Parker Thayer writes for the Federalist about a key task for those who want to fight the damage done by harmful nonprofit groups.
In the wake of Charlie Kirk’s assassination, conservatives and moderates alike are crying out for the decimation of hyper-politicized nonprofit organizations and the “NGO complex” that many believe enables and encourages left-wing extremism. The sentiment is correct, but the righteous anger is currently directionless, leading to dubious comments about “hate speech,” vague notions of charges under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, and talk of investigations into Antifa funding, with no real sense of where to strike first. There needs to be a clear target, and it should be one easily hit for maximum effect.
The “charitable” voter registration industry is that target, and this is a uniquely opportune moment to hit it.
Despite IRS rules prohibiting charitable groups from engaging in partisan electioneering, it’s an open secret that a small army of voter registration nonprofits operates as an extension of the Democratic Party. In 2020, a Democrat Super PAC called Mind the Gap sent a memo advising megadonors that the largest of these “charitable” groups, the Voter Participation Center (VPC) and the Everybody Votes Campaign (EVC), were “4 to 10 times more cost-effective than the next best alternative” for “netting additional Democratic votes.”
The EVC is the largest voter registration campaign in history. It has recorded more than 7 million registrations and $200 million in funding since 2015, when it was first conceived for explicitly partisan reasons, as proved by emails between Democrat consultants and John Podesta.
EVC’s canvassers have been repeatedly investigated for submitting thousands of fraudulent registration forms in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Arizona. The group is also one of the biggest donors to the New Georgia Project, a Georgia activist group recently fined $300,000 by the Georgia Ethics Commission for engaging in partisan electioneering on behalf of its founder, Stacey Abrams.
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