(RightWing.org) – Unfortunately, trying to track how so-called dark money finds its way into the pockets of Progressive causes and Democrats running for office can be a real challenge. It can be like opening Russian nesting dolls, where organization A donates to foundation B which then gives money to fund C… well, you get the idea. In other words, it’s a topic best approached with patience and a large bottle of Excedrin close at hand as the culprits try to change the American way of life. Arguably the most notorious and infamous character who does that is the Hungarian-born billionaire George Soros, but he is hardly the only one.
Swiss Mis-ter
Recently, the shadowy figure of Hansjorg Wyss has been the target of news reports and at least one administrative complaint made to the Federal Election Commission (FEC) in a related lawsuit. The watchdog group, Americans for Public Trust (APT), asked the governmental agency to take action against the billionaire because he is a Swiss-born resident in the United States who does not hold a “green card” and is therefore barred from contributing to political candidates under United States law.
The convoluted maze of organizations Wyss has his fingers in is extensive, but the APT complaint mentions the Berger Action Fund, the Sixteen Thirty Fund, and the Hub Project by name. The Influence Watch website’s profile of the Sixteen Thirty Fund notes that even Left-leaning news sites such as the New York Times, The Atlantic, and POLITICO have identified it as a massive source of Liberal dark money that not only seeks to promote Democratic Party candidates, it also spends large amounts of cash in opposing Conservatives such as former President Donald Trump.
Specifically, the New York Times article, which was published on May 3, 2021, stated that dark money “helped create and fund dozens of groups” that worked to block nominees put forth by Trump and, on the flip side of the same coin to “push progressive appointments by [President Joe] Biden.” In an earlier NYT story from April of that year, they reported the Hub Project financed protests that had the veneer of being grassroots projects demanding Trump release his tax returns in 2017.
Wyss’s influence-peddling seems to span more than 30 years, with the May NYT piece indicating he was a donor to “Democratic congressional candidates and left-leaning political action committees” as far back as 1990. It also reported officials with the Hub Project have been given positions within the Biden administration (at least one of whom is a retread from former President Barack Obama). Molly McUsic, the current president of the Wyss Foundation and former board member of the Sixteen Thirty Fund, was a member of his transition team.
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