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desmog How a ‘Pro-Climate’ Charity Channelled Cash to a Koch-Funded Think Tank - DeSmog

A UK charity that portrays itself as a climate leader facilitated a £830,000 donation to the Mercatus Center, a conservative think tank heavily funded by U.S. oil billionaire Charles Koch, DeSmog can reveal.

The London-based Founders Pledge channels donations from entrepreneurs to charities – empowering business leaders “to do immense good”, according to its website.

This includes giving money to climate causes. The Founders Pledge runs a Climate Fund that claims to “find and fund impactful, neglected climate solutions” – having distributed almost $36 million from over 5,000 donors.

Donor Advised Funds (DAFs) like the one sponsored by the Founders Pledge allow wealthy individuals to anonymously distribute money and other assets. Research shows that DAFs are increasingly being used to funnel money to reactionary causes – including in the UK.

The Mercatus Center is a conservative “market oriented” think tank registered as a charity. Mercatus and its sister group the Institute for Humane Studies (IHS), both located at George Mason University, have been funded by American billionaire and oil magnate Charles Koch, co-founder of Koch Industries – the second-largest private company in the U.S.

The network of influence controlled and supported by Charles Koch and his late brother David includes “a web of interconnected, right-wing think tanks and advocacy groups”. The pair have piled millions of dollars into causes promoting climate disinformation, including buying credibility with large investments in academic institutions.

Between 2018 and 2022, George Mason was by far the biggest university in receipt of Charles Koch’s money. The three institutions – George Mason, Mercatus, and the IHS – received $128.6 million from four Koch foundations during the period. The Mercatus Center, which has called climate change “beneficial”, has also received funding from the oil major ExxonMobil.

And yet, the Founders Pledge – which distributes over £100 million annually and operates in the UK, Germany, and U.S. – has been featured in articles highlighting its green credentials and has been labelled as being among the most “high-impact, cost-effective, evidenced-based organisations” to donate through.

Firms operating DAFs have the right to refuse to give to certain causes, though in practice this rarely happens.

The Founders Pledge told DeSmog: “We tackle climate change as the global, long-term challenge it is, focusing on solutions that change trajectories, transform systems, reduce the biggest risks for devastating damage around the world, and that will be effective even if everything goes wrong.

“Among other efforts, we fund efforts to fast-track low-carbon technologies like advanced geothermal and to make new infrastructure as low-carbon as possible and look for ways to reduce future emissions from existing systems.”

The Mercatus Center did not respond to DeSmog’s request for comment.

The Mercatus Center and Charles Koch

DeSmog’s investigation finds that the Founders Pledge was used to donate almost £830,000 to the Mercatus Center in 2022.

Mercatus was originally founded – with grant funding from Charles Koch – by Richard Fink, an executive vice president and board member at Koch Industries who, along with Charles, still sits on the Mercatus board and has previously been described as “a fixture in Koch Industries”.

Brian Hooks, CEO and chair of the Koch-founded Stand Together Trust, also sits on the board alongside Emily Chamlee-Wright, president and CEO of the IHS.

Charles Koch is chairman emeritus of the IHS board, which is largely populated by George Mason professors and representatives from the Charles Koch Foundation and Stand Together. It has been described by Mother Jones as “a haven for climate deniers that receives funding from the Koch family foundations”.

The Koch Foundation has paid the salaries of Mercatus Center professors, which in turn have produced work arguing that “The evidence regarding global warming and human contribution to it is mixed, and as forecasts of anthropogenic warming get more refined, they predict less extreme warming.”

In 2020, the think tank was also accused of promoting “flawed” research to “hobble” environmental research in Australia, and it has previously suggested that climate change could be “beneficial” and make humanity “better off”.

The Institute for Humane Studies declined to offer an on the record comment.

Political Donations

The Founders Pledge received some £111 million in 2023, and distributed £101.4 million to various charitable causes.

Originating in the U.S. in the 1930s, DAFs are increasingly used by the wealthy to donate to political causes – and often those with reactionary beliefs. A 2024 study found that DAFs are more likely to be used for political donations than other funding methods, while they account for more than one-quarter of all contributions received by “anti-government and hate groups”.

Money from prominent DAFs has been used to finance the radical Project 2025 playbook for Donald Trump’s second term, to contribute to the coffers of groups campaigning against women’s and LGBTQ rights, and to prop up climate denial think tanks, all without the original donors having to disclose their identities.

As of 2023, roughly 2 million DAFs in the U.S. distributed $55 billion in grants to charitable organisations, while UK charities received £645 million from DAFs in the same year, according to the National Philanthropic Trust.

Speaking to DeSmog on the opacity of DAFs, Brian Mittendorf, a professor at Ohio State University and co-author of the aforementioned study, said that his research “shows that donor advised funds in the U.S. disproportionately fund politically engaged institutions” and that “one motivation for this could be to limit revelations about who funds political organisations.”

He added that “public disclosures by these organisations make it difficult to identify which fund provided money to which organisations and especially who gave money to those funds in the first place.”

“When private foundations distribute money to a donor advised fund prior to it being sent to the ultimate recipient, the paper trail is lost,” he said.

The Rise of DAFs in the UK

The practice of channelling political donations through DAFs now seems to be more commonplace in the UK.

One DAF supplier – called Prism The Gift Fund – has been used to distribute nearly £1.6 million since 2017 to a suite of right-wing think tanks and lobby groups including Policy Exchange, the Global Warming Policy Foundation, the Legatum Institute (now the Prosperity Institute), the Centre for Social Justice, and Henry Jackson Society.

The ultimate source of the funds are unknown.

Moreover, research into the transparency requirements surrounding DAFs suggest that the UK could even be lagging behind the U.S.

One key area is how grants are recorded. In the U.S., DAF providers are required to list most of the grants they pay out in their annual returns. Speaking to DeSmog, Mittendorf explained that suppliers of DAFs in the U.S. have to disclose who received a donation if it surpasses $5,000.

This differs from the UK, where there is no formal requirement for DAF providers to list their recipients, although some still choose to do so.

In the case of the Founders Pledge, while recipients of larger donations are named in its 2023 accounts, “grants less than £645,000” are recorded as one lump sum, with no way to tell where that money has gone to, in addition to not being able to tell where it has come from.

A spokesperson for the Charity Commission confirmed that, at present, recording requirements are minimal. “As DAFs are managed by the charities they reside in, our guidance for the parent charities/trustees is the same as for any other charity, rather than specifically for DAFs… No charities are required to list all the organisations they provide grants to.”

A spokesperson for another prominent DAF provider, The Charity Service, said that “the issues around transparency and DAFs is an interesting one especially as anonymous giving is one of the perceived benefits of giving through a DAF for many donors.”

Tom Brake, director of the campaign group Unlock Democracy, said: “The increasingly influential role think tanks have in our democracy must go hand-in-hand with greater transparency over who funds them and to what end. DAFs do the exact opposite, shielding those donating to think tanks and other organisations from public scrutiny.”

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Think Tank Watch: Billionaires Play Big Role in Funding of New Think Tank Institute for Progress (IFP)

Friday, January 21, 2022

Billionaires Play Big Role in Funding of New Think Tank Institute for Progress (IFP)

Get ready to learn another think think tank acronym: IFP. It stands for Institute for Progress, a new Washington, DC-based think tank that has been launched by Caleb Watney and Alec Stapp.

Its mission is to "accelerate scientific, technological, and industrial progress while safeguarding humanity's future." The founders say they will spend most of their initial attention on three key areas: 1) Metascience, 2) Immigration, and 3) Biosecurity.

Mr. Watney, the Co-CEO, was the director for innovation policy at the think tank Progressive Policy Institute (PPI). Before that, he worked as a technology policy fellow at the R Street Institute and as a graduate research fellow at the Mercatus Center.

Mr. Stapp, the other Co-CEO, was the director of technology policy at PPI, a research fellow at the International Center for Law and Economics, a technology policy fellow at the Niskanen Center, and a graduate research fellow at the Mercatus Center.

