ogc163
Superstar
Media mogul Oprah Winfrey is worth nearly $3 billion.
Basketball legend-turned-businessman Michael Jordan’s net worth is a reported $1.65 billion.
Businessman and philanthropist Robert Smith is worth more than both of them with an estimated net value of $4 billion-plus.
All three black billionaires are known as generous philanthropists, but not big political givers — they are rarely mentioned in the same breath as political megadonors Charles and David Koch, George Soros and Tom Steyer.
Winfrey, Jordan and Smith aren’t anomalies, either. The nation’s wealthiest African-Americans are decidedly reluctant campaign contributors, almost completely ceding the rarefied rank of “political megadonor” to older, white men, according to a Center for Public Integrity analysis of Federal Election Commission and Center for Responsive Politics data.
Since 2010, when the Supreme Court decided Citizens United v. FEC and opened floodgates to unlimited spending in elections, minority donors have been all but absent from every federal election’s top 100 political spenders list, the analysis found.
Critics of the nation’s campaign money system say lawmakers are increasingly beholden to a very small pool of aging white donors who don’t reflect a country that’s becoming younger, blacker and browner.
The success of Democrats’ mission to retake control of the U.S. House and Senate in the 2018 midterm elections depends heavily on convincing people of color to vote in a post-Barack Obama era. Democrats recently announced a new campaign aimed at turning out nonwhite voters. In addition, a new cluster of left-leaning super PACs and grassroots political groups — with names such as BlackPAC, Black Economic Alliance and Asian American Victory Fund — have sprung up in support. Some of these groups depend heavily on funding from white donors.
Quentin James, founder of The Collective PAC, whose mission is to help elect African-American candidates to office, said black donors don’t prioritize political giving, thwarting their impact on the political process.
“We’ve been told the biggest lie in politics, which is that the only thing that matters is your vote,” James said, citing the ramifications of the Citizens United decision. “If our community wants to be fully taken into account in this political system, our dollars have to matter as much as our votes.”
Take billionaire and Las Vegas Sands Corp. owner Sheldon Adelson, a fervent advocate for Israel.
Adelson, together with his wife, Miriam Adelson, contributed almost $82.6 million to mostly Republican or conservative political causes during 2015 and 2016 alone. Trump initially painted Adelson as a political puppet master, but Adelson subsequently became a top Trump backer anyway.
Adelson’s reward? Trump heeded his calls to ditch the United States’ nuclear agreement with Iran and move the U.S. Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
There’s no black analogue to Adelson. Not even close.
Oakland, California-based real estate investor and developer Wayne Jordan is the only African-American to appear in the top 100 donors list since 2009, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. The Rock the Vote founder and his wife, M. Quinn DeLaney, have together given Democratic political candidates and committees more than $6 million since 2007, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Jordan, who contributed to Obama’s 2013 inaugural committee, declined requests for comment.
Two Latinos appeared among the top 100 political donors for the 2015-2016 election cycle: MBF Healthcare Partners founder and chairman Miguel Fernandez, who gave mainly to Republicans and conservatives, and Texas-born, Chihuahua state cabinet member Alejandra de la Vega Foster, whose name appears alongside her husband, crude oil refiner Paul L. Foster, giving only to Republicans.
Haim Saban, a Democrat-supporting Israeli-American born in Egypt, and Hushang Ansary and his wife Shahla, a Republican-backing Iranian-American, also made the list, as did Iranian-born Tom Rastin, who supports Democrats.
Michael Steele, former chairman of the Republican National Committee, said that if someone is politically motivated, wealthy and not white, that person better play the political money game “the way the white boys are playing it.”
And that means spending huge amounts of money, as the law now allows, he said.
The laws are “written the way they are to take care of boys they’re supposed to take care of,” Steele said. “The problem is they can’t say, ‘Whites Only.’”
Why black Americans don’t give big to politics
The nation’s top black billionaires and many millionaires tend to be generous with their money — just not in a direct political sense. They may give heavily to charitable causes, churches or issue-driven groups that don’t engage in elections — even if they’re politically active in other ways, according to research.
Using celebrity instead of money to affect politics is a common practice among the famous, Steele said.
”It’s not the same as writing a $2.5 million check, but that celebrity could be worth $2.5 million [in] fundraising,” he said.
For example, Winfrey, who endorsed Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton during the 2016 election, gave $21 million to the National Museum of African American History and Culture, which now boasts an exhibit in her honor. Smith and Michael Jordan also donated to the museum, giving $20 million and $5 million respectively.
Their federal elections giving since Obama’s first run for the presidency totals more than $616,000, according to Center for Responsive Politics data.
That’s not nothing. But consider that investor and Democratic super donor Donald Sussman, who is white, contributed $2 million to the Emily’s List Women Vote! super PAC — in May alone.
Estee Portnoy, a spokeswoman for Michael Jordan, said the six-time NBA champion has given plenty to politics.
