After registering through the appropriate channels and having its attendance confirmed, The Star News Network Wednesday was kicked out of a media briefing by a left-wing election group that is funded by Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, before that briefing even began.
Center for Election Innovation & Research (CEIR) held a media briefing to discuss what it calls “efforts to undermine democracy in several states,” including Wisconsin, where former state Supreme Court Justice Mike Gableman has been investigating 2020’s election integrity in the state.
“You are unable to rejoin this meeting because you were previously removed by the host,” read a message from Zoom, where the briefing was held.
“The briefing will be hosted by David Becker, JD, Executive Director and Founder of CEIR,” the media invitation said. “Becker has over 22 years of experience in elections, serving as a senior attorney with the U.S. Department of Justice Voting Section in both the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations, as well as leading the elections team at The Pew Charitable Trusts, prior to founding CEIR.”
It directed media outlets to RSVP to a woman called Liz Voyles at a group called Brass Ring Communications in Washington, D.C., who confirmed The Star’s RSVP.
CEIR, a nonprofit 5ol(c)(3), has been at the center of controversy after accepting a $12 million grant from Zuckerberg ahead of the 2020 election. CEIR says its mission is to “restore trust in the American election system and promote election procedures that encourage participation and ensure election integrity and security.”
Most of that donation – $11.8 million of it – was used to revive an inactive nonprofit called The Michigan Center for Election Law and Administration (MCELA), which was founded by current Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson (D) in 2008.
MCELA, which is itself a left-wing nonprofit masquerading as a non-partisan election law group, then went on to pay most of the $11.8 million to two Democrat consulting firms to pay for advertisements.
The Michigan Star reported:
There were only two expenditures reported in 2020 by MCELA, both for “media strategy and purchase.” The biggest, for $9,799,407, went to Waterfront Strategies in Washington, D.C., a firm that specializes in handling media buys for Democrat and left-wing interest groups. Waterfront Strategies is an in-house subsidiary of GMMB, the largest Democratic consulting firm in the United States. GMMB was instrumental in electing Barack Obama and countless other Democrat office holders.
The remaining $2,088,000 in reported expenditures went to Alper Strategies of Grosse Pointe, Michigan, which is also a Democrat-controlled organization. Founder Jill Alper was previously the political director and coordinated campaign director of the Democratic National Committee.
The content of those advertisements remains unclear.
Notably, none of the $11.8 million was spent on administrative fees, other than a paltry $1,217 on insurance, suggesting that MCELA was simply used as a funnel from CEIR to help Democrats win the 2020 elections.
Nonprofits are barred by law from participating in partisan politics.
The Star planned to ask about this scheme during Wednesday’s media briefing.
Specifically, it had two questions prepared:
-
Your organization gave $12 million to a shell Michigan 501(c)(3) founded by the Democrat Secretary of State in Michigan. $11.8 million of that money was then sent directly to two Democrat consulting firms for the purported purposes of voter education, but some say it was for Democrat Get Out the Vote operations for then-candidate Biden. Given that conduct, isn’t it your organization that is subverting Democracy in the U.S.?
- Will you instruct those two Democrat consulting firms to make all of their financial records for that $11.8 million in expenditures available to investigators?
Those questions remain unanswered.
_ _ _
Pete D’Abrosca is a reporter at The Star News Network. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Mark Zuckerberg” by Mark Zuckerberg. Background Photo “Election Day 2020” by Phil Roeder. CC BY 2.0.