Scholars at the think tank include senior biosecurity fellow Nikki Teran, who previously worked with the Committee on International Security and Arms Control at the National Academy of Science, the Council on Strategic Risks, and the Open Philanthropy Project. Another scholar is senior immigration fellow Jeremy Neufeld, who previously worked at the Niskanen Center.

There are currently three external board members: Tamara Winter, who formerly worked at the Charter Cities Institute and the Mercacuts Center; Dan Correa, a former Obama Administration official who was CEO of the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) and worked at Stanford's Freeman Spogli Institute as well as the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF); and Zachary Graves, a visiting fellow at George Mason University's Antonin Scalia Law School who formerly worked at the Cato Institute and R Street Institute.

IFP, whose new website can be found here, only accepts funding from individuals and foundations. It is currently funded with the support of Open Philanthropy, Emergent Ventures, Patrick Collison, John Collison, and Sam Bankman-Fried.

Facebook co-founder Dustin Muskowitz and wife Cari Tuna are the main funders of Open Philanthropy, an entity which supports numerous think tanks. George Mason University's Mercatus Center houses Emergent Ventures, a fellowship and grant program which was launched with a $1 million grant from the Thiel Foundation. That foundation was created and funded by billionaire Peter Thiel, co-founder of PayPal and early investor in Facebook.

Patrick Collison and his brother John Collison are Irish billionaires who co-founded online payment processor Stripe. Sam Bankman-Fried, another billionaire, is the founder and CEO of FTX, a cryptocurrency exchange.

The IFP founders note that Tyler Cowen, head of the Mercatus Center, played a big role in their thinking.

IFP joins a crowded field of policy shops in Washington, which has more than 400 think tanks large and small.

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new

last week, President Biden _{signed an Executive Order}_ encouraging U.S. leadership in the clean car sector with a goal of half of all new car sales in the U.S. being zero-emission by 2030. It took them a few days, but deniers seem to have assembled their response by cobbling together a mix of old lies, new misrepresentations, and bizarre logical fallacies.

:{

For example, a response that in any sane outlet might be praise for Biden’s plan was published in the Koch-funded RealClearEnergy as an attack: _{President Biden’s Electric Car Future is Union Made}_. Bruce Yandle, a fellow at theKoch-funded Mercatus Center at George Mason University, is upset that Biden invited three major U.S. car companies to attend the announcement because they were the largest employers of workers in the United Auto Workers union, and didn’t invite non-American companies with non-union workers to his event promoting good American jobs.}:

By Climate Denier Roundup

Obviously, it’s no surprise that a Koch crony is anti-union and anti-EV, unless you confuse organized labor with organized denial.

Speaking of organized denial, while the _{once-Koch-funded}_ Daily Caller has since _{basically given up}_ on regular climate denial reporting, and its IPCC story was _{a straightforward rip-off}_ of the _{AP’s “code red” coverage}_ (sans any Koch-network denial quote, because no-pay, no-play, we assume). The Caller still occasionally publishes guest opinion pieces and _{ran one from Charlotte Whelan}_ of the (_{pro-Covid}_) Independent Women’s Forum andSteamboat Institute (which is hosting _{Marc Morano and a slate of other rightwing pseudostars at an upcoming festival}_).

Whelan is also upset the White House invited union workers to its pro-union-jobs event, and adds (with a deliberately misleading citation) the claim that “it could take more than 15 years to recoup the upfront extra costs in fuel savings. The average American certainly can’t wait that long to ‘make back’ the additional upfront cost” But the work cited (_{an NRDC post}_ based on _{a peer-reviewed study}_) doesn’t even measure how long it would take to recoup the upfront cost of an EV with cheaper charging and a more efficient propulsion system. The study did, however, use 15 years as the unit of measurement for a car’s life. So the calculations show that over an average 15-year lifespan of ownership, it can be almost $15,000 cheaper to go with an electric car.

Over at theKoch-funded Heritage foundation’s media arm, their policy analyst _{Katie Tubb makes a similar claim}_ about EVs being for rich people, which we’ve addressed before as part of _{their propaganda campaigns}_, as well as the _{old racist dog whistle about China}_.

Finally, we get to a new name to us, Diana Furchtgott-Roth, who wrote that Biden’s move was “costly and counterproductive” in the _{industry-funded}_ Manhattan Institute’s City Journal.

After a column _{defending the auto industry from 5G in January}_, and another in March with the phrase “nothing beats personal vehicles for social distancing.” Furchtgott-Roth makes similar points to the other professional disinformers in her most recent City Journal piece, but she also _{a:{dds a particularly baffling claim:(style="background-color:#ffff33;"):}:}_ that because “the United States has achieved energy security by becoming a net exporter of oil and natural gas,” then “mandating sales of electric vehicles would weaken that security.”

But if exporting oil makes us stronger (by her logic) then wouldn’t having more of it to export because our own cars are using less of it be a good thing, that would make us stronger?

Why would someone write something so inane and illogical, despite a byline that includes “former deputy assistant secretary for research and technology at the U.S. Department of Transportation” and “adjunct professor of economics at George Washington University?” Those are both legitimate organizations, not industry-funded disinformation operations!

Well it turns out that the DOT appointment was made by notoriously-bad-hiring-manager Donald Trump, and prior to that, _{Furchtgott-Roth was an economist for the American Petroleum Institute}_, _{proving once again}_ that _{when someone says something stupid about EVs}_, it’s _{probably on purpose}_.

(Originally appeared at DailyKos.)

https://www.nytimes.com/**2018/05**/05/us/koch-donors-george-mason.html

no lnx

What Charles Koch and Other Donors to George Mason University Got for Their Money

George Mason University recently released documents that raised questions about whether big-money donors were given undue influence over academic affairs.

By Erica L. Green and Stephanie Saul

May 5, 2018

FAIRFAX, Va. — A group of student activists sat in the library at George Mason University this past week feeling both vindicated and violated.

The group, Transparent GMU, had sued the university and its fund-raising foundation last year after it was denied requests for documents that it suspected showed how deep-pocket donors were given undue influence over academic affairs. After a recent court hearing in the case, the university released those documents, some of which appeared to affirm the group’s suspicions.

“It feels like transparency Christmas,” said Kailey Adkins, a sophomore at George Mason and a Transparent GMU member. But, she added: “I mostly feel deceived and disappointed. G.M.U. breached my trust and sense of security in my education.”

The documents reveal in surprising detail that for years, as George Mason grew from a little-known commuter school to a major public university and a center of libertarian scholarship, millions of dollars in donations from conservative-leaning donors like the Charles Koch Foundation had come with strings attached.

As early as 1990, entities controlled by the billionaire brothers Charles G. and David H. Koch were given a seat on a committee to pick candidates for a professorship that they funded, the records show. Similar arrangements that continued through 2009 gave donors decision-making roles in selecting candidates for key economics appointments at the Mercatus Center, a Koch-funded think tank on campus that studies markets and regulation. The appointments, which also created faculty lines at George Mason, were steered to professors who, like the Kochs, embraced unconstrained free markets.

More recently, in 2016, executives of the Federalist Society, a conservative national organization of lawyers, served as agents for a $20 million gift from an anonymous donor, and were given the right to terminate installments of the gift at their discretion. Emails disclosed by the university show that Federalist Society officials were also involved in hiring discussions and had suggested a student for admission. In turn, a professor at the law school wrote the society asking for help securing recommendations for prestigious federal judicial clerkships for students active in the society.

Following a period of deep cuts in public funding, the documents and related emails raised broad questions about whether universities that rely heavily on private donors can remain free from the influences of contributors who may be pursuing commercial, political or philosophical agendas.

In academia, such influence is viewed as inappropriate, partly because it may pressure professors to produce biased research, undermining the credibility of their work and spreading incorrect information to students. That may be particularly problematic in the interpretation of data and construction of models in areas of economics that affect federal tax policy or regulation.

Bethany Letiecq, an associate professor in the Human Development and Family Science program at George Mason and president of the university’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors, said the documents demonstrated that the school had “ceded our authority and autonomy to one of the wealthiest industrialists in the world.”

