NEW YORK — Demand Justice, an organization founded by former members of Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign and associated with a “social welfare organization” financed by billionaire activist George Soros, is raising money for an eventual court fight against what the group describes as President Trump’s proposed “racist, unnecessary wall.”
Demand Justice claims: “This lawless president has created a humanitarian crisis along the southern border of our country by targeting asylum seekers; already, two children have died in U.S. border patrol custody.”
The organization fails to mention that Trump’s proposed barrier seeks to stop the “humanitarian crisis” of illegal aliens, including children, attempting the dangerous trek to cross the porous U.S.-Mexico border.
In an email blast, Demand Justice asks supporters for $5 to eventually challenge any proposed barrier in the court system:
If Trump takes this unprecedented action, it WILL be challenged in the courts. This is why we fight. Give $5 now.
We won’t allow Trump to hold our country hostage with his fearmongering and scare tactics. The courts may be our last line of defense against Trump’s authoritarian impulses and now is the time to show him we won’t stand down. Give $5 now to help us fight back.
Clinton herself put her name on a separate fundraising email pitch via her associated Onward Together progressive organization seeking funds to “fight back against the administration’s hateful rhetoric and harmful policies — donate directly to the organizations helping to reunite and provide support to families seeking asylum at the border.”
Demand Justice, which formed last year, took center stage when it helped lead opposition to Trump’s Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh. Breitbart News reported that less than one hour after Trump announced Kavanagh as his nominee, Demand Justice had already put up the website stopkavanaugh.com, exclaiming: “We need to demand that the Senate defeat the Brett Kavanaugh nomination.”
The organization came under news media scrutiny for its refusal to disclose its donor list. The Associated Press reported:
Demand Justice was formed just a few months ago and is structured in such a way that it doesn’t have to file annual tax returns. That’s because it’s “fiscally sponsored” by a tax-exempt social welfare organization called the Sixteen Thirty Fund. The Sixteen Thirty Fund files federal tax returns but doesn’t have to disclose the identities of its donors.
A recent Daily Caller investigation found that Soros’s Open Society Policy Center (OSPC) previously donated some $2.2 million to the Sixteen Thirty Fund, the fiscal sponsor for Demand Justice.
The Sixteen Thirty Fund describes itself as providing a “fiscal sponsorship vehicle for donors to direct capital toward social welfare projects that include advocacy, lobbying, and some political and electoral activities.”
Demand Justice was founded by Brian Fallon, who served as press secretary for Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign. The group’s digital team is headed by Gabrielle McCaffrey, who was a digital organizer for Clinton’s campaign.
Working at Demand Justice is Paige Herwig, a former Judiciary Committee aide to Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA). Prior to her stint with Feinstein, Herwig served as counselor to Attorney General Loretta Lynch.
According to emails released by the Justice Department, Herwig was included in a chain of emails crafting the initial media response into Lynch’s infamous tarmac meeting at the Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport in which former President Bill Clinton, the husband of the FBI’s main subject in a criminal probe, boarded the attorney general’s plane and reportedly stayed there for about 20 minutes.
Demand Justice’s formation was encouraged by former Obama White House counselor John Podesta, who served as chairman of Clinton’s latest presidential campaign. “We have ignored this field of battle for too long,” Podesta told the New York Times regarding Demand Justice.
Even before Trump announced Kavanaugh as his nominee, Demand Justice committed to spending about $5 million to oppose the eventual nominee. The organization seeks to raise $10 million in its first year.
In a recent interview with the New York Times, Fallon would not comment on the source of the group’s financing, but the newspaper noted that he was a featured speaker at the conference of the Democracy Alliance, a grouping of progressive donors.
Democracy Alliance’s founding donors include Soros and billionaire Tom Steyer. Indeed, Fallon’s panel at Democracy Alliance was moderated by Sarah Knight of Soros’s Open Society Foundations.
Democracy Alliance directs donors to leftist groups, including the ACLU, the Women’s March, Media Matters for America, and reportedly the radical Indivisible group known for storming Republican townhalls. Democracy Alliance highlighted anti-Trump organizations to donors in a “resistance map” suggesting which activist groups would be opportune for funding. Already, Indivisible received funds from donors and coalitions associated with Democracy Alliance financiers, the New York Times reported.
Aaron Klein is Breitbart’s Jerusalem bureau chief and senior investigative reporter. He is a New York Times bestselling author and hosts the popular weekend talk radio program, “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio.” Follow him on Twitter @AaronKleinShow. Follow him on Facebook.
Joshua Klein contributed research to this article.
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