“He has donated to the campaigns of a number of candidates for political office over the years, including Barack Obama, Bill Bradley and Harvey Gantt, and will continue to do so,” she said in an email, highlighting his 2000 commercial endorsing former basketball star-turned-U.S. senator Bill Bradley’s presidential bid and noting that he hosted a 2012 fundraiser for Obama. Gantt, the first African-American mayor of Charlotte, North Carolina, twice ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate in the 1990s.
Years ago, Jordan was quoted as saying “Republicans buy sneakers too,” a quote that has repeatedly surfaced as evidence he avoids getting enmeshed in politics. Spokespeople for Jordan have previously denied that he ever said it, and Portnoy, too, said Jordan “never made the statement.”
Winfrey’s spokeswoman, Nicole Nichols, said Winfrey was not available for an interview or comment. Alan Fleischmann, a spokesman for Robert Smith, said he wasn’t “able to participate in this story.”
The Center for Public Integrity contacted more than 50 other black, Latino and Asian celebrities and high-net-worth individuals — LeBron James, Spike Lee, Ava DuVernay, Shonda Rhimes, Denzel Washington and Tracee Ellis Ross among them — who’ve been politically outspoken but made few, if any political contributions, to ask why.
Many of their representatives did not respond, and others who did said their clients were unavailable to comment.
George Takei, another Obama supporter who recently called President Donald Trump’s immigration stances “a chilling low,” has given $43,750 since 2007, including contributions to Obama’s and Clinton’s campaigns and to congressional candidates. He regularly offers up pointed political fare to his nearly 2.9 million Twitter followers. His husband and manager, Brad Takei, said George Takei wasn’t available to comment.
Model and TV personality Chrissy Teigen is one of Trump’s most famous Twitter critics, but federal records don’t reflect any political contributions from her. Teigen was unavailable for comment, publicist Britney Ross said.
Teigen’s husband, musician John Legend, has so far contributed nearly $32,000 during the 2017-2018 election cycle to liberal groups and some Democratic congressional candidates.
Legend — given name John Stephens — sang “If You’re Out There” at the 2008 Democratic National Convention and he was heavily featured in Will.I.Am’s “Yes We Can”, a song supporting Obama. He gave $4,600 that year to Obama for America. Legend’s representatives didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Kanye West, who first signed Legend to his music label, has proclaimed he would’ve voted for Trump — if he voted at all — in 2016. West visited the president at Trump Tower in New York City late last year and has been posting pictures of himself wearing a “Make America Great Again” hat.
In the past, he’s contributed to the Clinton and Obama campaigns, as well as the DNC in 2014 — but he has yet to give to Trump or any Republican party committees.
An unidentified woman answering West’s cell phone declined to comment.
Basketball legend-turned-businessman Michael Jordan’s net worth is a reported $1.65 billion.
Businessman and philanthropist Robert Smith is worth more than both of them with an estimated net value of $4 billion-plus.
All three black billionaires are known as generous philanthropists, but not big political givers — they are rarely mentioned in the same breath as political megadonors Charles and David Koch, George Soros and Tom Steyer.
Winfrey, Jordan and Smith aren’t anomalies, either. The nation’s wealthiest African-Americans are decidedly reluctant campaign contributors, almost completely ceding the rarefied rank of “political megadonor” to older, white men, according to a Center for Public Integrity analysis of Federal Election Commission and Center for Responsive Politics data.
Since 2010, when the Supreme Court decided Citizens United v. FEC and opened floodgates to unlimited spending in elections, minority donors have been all but absent from every federal election’s top 100 political spenders list, the analysis found.
Critics of the nation’s campaign money system say lawmakers are increasingly beholden to a very small pool of aging white donors who don’t reflect a country that’s becoming younger, blacker and browner.
The success of Democrats’ mission to retake control of the U.S. House and Senate in the 2018 midterm elections depends heavily on convincing people of color to vote in a post-Barack Obama era. Democrats recently announced a new campaign aimed at turning out nonwhite voters. In addition, a new cluster of left-leaning super PACs and grassroots political groups — with names such as BlackPAC, Black Economic Alliance and Asian American Victory Fund — have sprung up in support. Some of these groups depend heavily on funding from white donors.
Quentin James, founder of The Collective PAC, whose mission is to help elect African-American candidates to office, said black donors don’t prioritize political giving, thwarting their impact on the political process.
“We’ve been told the biggest lie in politics, which is that the only thing that matters is your vote,” James said, citing the ramifications of the Citizens United decision. “If our community wants to be fully taken into account in this political system, our dollars have to matter as much as our votes.”
Take billionaire and Las Vegas Sands Corp. owner Sheldon Adelson, a fervent advocate for Israel.
Adelson, together with his wife, Miriam Adelson, contributed almost $82.6 million to mostly Republican or conservative political causes during 2015 and 2016 alone. Trump initially painted Adelson as a political puppet master, but Adelson subsequently became a top Trump backer anyway.
Adelson’s reward? Trump heeded his calls to ditch the United States’ nuclear agreement with Iran and move the U.S. Embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.
There’s no black analogue to Adelson. Not even close.