“The question now is: How are we going to move forward and rebuild our reputation as a reputable institution in the Commonwealth?” Professor Letiecq said. “How are we going to undo this mess?”

News of the donor agreements prompted a university inquiry and other measures intended to rebuild trust in the institution’s academic mission and independence. The faculty senate voted on Wednesday to ask the administration that it publish an online database of all donors, appoint two tenured faculty members to the university’s gift acceptance committee, and extend an ad hoc faculty committee created in 2016 that is charged with examining potential conflicts of interest with outside gifts and grants.

[ImageCharles Koch, left, has given millions of dollars to George Mason University. The newly released documents show that donor agreements gave Mr. Koch’s foundation a voice in hiring faculty.]

Professor Letiecq said the faculty did not know whether there were any colleagues who may have been affected by the Koch Foundation’s influence over hiring in past years. But those who have been handpicked know they come with strings attached, she said. “They know the benefits that come with the position,” she said. “And I guess they can live with that.”

In one 2003 agreement, the Mercatus Institute said it had received $900,000 from the Menlo F. Smith Trust to fund a professorship in the economics department, and would make the first payment “conditional” upon the appointment of Russell Roberts, an economist who advocates limited government. A person designated by Menlo Smith, a St. Louis businessman, was given a seat on the selection committee, according to the agreement.

Professor Roberts, who is currently affiliated with the Hoover Institution at Stanford, denied on Thursday that Mr. Smith had had any say in his hiring. He said he had been selected for the job by the economics department, which then sought funding from Mr. Smith.

The exact amount of Koch donations to campuses across the country, which frequently are earmarked for programs fostering capitalism and free markets, is unknown. But it is estimated at nearly $150 million from 2005 to 2015, benefiting more than 300 schools. An estimated $50 million of that went to George Mason.

Arrangements between universities and organizations funded by Koch money have come under scrutiny partly because of the work of an activist organization called UnKoch My Campus, the national affiliate of Transparent GMU.

The group and its campus affiliates around the country have pressured universities to reject or rescind Koch-funded agreements and also have demanded disclosures about Koch funding. The movement has recently gained steam on several campuses where faculty members and students have protested Koch-funded centers or professorships, including recent actions at Wake Forest University, Montana State University and the University of Utah.

Samantha Parsons, who co-founded the organization as a George Mason student in 2014, said the group has worked with about two dozen campuses to protest donor influence, and is actively working with about a dozen.

“Faculty across the country are waking up and really seeing this as a moment to really defend academic freedom and integrity, and faculty governance,” she said.

While the documents provide a look into previously secretive arrangements, both the Charles Koch Foundation and the George Mason president, Ángel Cabrera, who acknowledged that the donations raised questions about outside influence, pointed out that the agreements were old.

Dr. Cabrera said his office is conducting a review of donor agreements at the university to determine if any others that exist contain similar language.

The Koch Foundation said it had changed the language of its standard university agreements, removing clauses, for example, that permitted donors to be on hiring committees. “We realized they could easily be used to mischaracterize our intent,” John Hardin, the foundation’s director of university relations, said in a statement.

The changes were made after the disclosure of a similar agreement at Florida State University that permitted a Koch representative to review faculty positions.

Yet there is evidence that donors, including the Koch Foundation, continue to exert extraordinary influence at universities, in many cases unwritten or even unstated. Daniel Kovenock, a professor of economics at Chapman University, which has received Koch funding, said he believed that the foundation had changed its methods.

“Instead of explicit contractual provisions governing use of the funds, it’s now a wink and a handshake,” Professor Kovenock said.

A former professor and administrator at Arizona State University described the “drama” involving an offer in 2014 by the Koch Foundation to donate money for a new professor dedicated to teaching the history of capitalism.

The professor, Matthew J. Garcia, said that he had welcomed the foundation’s donation to his program — the school of historical, philosophical and religious studies — but that he had insisted normal hiring procedures be followed to fill the job.

The hiring search was anything but normal, the professor said. As it progressed, a university dean told him, “A.S.U. will never hire anyone that Koch doesn’t approve,” according to Professor Garcia.

But Mr. Hardin, of the Charles Koch Foundation, said that any hires by A.S.U. were the result of the university’s process, not foundation pressure. “Unfortunately we see people trying to point the finger at us and trying to call us the boogeyman for things they don’t like when it’s not true,” Mr. Hardin said.

Representatives for Arizona State did not respond to requests for comment.

In the end, the Koch Foundation’s top choice was rejected by a faculty committee, Professor Garcia said. But the episode was among developments at A.S.U. that Professor Garcia said had left him disillusioned. He departed last year for Dartmouth, where he is a professor of history focusing on Latin America.

Officials of the Federalist Society played a key role as an intermediary between George Mason and an anonymous donor when the university’s law school was renamed in 2016 after the former Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, the released documents show.

The records and emails, while heavily redacted, say that representatives of the Federalist Society were given discretion to cancel the donor agreement and that society representatives discussed faculty selection and recommended at least one student for admission. Leonard Leo, a Federalist Society official who was among those directly involved in the correspondence, did not return a phone call seeking comment.

The dean of the law school, Henry N. Butler, said that any accusation that the society had undue influence was unfounded. “While we are pleased to receive recommendations from many sources,” he said, “decisions on faculty hiring and student admissions and scholarships are independent and strictly the purview of the law school’s faculty and administrative leadership.”

Despite the release of the documents, the lawsuit is still on. The activist groups want the foundation to release agreements with all of its donors.

Elizabeth Mathews, a senior and the vice president of Transparent GMU, said that she was saddened to have resorted to suing her own school, but that she felt its credibility was under siege.

“Even though we have looked particularly at the Kochs, this is a nonpartisan issue,” Ms. Mathews said. “We don’t believe anyone should be able to do this. We want donors to know they can’t do this out of the public eye anymore. We will be watching them, we will be asking questions.”

new

:{Erica L. Green:(style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;text-size-adjust:100%;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline-block"):}: and :{Stephanie Saul:(style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;text-size-adjust:100%;font-style:inherit;font-variant:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;display:inline-block;text-decoration-line:underline;text-decoration-color:#cccccc;"):}:

The group, Transparent GMU, had sued the university and its fund-raising foundation last year after it was denied requests for documents that it suspected showed how deep-pocket donors were given undue influence over academic affairs. After a recent court hearing in the case, the university released those documents, some of which appeared to affirm the group’s suspicions.

“It feels like transparency Christmas,” said Kailey Adkins, a sophomore at George Mason and a Transparent GMU member. But, she added: “I mostly feel deceived and disappointed. G.M.U. breached my trust and sense of security in my education.”

The documents reveal in surprising detail that for years, as George Mason grew from a little-known commuter school to a major public university and a center of libertarian scholarship, millions of dollars in donations from conservative-leaning donors like the Charles Koch Foundation had come with strings attached....as early as 1990... Similar arrangements that continued through 2009 gave donors decision-making roles in selecting candidates for key economics appointments at the Mercatus Center, a Koch-funded think tank on campus that studies markets and regulation. The appointments, which also created faculty lines at George Mason, were steered to professors who, like the Kochs, embraced unconstrained free markets.

More recently, in 2016, executives of the Federalist Society, a conservative national organization of lawyers, served as agents for a $20 million gift from an anonymous donor, and were given the right to terminate installments of the gift at their discretion. Emails disclosed by the university show that Federalist Society officials were also involved in hiring discussions and had suggested a student for admission. In turn, a professor at the law school wrote the society asking for help securing recommendations for prestigious federal judicial clerkships for students active in the society.

Following a period of deep cuts in public funding, the documents and related emails raised broad questions about whether universities that rely heavily on private donors can remain free from the influences of contributors who may be pursuing commercial, political or philosophical agendas.

In academia, such influence is viewed as inappropriate, partly because it may pressure professors to produce biased research, undermining the credibility of their work and spreading incorrect information to students. That may be particularly problematic in the interpretation of data and construction of models in areas of economics that affect federal tax policy or regulation.

