Allege withheld millions of dollars in donations
Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation (BLMGNF) is suing Tides Foundation for fraud, according to a bombshell lawsuit.
The group, which has managed hundreds of millions of dollars for left-wing groups since its creation in 1976, has allegedly withheld BLM donations, now totaling more than $33 million, and instead used the money to sponsor pro-Palestine groups that have fueled the recent college campus protests.
In a 285-page lawsuit filed on May 6 in California Superior Court–Los Angeles County, it was alleged Tides 'refused to honor its promises and continues to commandeer BLMGNF's donations.'
The lawsuit asserts Tides spread an undisclosed amount of donations to an unaffiliated radical BLM breakaway group - spearheaded by BLM-Los Angeles co-founder Dr. Melina Abdullah.
As well as managing BLM-related foundations, the group also manages donations for pro-Palestine activists who have been participating in anti-Israel protests nationwide.
Tides is a Los Angeles and San Francisco-based nonprofit that acts as a fiscal sponsor that collects donations for groups that don't have 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status, according to the New York Post.
BLMGNF–which was founded in 2017 as the national organization of the civil rights movement–gained millions of dollars in donations following the death of George Floyd in 2020. The organization put the money raised in the hands of Tides because they did not have tax-exempt status from the IRS.
Tides, reportedly, verbally assured the BLM activist network that the donations would be returned when the organization received tax-exempt status. The organization takes a percentage of all donations to manage a group's funds, according to the lawsuit.
While BLMGNF terminated the partnership with Tides back in 2022, Tides has refused to hand over the $33 million owed, the complaint states.
Tides is now being accused of mishandling the cash - after claiming to have transferred $7.4 million from the collective fund back to BLMGNF on June 9, 2022.
Instead, it sent only a portion of the cash to an unaffiliated BLM chapter in Oklahoma City, the lawsuit says.
'It is unclear why such a large amount would have been granted to a single city's BLM chapter,' the lawsuit says.
Tides have denied wrongdoing and called the allegations “completely false,” saying in a statement:
“Resources in the Black Lives Matter [collective action fund] were never intended to be granted to large, well-funded national organizations like Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation, and were always intended to be granted to local Black Lives Matter chapters. BLMGNF's lawsuit seeks to circumvent the intent of the Fund's donors and deprive grassroots Black Lives Matter chapters critical resources, for its own benefit.”
George Soros and his son, Alex Soros, have reportedly donated nearly $14 million from their Open Air Society Foundations to Tides - which also sponsors activist group such as the pro-Palestinian Adalah Justice Project as well as other organizations backing the wave of college campus protests.
College campuses nationwide have witnessed protests over the past month on both sides of the conflict in the Middle East following Hamas' terror attack on Israel on Oct. 7.
