanthropy has just written a piece in response to the gift, entitled "Who Gives to Conservative Think Tanks?"  Mr. Callahan says that American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and Cato Institute draw lots of support from the finance community, including many New Yorkers, but Heritage is "definitely a think tank of traditional heartland conservatives."

Mr. Callahan notes that the Heritage gift is meant to honor Mrs. Anderlik's late husband Joseph Anderlink, who was a successful executive at a civil engineering firm.  [More specifically, he was a vice president of engineering at Bonestroo Rosene Anderlik and Associates.]  In 2010 Mrs. Anderlik gave the same amount ($2.7 million) to Iowa State University to create an endowed engineering professorship.

While $2.7 million is a large amount, it is small change compared to a couple of previous gifts that Heritage Foundation has recently received.  Earlier this year the think tank received an "eight-digit" gift from a retired radiologist and several members of her family.  And in 2013, Heritage Foundation received $26 million from the family of the late Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis.

To put these gifts into perspective, in 2013, the Heritage Foundation received contributions and grants totaling around $102 million.  In 2012, it received  around $78 million.