Bethany Letiecq, an associate professor in the Human Development and Family Science program at George Mason and president of the university’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors, said the documents demonstrated that the school had “ceded our authority and autonomy to one of the wealthiest industrialists in the world.” The question now is: How are we going to move forward and rebuild our reputation as a reputable institution in the Commonwealth?” Professor Letiecq said. “How are we going to undo this mess?”

News of the donor agreements prompted a university inquiry and other measures intended to rebuild trust in the institution’s academic mission and independence. The faculty senate voted on Wednesday to ask the administration that it publish an online database of all donors, appoint two tenured faculty members to the university’s gift acceptance committee, and extend an ad hoc faculty committee created in 2016 that is charged with examining potential conflicts of interest with outside gifts and grants. Professor Letiecq said the faculty did not know whether there were any colleagues who may have been affected by the Koch Foundation’s influence over hiring in past years. But those who have been handpicked know they come with strings attached, she said. “They know the benefits that come with the position,” she said. “And I guess they can live with that.”

In one 2003 agreement, the Mercatus Institute said it had received $900,000 from the Menlo F. Smith Trust to fund a professorship in the economics department, and would make the first payment “conditional” upon the appointment of Russell Roberts, an economist who advocates limited government. A person designated by Menlo Smith, a St. Louis businessman, was given a seat on the selection committee, according to the agreement.

Professor Roberts, who is currently affiliated with the Hoover Institution at Stanford, denied on Thursday that Mr. Smith had had any say in his hiring. He said he had been selected for the job by the economics department, which then sought funding from Mr. Smith.

The exact amount of Koch donations to campuses across the country, which frequently are earmarked for programs fostering capitalism and free markets, is unknown. But it is estimated at nearly $150 million from 2005 to 2015, An estimated $50 million of that went to George Mason.>Arrangements between universities and organizations funded by Koch money have come under scrutiny partly because of the work of an activist organization called...The group and its campus affiliates around the country have pressured universities to reject or rescind Koch-funded agreements and also have demanded disclosures about Koch funding. The movement has recently gained steam on several campuses where faculty members and students have protested Koch-funded centers or professorships, including recent actions at Wake Forest University, Montana State University and the University of Utah.

Samantha Parsons, who co-founded the organization as a George Mason student in 2014, said the group has worked with about two dozen campuses to protest donor influence, and is actively working with about a dozen.

“Faculty across the country are waking up and really seeing this as a moment to really defend academic freedom and integrity, and faculty governance,” she said.

While the documents provide a look into previously secretive arrangements, both the Charles Koch Foundation and the George Mason president, Ángel Cabrera, who acknowledged that the donations raised questions about outside influence, pointed out that the agreements were old.

Dr. Cabrera said his office is conducting a review of donor agreements at the university to determine if any others that exist contain similar language.

The Koch Foundation said it had changed the language of its standard university agreements, removing clauses, for example, that permitted donors to be on hiring committees. “We realized they could easily be used to mischaracterize our intent,” John Hardin, the foundation’s director of university relations, said in a statement.

The changes were made after the disclosure of a similar agreement at Florida State University that permitted a Koch representative to review faculty positions.

Image

Yet there is evidence that donors, including the Koch Foundation, continue to exert extraordinary influence at universities, in many cases unwritten or even unstated. Daniel Kovenock, a professor of economics at Chapman University, which has received Koch funding, said he believed that the foundation had changed its methods.

“Instead of explicit contractual provisions governing use of the funds, it’s now a wink and a handshake,” Professor Kovenock said.

A former professor and administrator at Arizona State University described the “drama” involving an offer in 2014 by the Koch Foundation to donate money for a new professor dedicated to teaching the history of capitalism.

The professor, Matthew J. Garcia, said that he had welcomed the foundation’s donation to his program — the school of historical, philosophical and religious studies — but that he had insisted normal hiring procedures be followed to fill the job.

The hiring search was anything but normal, the professor said. As it progressed, a university dean told him, “A.S.U. will never hire anyone that Koch doesn’t approve,” according to Professor Garcia.

But Mr. Hardin, of the Charles Koch Foundation, said that any hires by A.S.U. were the result of the university’s process, not foundation pressure. “Unfortunately we see people trying to point the finger at us and trying to call us the boogeyman for things they don’t like when it’s not true,” Mr. Hardin said.

Representatives for Arizona State did not respond to requests for comment.

In the end, the Koch Foundation’s top choice was rejected by a faculty committee, Professor Garcia said. But the episode was among developments at A.S.U. that Professor Garcia said had left him disillusioned. He departed last year for Dartmouth, where he is a professor of history focusing on Latin America.

Officials of the Federalist Society played a key role as an intermediary between George Mason and an anonymous donor when the university’s law school was renamed in 2016 after the former Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, the released documents show.

The records and emails, while heavily redacted, say that representatives of the Federalist Society were given discretion to cancel the donor agreement and that society representatives discussed faculty selection and recommended at least one student for admission. Leonard Leo, a Federalist Society official who was among those directly involved in the correspondence, did not return a phone call seeking comment.

The dean of the law school, Henry N. Butler, said that any accusation that the society had undue influence was unfounded. “While we are pleased to receive recommendations from many sources,” he said, “decisions on faculty hiring and student admissions and scholarships are independent and strictly the purview of the law school’s faculty and administrative leadership.”Despite the release of the documents, the lawsuit is still on. The activist groups want the foundation to release agreements with all of its donors.Elizabeth Mathews, a senior and the vice president of Transparent GMU, said that she was saddened to have resorted to suing her own school, but that she felt its credibility was under siege.Even though we have looked particularly at the Kochs, this is a nonpartisan issue,” Ms. Mathews said. “We don’t believe anyone should be able to do this. We want donors to know they can’t do this out of the public eye anymore. We will be watching them, we will be asking questions.”

NEW

https://www.desmogblog.com/mercatus-center

Background

The Mercatus Center is a conservative think tank located at George Mason University and is a sister organization to the Institute for Humane Studies. The Mercatus Center was originally founded at Rutgers University by Richard Fink in the late 1970s, under the name the Center for Market Processes. [1]

Koch Industries began funding the organization when it moved to George Mason University in the 1980s, and still finances the center today. In 1999, the organization was renamed the Mercatus Center. Charles Kochand Richard Finkserve on its board of directors.  [1], [2]

The Mercatus Center believes that a gap exists between economic understanding and real-world decision and policy making. Its mission is to “bridge the gap between academic research and public policy problems, to advance an understanding of the economics of public policy.” through “education (graduate student training), research (peer reviewed academic publications and policy studies), and outreach (media, testimony, and lectures).” [3]

The Wall Street Journalhascalled the Mercatus Center “the most important think tank you’ve never heard of.” SourceWatchidentifies the Mercatus Center as “one of the best-funded think tanks in the United States.” [4], [5]

From 1999-2006, the Mercatus Center received a total of $2,670,662 in funding from conservative organizations, including $1.44 million from theKochFamily Charitable Foundations. Since 1998, the Mercatus Center at GMU has received at least $330,000 from ExxonMobil. [6]

Mercatus Center and Lobbying

According to the Center for Public Integrity, the Mercatus Center regularly lobbies in the federal government, including providing lawmakers with “Capitol Hill breakfasts and luncheons hosted by deregulation scholars.” [21]

The Mercatus Center states that it does not engage in lobbying, and does not employ nor retain any registered lobbyists. However, in 2005 Ohio Congressman Bob Ney, who has traveled on 19 occasions at the expense of the Mercatus Center, proposed a bill to amend the Clean Air Act.

Ney’s bill called for the Secretary of Energy to build fifteen new oil refineries and sell them to private companies. Ney’s amendment fell in line with the position of the Mercatus Center, which had been trying to weaken the Clean Air Act, and had the potential to benefit Koch Industries, Inc.—the largest private oil company in the United States and the Mercatus Center’s largest beneficiary.