Oakland, California-based real estate investor and developer Wayne Jordan is the only African-American to appear in the top 100 donors list since 2009, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. The Rock the Vote founder and his wife, M. Quinn DeLaney, have together given Democratic political candidates and committees more than $6 million since 2007, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. Jordan, who contributed to Obama’s 2013 inaugural committee, declined requests for comment.
Two Latinos appeared among the top 100 political donors for the 2015-2016 election cycle: MBF Healthcare Partners founder and chairman Miguel Fernandez, who gave mainly to Republicans and conservatives, and Texas-born, Chihuahua state cabinet member Alejandra de la Vega Foster, whose name appears alongside her husband, crude oil refiner Paul L. Foster, giving only to Republicans.
Haim Saban, a Democrat-supporting Israeli-American born in Egypt, and Hushang Ansary and his wife Shahla, a Republican-backing Iranian-American, also made the list, as did Iranian-born Tom Rastin, who supports Democrats.
Michael Steele, former chairman of the Republican National Committee, said that if someone is politically motivated, wealthy and not white, that person better play the political money game “the way the white boys are playing it.”
And that means spending huge amounts of money, as the law now allows, he said.
The laws are “written the way they are to take care of boys they’re supposed to take care of,” Steele said. “The problem is they can’t say, ‘Whites Only.’”
Why black Americans don’t give big to politics
The nation’s top black billionaires and many millionaires tend to be generous with their money — just not in a direct political sense. They may give heavily to charitable causes, churches or issue-driven groups that don’t engage in elections — even if they’re politically active in other ways, according to research.
Using celebrity instead of money to affect politics is a common practice among the famous, Steele said.
”It’s not the same as writing a $2.5 million check, but that celebrity could be worth $2.5 million [in] fundraising,” he said.
For example, Winfrey, who endorsed Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton during the 2016 election, gave $21 million to the National Museum of African American History and Culture, which now boasts an exhibit in her honor. Smith and Michael Jordan also donated to the museum, giving $20 million and $5 million respectively.
Their federal elections giving since Obama’s first run for the presidency totals more than $616,000, according to Center for Responsive Politics data.
That’s not nothing. But consider that investor and Democratic super donor Donald Sussman, who is white, contributed $2 million to the Emily’s List Women Vote! super PAC — in May alone.
Estee Portnoy, a spokeswoman for Michael Jordan, said the six-time NBA champion has given plenty to politics.
“He has donated to the campaigns of a number of candidates for political office over the years, including Barack Obama, Bill Bradley and Harvey Gantt, and will continue to do so,” she said in an email, highlighting his 2000 commercial endorsing former basketball star-turned-U.S. senator Bill Bradley’s presidential bid and noting that he hosted a 2012 fundraiser for Obama. Gantt, the first African-American mayor of Charlotte, North Carolina, twice ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate in the 1990s.
Years ago, Jordan was quoted as saying “Republicans buy sneakers too,” a quote that has repeatedly surfaced as evidence he avoids getting enmeshed in politics. Spokespeople for Jordan have previously denied that he ever said it, and Portnoy, too, said Jordan “never made the statement.”
Winfrey’s spokeswoman, Nicole Nichols, said Winfrey was not available for an interview or comment. Alan Fleischmann, a spokesman for Robert Smith, said he wasn’t “able to participate in this story.”
The Center for Public Integrity contacted more than 50 other black, Latino and Asian celebrities and high-net-worth individuals — LeBron James, Spike Lee, Ava DuVernay, Shonda Rhimes, Denzel Washington and Tracee Ellis Ross among them — who’ve been politically outspoken but made few, if any political contributions, to ask why.
Many of their representatives did not respond, and others who did said their clients were unavailable to comment.
George Takei, another Obama supporter who recently called President Donald Trump’s immigration stances “a chilling low,” has given $43,750 since 2007, including contributions to Obama’s and Clinton’s campaigns and to congressional candidates. He regularly offers up pointed political fare to his nearly 2.9 million Twitter followers. His husband and manager, Brad Takei, said George Takei wasn’t available to comment.
Model and TV personality Chrissy Teigen is one of Trump’s most famous Twitter critics, but federal records don’t reflect any political contributions from her. Teigen was unavailable for comment, publicist Britney Ross said.
Teigen’s husband, musician John Legend, has so far contributed nearly $32,000 during the 2017-2018 election cycle to liberal groups and some Democratic congressional candidates.
Legend — given name John Stephens — sang “If You’re Out There” at the 2008 Democratic National Convention and he was heavily featured in Will.I.Am’s “Yes We Can”, a song supporting Obama. He gave $4,600 that year to Obama for America. Legend’s representatives didn’t respond to requests for comment.
Kanye West, who first signed Legend to his music label, has proclaimed he would’ve voted for Trump — if he voted at all — in 2016. West visited the president at Trump Tower in New York City late last year and has been posting pictures of himself wearing a “Make America Great Again” hat.
In the past, he’s contributed to the Clinton and Obama campaigns, as well as the DNC in 2014 — but he has yet to give to Trump or any Republican party committees.
An unidentified woman answering West’s cell phone declined to comment.
