by Eric Lendrum
The official Black Lives Matter organization lost millions of dollars in 2022, according to recently unearthed tax returns.
According to the Washington Free Beacon, the Black Lives Matter Global Foundation Network saw a deficit of $8.5 million in 2022, and also lost $10 million from its investment accounts. In addition, the group recorded a loss of $961,000 on a securities sale of $172,000, amounting to a roughly 85 percent loss as a result of the transaction.
Patrisse Cullors, one of the co-founders of the group, had previously criticized the idea of so-called charities being forced to disclose their finances, referring to the practice as “triggering” and “deeply unsafe.” Cullors herself has come under fire for allegedly using money raised by the organization to buy multiple mansions for herself and her partner, Janaya Khan, all across the country.
The latest revelations from the group’s Form 990 suggest that it could be on its way to financial insolvency, even after Cullors stepped down in 2021 and appointed a new successor, Shalomyah Bowers.
In Fiscal Year 2022, the organization raised a mere $9.3 million, a staggering 88 percent drop from the prior year. In February 2022, the group was forced to shut down its online fundraising operations due to transparency concerns raised by several blue states. The organization had previously raised as much as $90 million in the aftermath of the death of George Floyd, a black man who died of a fentanyl overdose while in police custody in Minneapolis, Minnesota, in May of 2020.
The group had spent at least $12 million on luxury homes, and then another $10.5 million on contractors, among other expenses. Several of these “contractors” include Cullors’ close friends and family, such as her brother Paul, who had no prior experience as a bodyguard; his two companies were paid a collective total of $1.6 million to provide security for BLM leadership. Paul himself was one of BLM’s only two paid employees in 2022, receiving a $126,000 annual salary in addition to the aforementioned consulting fees.
“While Patrisse Cullors was forced to resign due to charges of using BLM’s funds for her personal use, it looks like she’s still keeping it all in the family,” said Paul Kamenar, an attorney for the National Legal and Policy Center.
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Eric Lendrum reports for American Greatness.