Lobbying rules stipulate that any organization that spends more than $24,500 within a six-month period trying to influence government representatives, must register itself as a lobbying group. In both 2004 and 2005, the Mercatus Center spent over $55,000 on congressional travel. Furthermore, between 2000 and 2005 Mercatus spent $227,000 on more than 400 trips by government officials and their aides. The Mercatus Center has never registered itself as lobbying group. [22]

Craig Holman of Public Citizen reported that “‘There is no conceivable argument of why this group has not registered to lobby. They have met the threshold that makes them a lobbying group.” Carrie Conko, the Center's communications director responded, saying “The Mercatus Center does not engage in lobbying.” [23]

Stance on Climate Change

“The evidence regarding global warming and human contribution to it is mixed, and as forecasts of anthropogenic warming get more refined, they predict less extreme warming.” [7]

Funding

According to data compiled by the Conservative Transparency project, the Mercatus Center received the following funding from 1985 to 2014. Note that not all funding data has been verified by DeSmogBlog for accuracy. [30]

See the attached spreadsheet for details on the **Mercatus Center's funding by year (.xlsx)**.

DonorTotal
DonorsTrust$10,079,250
Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation$9,085,500
Searle Freedom Trust$1,770,000
Marshall Heritage Foundation$1,500,000
Donors Capital Fund$1,418,000
Earhart Foundation$717,125
Sarah Scaife Foundation$680,000
DeVos Urban Leadership Initiative$500,000
Exxon Mobil$330,000
John Templeton Foundation$254,971
The Opportunity Foundation$240,000
Armstrong Foundation$180,000
The Challenge Foundation$175,000
Pierre F. and Enid Goodrich Foundation$170,000
John William Pope Foundation$155,000
Chase Foundation of Virginia$150,000
Bochnowski Family Foundation$145,000
The Rodney Fund$88,200
The Shelby Cullom Davis Foundation$80,000
JM Foundation$75,000
The Roe Foundation$55,000
Tepper Family Foundation$53,000
Lowndes Foundation$45,000
:{Atlas Economic Research:(style="background-color:#ffff66;"):}: Foundation$30,000
Philip M. McKenna Foundation$30,000
**American Petroleum Institute**$25,000
**PhRMA**$25,000
The Randolph Foundation$25,000
The Gordon and Mary Cain Foundation$20,000
Lynn & Foster Friess Family Foundation$11,000
The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation$10,000
William H. Donner Foundation$10,000
Aequus Institute$7,000
Leadership Institute$3,500
Grand Total$28,142,546

Koch Funding

According to Greenpeace's *PolluterWatch* project, the Mercatus Center received at least $10,474,500 from Koch Foundations from between 1997 and 2010. [8]

Greenpeace USA foundthat the Mercatus Center at George Mason University has received $9,285,500 since 1999,while the Center for the Study of Market Processes (the precursor to Mercatus) received $2,156,065between 1986 and 1997 for a grand total of $11,441,565. [31]

*Note that original tax forms prior to 1997 are no longer available for verification.

docs]

...

Key People

Board of Directors

As of September, 2015: [9]

Scholars

As of September, 2015: [10]

Board of Directors (2012)

As of March, 2012, the Mercatus Center listed the following members of their Board of Directors on their website: [16]

Scholars (2012)

The Mercatus Center at George Mason University listed the following “Scholars” on their website as of March, 2012.[17]

Actions

June, 2016

The Mercatus Center was among organizations named in a Massachusetts subpoena looking for communications between ExxonMobil and organizations denying climate change, reports The Washington Times. [28]

Organizations named in the Massachusetts subpoena include the following: [28]

This latest inquiry by Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey is one in a series of investigations into what ExxonMobil knew about climate change and when, started by a coalition of attorneys general in the US. [29]

2009

The Mercatus Center opposed a mandatory greenhouse gas reporting rule. They claimed that a solution to global warming should not be cutting emissions, but rather “Work to facilitate movement of people from areas likely to be harmed by climate change” (PDF). [24]

2002

In 2002, the Mercatus Center's Distinguished Senior Scholar, Wendy Gramm asked for the reassessment of 44 of the Clean Air Act’s federal regulations.

Regulations included in the Mercatus Center’s requests for review were: national public health standards for smog and soot, and standards for tailpipe exhaust pollution from gasoline vehicles, diesel vehicles, and heavy diesel trucks.  As the non-profit group, Clean Air Trust highlighted, “Gramm would like to pull the plug on virtually every effective air pollution cleanup measure adopted in recent years.”[25]

January, 2001

In a public comment (PDF) to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on vehicle emissions, the Mercatus Center suggested that global warming would be, “beneficial, occurring at night, in the winter, and at the poles. If a slight warming does occur, historical evidence suggests it is likely to be beneficial, stimulating plant growth and making humans better off.” [7]

2001

The Mercatus Center suggested 44 regulations to kill or modify under the Bush Administration, among them rules governing renovations to electric-utility plants. 14 of the 23 rules that the Whitehouse chose had been suggested by Mercatus, which according to the Wall Street Journal was “a record that flabbergasted Washington lobbying heavyweights.”[26]

Mercatus Center/CSMP Founding

The Mercatus Center began as the Center for the Study of Market Processes, “an educational and research center affiliated with George Mason University.” View historic documents below:

Mercatus Center Contact & Location

As of June 2016, the Mercatus Center listed the following contact information on its website: [27]

Mercatus Center

George Mason University

3434 Washington Boulevard, 4th Floor

Arlington, VA 22201-4508

Related Entries

Resources/cites

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In 2001, for example - the first year that OMB compiled the "hit list" - it received nominations covering 71 federal regulations. Forty-four of these nominations were submitted by the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, a conservative think tank funded by many of the same industries that are directly regulated by the targeted rules. Of the 71 submissions, OMB ranked 23 as "high priority" on the basis of brief, skeletal statements (often no more than a page) submitted by Mercatus and other industry groups. Thirteen of the 23 rules on the "hit list" were environmental regulations, including such important promulgations as the Forest Service's roadless area conservation rule and EPA's rule strengthening the standard for arsenic in drinking water. EPA's rule regulating water pollution from Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs) also made it onto the list, just one month after representatives of the agriculture industry met with top-level OMB officials. Despite repeated requests from the Center for Progressive Reform and OMB Watch, however, OMB has never disclosed the criteria by which it selects rules for inclusion on the "hit list."

==

3/15

By now, it's common knowledge that the Koch Brothers more or less own the Republican Party – having spent twice as much in election 2012 as the top ten unions combined.

But a lesser-known aspect of Koch influence is their spending on ideological warfare. The Kochs not only spend big in our elections, but they also finance a network of think tanks, advocacy campaigns, and even educational curricula in order to spread their message.

One example is George Mason University (GMU). Last year, a group of students protested the fact that the Charles Koch Foundation, which is the university's single largest donor, has given at least $23 million to the school since 2005.

This week, a GMU professor gave a speech on a topic that could've come right out of the Kochs' ideology – why we need “less democracy.”

Dr. Garett Jones, professor of Economics and BB&T Professor for the Study of Capitalism at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, gave a lecture on the aforementioned topic, taking aim at some of the core values this country is founded upon. Here's a summary from Fourth Estate, a GMU student paper:

Jones says that less democracy and more epistocracy could lead to better governance. Democracy leaves power to the majority while epistocracy allocates power to the knowledgeable. Jones did not imply that democracy should be eliminated, but lessened by 10% for the sake of long term economic growth.

According to Jones, less democracy would lead to better governance because politicians would be inclined to work on long term growth rather than spending to impress constituents during election season. Politicians try to please the public at the expense of neglecting long- term policies because they are elected through a democratic process.

For example, Jones said senators act like voters have short term memories. They make decisions to get reelected rather than spending their whole term focused on long-term growth.

Jones's remarks are fairly consistent with Koch political activity, which includesadvocating for voter ID laws that are designed to drive down voter participation. On his GMU site, the university notes that Jones is not only an academic researcher, but that he has also served as Economic Policy Adviser to Senator Orrin Hatch and as a staff economist to the Joint Economic Committee of the U.S. Congress “ – bodies he apparently thinks are too democratic.

