Revealed: Dem Dark Money's Sinister Puppet Master Exposed As Hypocritical 'Nonpartisan'

As per documents scrutinized by the Washington Examiner and the fund, the New Venture Fund played a crucial fiscal role in launching the Trust Project by channeling over $3 million from undisclosed sources between 2019 and 2021.

This revelation is potentially controversial, as the Trust Project purports to be a "nonpartisan" entity, collaborating with large tech companies such as Microsoft and Google to promote and inform about trustworthy news outlets. Yet, the New Venture Fund, which steered a significant portion of its financial lifeline, is intrinsically linked to Arabella Advisors - an extensive liberal "dark money" network that the GOP has criticized for its apparent lack of transparency.

In response to these findings, a representative from the New Venture Fund spoke to the Washington Examiner, stating, "As an independent 501(c)(3) fiscal sponsor, New Venture Fund (NVF) supports a wide range of nonpartisan projects aimed at creating positive impact in our communities, our country, and our world. Our work with the Trust Project is a prime example of the important role fiscal sponsors play."

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Emphasizing the NVF's supportive rather than influential role, the spokesperson further added, "From 2019-2021, NVF provided the Trust Project with a platform to quickly launch and scale its work until it became its own independent 501(c)(3). Like other fiscal sponsors, NVF is not the original source of funding for the projects it incubates."

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The Trust Project is a collaborative endeavor funded by Microsoft and Google and comprises various members, such as the University of Washington's Center for an Informed Public. The latter has been subject to records requests by Republicans due to its efforts in tracking "disinformation." Established technically in 2018, the Trust Project achieved tax-exempt status in 2021, based on an IRS letter.

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Big Tech giants, including Bing, Microsoft, Google, and Facebook, utilize the Trust Project's "trust indicators" and associated "machine-readable signals" to highlight stories deemed reliable online. The Trust Project advocates that the presence of "diverse" voices is a possible indicator of a reliable story, encouraging readers to seek evidence of journalists' attention to diversity.

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The Trust Project's CEO, Sally Lehrman, has responded to these findings, claiming that the organization's relationship with the New Venture Fund "would not have any impact on our ability to be strictly nonpartisan," reaffirming their commitment to being "strictly nonpartisan." Lehrman further clarified that the relationship with the New Venture Fund was purely related to "grant administration."

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According to financial disclosures, Democracy Fund, a group launched by billionaire eBay founder and Democratic donor Pierre Omidyar, has since donated at least $1 million to the New Venture Fund for the Trust Project. The Trust Project, which became an independent nonprofit in 2019, announced that it had received $2.25 million "in total gifts" from Democracy Fund, Facebook, and Craig Newmark Philanthropies, a liberal group founded by billionaire Craigslist founder and Democratic donor Craig Newmark.

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The New Venture Fund's association with the Trust Project has raised concerns among conservative circles, with Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) stating, "Practically every day, we learn more about how determined liberal Democrats and their financiers are to censor and silence media and individuals that don't think the way progressives want. We need to expose this everywhere we find it."

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Caitlin Sutherland, executive director of the conservative watchdog Americans for Public Trust, also pointed to the New Venture Fund's prior support for ACRONYM, a "progressive" media group run by Democratic strategist Tara McGowan. The organization had bolstered Courier Newsroom, a network of websites across the U.S. that critics claim has portrayed themselves as local news sources to aid Democratic political candidates.

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McGowan currently heads Good Information, an organization devoted to combating "disinformation." Its charity branch includes Richard Stengel as a director, who previously served as the inaugural leader of the Global Engagement Center, an interagency located within the State Department. Notably, the Global Engagement Center has been under congressional investigation, led by Issa and fellow Republicans, following a succession of reports by the Washington Examiner that shed light on it providing $100,000 to the Global Disinformation Index, a group alleged to provide blacklists of conservative media outlets to advertisers, thereby intending to shut down undesirable websites.

Sutherland conveyed her misgivings about the Trust Project's objectivity to the Washington Examiner, stating, "Clearly, the Trust Project is not an objective source and should not be in the business of determining what is legitimate and trustworthy news in America." Sutherland's organization had raised a federal campaign finance complaint in 2020, suggesting Courier Newsroom should register as a political action committee due to its ties to Democrats.

Regarding queries about their collaboration with the Trust Project, Microsoft declined to provide a specific comment. Still, it directed the Washington Examiner to a company blog post from January discussing the group.

Reassuring the public of the organization's independence, a spokesperson from the New Venture Fund clarified, "NVF provided a platform and the operational support (H.R., accounting, grants management) to help the project get off the ground. The project developed its own strategy, led its own programmatic activities, and conducted its own fundraising even before it spun off to become an independent 501(c)(3) public charity."

As this information comes to light, the Trust Project and its backers find themselves at the center of an escalating debate about the line between partisanship and the battle against misinformation. As organizations, platforms, and watchdogs navigate the ever-evolving landscape of news consumption and trust in media, these issues become increasingly pertinent.

The conversation around the Trust Project's nonpartisanship and funding sources underlines a broader debate around transparency in media reliability initiatives and the broad landscape of the fight against misinformation.