==

http://en.:{wiki:(style="background-color:#ffff66;"):}:pedia.org/wiki/Mercatus_Center

Mercatus

The Mercatus Center at George Mason University in the United States is a non-profit[^^1]^(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercatus_Center#cite_note-about-0) market-oriented research, education, and outreach think tank that works with policy experts, lobbyists, and government officials to connect academic learning and real-world practice.

The Mercatus Center was founded by Rich Fink, former president of the Koch Family Foundations, which funds a network of market-oriented think tanks and advocacy groups. Originally called the Center for Market Processes, it moved why? from Rutgers University to George Mason in the early 1980s before assuming its current name in 1999. The Mercatus Center is entirely funded through donations, including from energy company Koch Industries[^^2]^(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercatus_Center#cite_note-Kamen-1), individual donors and foundations.

The organization's stated mission is to generate knowledge and understanding of how institutions affect the freedom to prosper and find creative solutions to overcome barriers that prevent individuals from living free, prosperous, and peaceful lives. A university-based research center, Mercatus works to advance knowledge about how markets work to improve lives by training graduate students, conducting research, and applying sound economics to offer solutions to society’s most pressing problems. Mercatus has several research and outreach programs: Capitol Hill Campus, the Government Accountability Project, the Regulatory Studies Program, and the Global Prosperity Initiative.

The Mercatus Center is located on George Mason University's Arlington Campus, along with theGeorge Mason University School of Law, the Law and Economics Center, and its sister organization, the Institute for Humane Studies. Its general director and board chairman is George Mason economics professor Tyler Cowen. Other Board members include Nobel Laureate Vernon Smith, former U.S. Attorney General Edwin Meese, businessman Charles G. Koch, and Rich Fink.

In 2001, the Office of Management and Budget asked for public input on which regulations should be revised or killed. Mercatus submitted 44 of the 71 proposals the OMB received. The recommendations from Mercatus critiqued regulations such as a proposed Interior Department rule prohibiting snowmobiles in Rocky Mountain National Park, a Transportation Department rule limiting truckers' hours behind the wheel, and a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency rule limiting the amount of arsenic in drinking water.[^^2]^(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercatus_Center#cite_note-Kamen-1) More recently, Mercatus has offered a series of critiques of the government's Hurricane :{Katrina:(style="background-color:#ffff66;"):}: disaster relief[^^3]^(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercatus_Center#cite_note-2) and a framework for evaluating counter-terrorism measures[^^4]^(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercatus_Center#cite_note-3). Mercatus organizes an active African research activity, EnterpriseAfrica!, in cooperation with the Institute of Economic Affairs of the United Kingdom, the Free Market Foundation of South Africa, and the John Templeton Foundation.  wiki

http://www.:{sourcewatch:(style="background-color:#ffff66;"):}:.org/index.php?title=Mercatus_Center

The Mercatus Center, part of George Mason University, is one of the best-funded think tanks in the United States at the moment. It is listed as "sister organization" to the Institute of Humane Studies. "Mercatus generates knowledge and understanding of how institutions affect the freedom to prosper and holds organizations accountable for their impact on that freedom," it states on its website. [1]

The Mercatus Center has engaged in campaigns involving deregulation, especially environmental deregulation. [WENT AFTER EPA, which went after KOCH?]

Contents[hide]

History

The Mercatus Center was founded as the Center for Market Processes by Rich Fink, executive vice president of Koch Industries and former president of the Koch Foundations, who went on to found Citizens for a Sound Economy. In the early 1980s the center moved to George Mason University. It merged with the Center for the Study of Public Choice during 1998 to become the James M. Buchanan Center for Political Economy. The Mercatus Center brand was developed in 1999 from the JBC.

Regulatory Studies Program

Personnel

Board of Advisors

Executive Staff

The Mercatus Center

The Mercatus Center is a conservative think tank located at George Mason University.  It is a sister organization to the Institute for Humane Studies.  The Mercatus Center was originally founded at Rutgers University by Richard Fink in the late 1970s, under the name the Center for Market Processes.

Koch Industries began funding the organization when it moved to George Mason University in the 1980s, and still finances the centre today. In 1999, the organization was renamed the Mercatus Center.  Charles Koch and Richard Fink serve on its board of directors.

The Mercatus Center believes that a gap exists between economic understanding and real-world decision and policy making.  Its mission, therefore, is to bridge that gap and to "provide policy makers with the economic tools to make sense of today's most pressing issues."

The *Wall Street Journal* has called the Mercatus Center "the most important think tank you've never heard of," and SourceWatch identifies the Mercatus Center as "one of the best-funded think tanks in the United States at the moment."  From 1999-2006, the Mercatus Center received a total of $2,670,662 in funding from conservative organizations, including $1.44 million from the Koch Family Charitable Foundations.  Furthermore, between the years 2003 and 2007 the Mercatus Center received $160,000 in funding from ExxonMobil.

The Mercatus Center and Lobbying

According to PublicIntegrity.com, the Mercatus Center regularly lobbies in the federal government, includingproviding lawmakers with "Capitol Hill breakfasts and luncheons hosted by deregulation scholars."  Mercatus has been an effective machine for pushing Koch's conservative political and economic values.

The Mercatus Center explicitly states that it does not engage in lobbying, and definitely "does not employ nor retain any registered lobbyists."  However, in 2005 Ohio Congressman Bob Ney, who has travelled on 19 occasions at the expense of the Mercatus Center, proposed a bill to amend the Clean Air Act.  Ney's bill called for the Secretary of Energy to build fifteen new oil refineries and sell them to private companies.  Ney's amendment not only fell in line with the position of the Mercatus Center, which had been trying to weaken the Clean Air Act, but it also seemed to benefit Koch Industries, Inc.--the largest private oil company in the United States and the Mercatus Center's largest beneficiary.

Lobbying rules stipulate that any organization that spends more than $24,500 within a six-month period trying to influence government representatives, must register itself as a lobbying group.  In both 2004 and 2005, the Mercatus Center spent over $55,000 on congressional travel.  Furthermore, between 2000 and 2005 Mercatus spent $227,000on more than 400 trips by government officials and their aides.  The Mercatus Center has never registered itself as lobbying group.

The Mercatus Center and The Clean Air Act

In 2002 the Mercatus Center led a focused attack on the Clean Air Act.  This attack was led by Mercatus Center Distinguished Senior Scholar, Wendy Gramm.  Gramm, who is an ardently opposes regulation in the energy sectors, asked for the reassessment of 44 of the Clean Air Act's federal regulations.  Regulations included in the Mercatus Center's requests for review were: national public health standards for smog and soot, and standards for tailpipe exhaust pollution from gasoline vehicles, diesel vehicles, and heavy diesel trucks.  As the non-profit group, Clean Air Trust highlighted, "Gramm would like to pull the plug on virtually every effective air pollution cleanup measure adopted in recent years."

http://www.desmogblog.com/koch-and-george-mason-university

jm nyt:

In the mid-eighties, the Kochs provided millions of dollars to George Mason University, in Arlington, Virginia, to set up another think tank. Now known as the Mercatus Center, it promotes itself as “the world’s premier university source for market-oriented ideas—bridging the gap between academic ideas and real-world problems.” Financial records show that the Koch family foundations have contributed more than thirty million dollars to George Mason, much of which has gone to the Mercatus Center, a nonprofit organization. “It’s ground zero for deregulation policy in Washington,” Rob Stein, the Democratic strategist, said. It is an unusual arrangement. “George Mason is a public university, and receives public funds,” Stein noted. “Virginia is hosting an institution that the Kochs practically control.”

The founder of the Mercatus Center is Richard Fink, formerly an economist. Fink heads Koch Industries’ lobbying operation in Washington. In addition, he is the president of the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation, the president of the Claude R. Lambe Charitable Foundation, a director of the Fred C. and Mary R. Koch Foundation, and a director and co-founder, with David Koch, of the Americans for Prosperity Foundation.

Fink, with his many titles, has become the central nervous system of the Kochtopus. He appears to have supplanted Ed Crane, the head of the Cato Institute, as the brothers’ main political lieutenant. Though David remains on the board at Cato, Charles Koch has fallen out with Crane. Associates suggested to me that Crane had been insufficiently respectful of Charles’s management philosophy, which he distilled into a book called “The Science of Success,” and trademarked under the name Market-Based Management, or M.B.M. In the book, Charles recommends instilling a company’s corporate culture with the competitiveness of the marketplace. Koch describes M.B.M. as a “holistic system” containing “five dimensions: vision, virtue and talents, knowledge processes, decision rights and incentives.” A top Cato Institute official told me that Charles “thinks he’s a genius. He’s the emperor, and he’s convinced he’s wearing clothes.” Fink, by contrast, has been far more embracing of Charles’s ideas. (Fink, like the Kochs, declined to be interviewed.)

At a 1995 conference for philanthropists, Fink adopted the language of economics when speaking about the Mercatus Center’s purpose. He said that grant-makers should use think tanks and political-action groups to convert intellectual raw materials into policy “products.”

The Wall Street Journal has called the Mercatus Center “the most important think tank you’ve never heard of,” and noted that fourteen of the twenty-three regulations that President George W. Bush placed on a “hit list” had been suggested first by Mercatus scholars. Fink told the paper that the Kochs have “other means of fighting [their] battles,” and that the Mercatus Center does not actively promote the company’s private interests. But Thomas McGarity, a law professor at the University of Texas, who specializes in environmental issues, told me that “Koch has been constantly in trouble with the E.P.A., and Mercatus has constantly hammered on the agency.”An environmental lawyer who has clashed with the Mercatus Center called it “a means of laundering economic aims.” The lawyer explained the strategy: “You take corporate money and give it to a neutral-sounding think tank,” which “hires people with pedigrees and academic degrees who put out credible-seeming studies. But they all coincide perfectly with the economic interests of their funders.”

In 1997, for instance, the E.P.A. moved to reduce surface ozone, a form of pollution caused, in part, by emissions from oil refineries. Susan Dudley, an economist who became a top official at the Mercatus Center, criticized the proposed rule. The E.P.A., she argued, had not taken into account that smog-free skies would result in more cases of skin cancer. She projected that if pollution were controlled it would cause up to eleven thousand additional cases of skin cancer each year.

In 1999, the District of Columbia Circuit Court took up Dudley’s smog argument. Evaluating the E.P.A. rule, the court found that the E.P.A. had “explicitly disregarded” the “possible health benefits of ozone.” In another part of the opinion, the court ruled, 2-1, that the E.P.A. had overstepped its authority in calibrating standards for ozone emissions. As the Constitutional Accountability Center, a think tank, revealed, the judges in the majority had previously attended legal junkets, on a Montana ranch, that were arranged by the Foundation for Research on Economics and the Environment—a group funded by Koch family foundations. The judges have claimed that the ruling was unaffected by their attendance.

Wendy Gramm

From SourceWatch

Jump to: navigation, search

Wendy Lee Gramm is chairman of the "regulatory studies program" at the Mercatus Center of George Mason University, generally calling for deregulation of the energy industry. She was onEnron's board of directors before its collapse. Enron had been a financial backer of the Mercatus Center.

Previously, Wendy Gramm held several positions in the Reagan Administration, including heading the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, when it exempted from regulation Enron trading in energy derivatives.

She has also previously been head of the Office of Management and Budget's (OMB) 'Information and Regulatory Affairs'. During 2002, the OMB drew up a "hit list" of existing federal environmental regulations it believes should be changed or rescinded. Of these, 44 had been suggested by the Mercatus Center.

Wendy Gramm is married to Senator Phil Gramm.

Contents[hide]

Positions held

Government

Thinktanks

Private companies

References

mayer

In the mid-eighties, the Kochs provided millions of dollars to George Mason University, in Arlington, Virginia, to set up another think tank. Now known as the Mercatus Center, it promotes itself as “the world’s premier university source for market-oriented ideas—bridging the gap between academic ideas and real-world problems.” Financial records show that the Koch family foundations have contributed more than thirty million dollars to George Mason, much of which has gone to the Mercatus Center, a nonprofit organization. “It’s ground zero for deregulation policy in Washington,” Rob Stein, the Democratic strategist, said. It is an unusual arrangement. “George Mason is a public university, and receives public funds,” Stein noted. “Virginia is hosting an institution that the Kochs practically control.”

The founder of the Mercatus Center is Richard Fink, formerly an economist. Fink heads Koch Industries’ lobbying operation in Washington. In addition, he is the president of the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation, the president of the Claude R. Lambe Charitable Foundation, a director of the Fred C. and Mary R. Koch Foundation, and a director and co-founder, with David Koch, of the Americans for Prosperity Foundation.

Fink, with his many titles, has become the central nervous system of the Kochtopus. He appears to have supplanted Ed Crane, the head of the Cato Institute, as the brothers’ main political lieutenant. Though David remains on the board at Cato, Charles Koch has fallen out with Crane. Associates suggested to me that Crane had been insufficiently respectful of Charles’s management philosophy, which he distilled into a book called “The Science of Success,” and trademarked under the name Market-Based Management, or M.B.M. In the book, Charles recommends instilling a company’s corporate culture with the competitiveness of the marketplace. Koch describes M.B.M. as a “holistic system” containing “five dimensions: vision, virtue and talents, knowledge processes, decision rights and incentives.” A top Cato Institute official told me that Charles “thinks he’s a genius. He’s the emperor, and he’s convinced he’s wearing clothes.” Fink, by contrast, has been far more embracing of Charles’s ideas. (Fink, like the Kochs, declined to be interviewed.)

At a 1995 conference for philanthropists, Fink adopted the language of economics when speaking about the Mercatus Center’s purpose. He said that grant-makers should use think tanks and political-action groups to convert intellectual raw materials into policy “products.”

The Wall Street Journal has called the Mercatus Center “the most important think tank you’ve never heard of,” and noted that fourteen of the twenty-three regulations that President George W. Bush placed on a “hit list” had been suggested first by Mercatus scholars. Fink told the paper that the Kochs have “other means of fighting [their] battles,” and that the Mercatus Center does not actively promote the company’s private interests. But Thomas McGarity, a law professor at the University of Texas, who specializes in environmental issues, told me that “Koch has been constantly in trouble with the E.P.A., and Mercatus has constantly hammered on the agency.” An environmental lawyer who has clashed with the Mercatus Center called it “a means of laundering economic aims.” The lawyer explained the strategy: “You take corporate money and give it to a neutral-sounding think tank,” which “hires people with pedigrees and academic degrees who put out credible-seeming studies. But they all coincide perfectly with the economic interests of their funders.”

In 1997, for instance, the E.P.A. moved to reduce surface ozone, a form of pollution caused, in part, by emissions from oil refineries. Susan Dudley, an economist who became a top official at the Mercatus Center, criticized the proposed rule. The E.P.A., she argued, had not taken into account that smog-free skies would result in more cases of skin cancer. She projected that if pollution were controlled it would cause up to eleven thousand additional cases of skin cancer each year.

In 1999, the District of Columbia Circuit Court took up Dudley’s smog argument. Evaluating the E.P.A. rule, the court found that the E.P.A. had “explicitly disregarded” the “possible health benefits of ozone.” In another part of the opinion, the court ruled, 2-1, that the E.P.A. had overstepped its authority in calibrating standards for ozone emissions. As the Constitutional Accountability Center, a think tank, revealed, the judges in the majority had previously attended legal junkets, on a Montana ranch, that were arranged by the Foundation for Research on Economics and the Environment—a group funded by Koch family foundations. The judges have claimed that the ruling was unaffected by their attendance.

Read more http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/08/30/100830fa_fact_mayer?printable=true#ixzz0xjjDaoCJ

The Mercatus Institute, a libertarian-oriented — and Koch brothers-affiliated — think tank based out of George Mason University (a public university, for whatever that’s worth), regularly releases its ranking of American states in terms of “Freedom.” Their definition of “freedom” largely adheres to the standard American libertarian conception of “liberty,” which is to say it is oriented almost entirely around private property ownership and low taxation. As a result,  America’s freest state this year turns out to be North Dakota.

North Dakota has also been in the news for another reason recently. What was it, again? Oh, right,  it passed the most restrictive antiabortion laws in the country. Including a law specifically aimed at shutting down the state’s lone abortion provider. It passed this law knowing it was unconstitutional.

rfk2:

Am Farm Bureau lobby front

Fed judge said animal fac needed water permit like any other fac; JG called mtg w/

ind and Mercatus  bd member was partner in McGuire Woods LLP, in the suit.  Merc

wrote plan, sent to epa ok'd by ex Farm Bur Adam Sharp --> build hog house to spc,

own only the shit; they make almost no $, so no one to sue when pollute w. shit;

write own shit mgmt plan w/ no public; even weak rules weakened more, shit

relgated to states; only tool for small farmers ~ int'l corp gone 74 ~TJ vision.

The Mercatus Center: A Tentacle of the Deregulation-Loving Kochtopus Helping in the Effort to Deny Climate Change and Eviscerate the EPA

Published 1, October 10, 2011 Academics , Environment , Politics , Science ,

Submitted by Elaine Magliaro, Guest Blogger

From Climate Science Watch (March 18, 2010): To the libertarians, the widely-shared scientific assessment that human-caused climate change will likely produce major harmful consequences — and the communication of this evidence to the public by the leading climate scientists — poses a particularly serious threat. An informed public concerned about the likelihood of harmful impacts of unchecked global climatic disruption is more likely to call for significant government action to curb greenhouse gas emissions. In order to block proactive government policymaking and keep corporate interests unregulated, libertarian groups have focused a significant part of their efforts on climate change on distorting the science to confuse public opinion, denying the seriousness of the problem, and, most recently, impugning the integrity of the climate science community. The Koch brothers have stepped forward with deep pockets to bankroll such efforts.

Many people have already heard about the libertarian billionaire businessmen brothers Charles and David Koch who have helped to found and/or fund a number of non-profit organizations and think tanks—including the Cato Institute, Americans for Prosperity, ALEC (American Legislative Exchange Council), the Federalist Society, the Reason Foundation, and the Heritage Foundation—whose aim seems to be the advancement of the Kochs’ agenda “that government taxes and regulations impinge on prosperity.”

What many people may not be aware of is the number of academic centers/institutions that the Kochs are also helping to fund at both public and private colleges and universities—including Florida State University, West Virginia University, Brown University, Troy University, and Utah State University.

I’m going to focus on just one of these Koch-funded academic centers in this post—the Mercatus Center, a conservative think tank located at George Mason University in Virginia—and on Susan B. Dudley, a woman who worked at Mercatus and was then appointed to a regulatory position at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) in 2007.

THE MERCATUS CENTER

In a 2004 Wall Street Journal article, the Mercatus Center was described as “the most important think tank you’ve never heard of.” Previously known as the Center for the Study of Free Market Processes, the Mercatus Center was founded by Richard Fink—with a grant from Charles Koch. Koch currently serves on the center’s Board of Directors—as does Fink who is also an executive vice president and a member of the board of directors of Koch Industries, Inc.

Jane Mayer wrote the following in Covert Operations, an article that appeared in the New Yorker in 2010: The Kochs are longtime libertarians who believe in drastically lower personal and corporate taxes, minimal social services for the needy, and much less oversight of industry—especially environmental regulation.

Public Citizen, a group founded by consumer advocate Ralph Nader, has called the Mercatus Center  “a wholly-owned subsidiary of Koch Industries and other corporate interests.” Richard Fink claims, however, that the center does not actively promote the Koch company’s private interests. He said that Koch “has other means of fighting its battles” in Washington and that they never had a nonprofit advance their agenda. Some people would disagree.

Thomas McGarity, a University of Texas law professor who specializes in environmental issues, told Mayer that “Koch has been constantly in trouble with the E.P.A., and Mercatus has constantly hammered on the agency.” Another environmental lawyer who spoke to Mayer said that Mercatus was “a means of laundering economic aims.”  The lawyer described the strategy: “You take corporate money and give it to a neutral-sounding think tank,” which “hires people with pedigrees and academic degrees who put out credible-seeming studies. But they all coincide perfectly with the economic interests of their funders.”

Rob Stein, a Democratic strategist, told Mayer that the relationship between George Mason University and Mercatus is an unusual arrangement. “George Mason is a public university, and receives public funds. Virginia is hosting an institution that the Kochs practically control.” Stein claimed that Mercatus was “ground zero for deregulation policy in Washington.”

According to Sourcewatch, Mercatus “has engaged in campaigns involving deregulation, especially environmental deregulation.” It has been reported that fourteen of the twenty-three regulations that George W. Bush put on his hit list were first suggested by academics who worked at the Mercatus Center.

In 2010, the University of Massachusetts at Amherst’s Political Economy Research Institute released a study that named Koch Industries as one of this country’s top ten polluters. That same year, Greenpeace released a report titled Koch Industries Secretly Funding the Climate Denial Machine. In the report’s executive summary, Greenpeace stated thatKoch Industries had “become a financial kingpin of climate science denial and clean energy opposition.”(Greenpeace also reported that Koch foundations have contributed more than $48 million in grants to “climate opposition groups” since 1997—and that more than half of that has been donated since 2005.)

MEET SUSAN B. DUDLEY

Frank O’Donnell, president of Clean Air Watch, wrote in 2007 about George W. Bush’s re-nomination of “a veritable rogues’ gallery of anti-environmental figures to key posts in federal agencies.” O’Donnell said that Susan B. Dudley, one of the nominees, was “a true anti-regulatory zealot. As director of regulatory studies at the industry-funded Mercatus Center, Dudley was like a wrecking ball out to smash key safeguards.” He added, “Putting Dudley in this key federal post would be like naming comedian Michael Richards to head the U.S. Civil Rights Commission.”

According to Lee Fang of Think Progress, George W. Bush appointed Susan B. Dudley, the director of the Regulatory Studies Program at the Mercatus Center, to head the OMB Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA)—after the center had attacked the “EPA regulation of tailpipe greenhouse gases by challenging the science of climate change.” (Dudley’s was a recess appointment in 2007.)

O’Donnell said that as head of OIRA Dudley would have one “of the most obscure yet powerful jobs in Washington. The person in this position can, largely without public scrutiny, interfere with actions of agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency, and become a conduit for industries seeking to avoid federal health, environmental and safety standards.”

The Cost is Too High: How Susan Dudley Threatens Public Protections, a report produced by Public Citizen and OMB Watch in 2006, said that while Dudley worked at Mercatus, she “attacked proposed regulations in formal submissions to government agencies and orchestrated campaigns to derail other safeguards already on the books.” The report also claimed that Dudley displayed“an extreme anti-regulatory ideology” and “questioned the merit of regulation altogether in congressional testimony and regulatory comments, and she has urged weakening, if not eliminating entirely, public safeguards.”

Dudley worked to oppose public health regulations as a “hidden tax” that hinders profitswhen she was at Mercatus. She opposed all of the following: EPA plans that would have set tougher standards for smog; lower-polluting cars and SUVs—as well as cleaner gasoline; air bagsin cars; stronger regulations for arsenic in drinking water; measures that could help curbglobal warming. (Think Progress)

Dudley has been quoted as stating that the “evidence regarding global warming and human contribution to it is mixed, and…if a slight warming does occur, historical evidence suggests it is likely to be beneficial, occurring at night, in the winter, and at the poles.” In her testimony before the Senate Subcommittee on Clean Air, Wetlands, Private Property and Nuclear Safety/Committee on Environment and Public on April 24, 1997, Dudley said: “Ozone in the troposphere, like ozone in the stratosphere, has the beneficial effect of screening ultraviolet radiation, which is known to have various health and welfare effects including melanoma and non-melanoma skin cancer, cataracts, and crop and fishery damage.”

The University Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR), a nonprofit consortium of more than seventy universities that offer Ph.D.s in atmospheric and related sciences, doesn’t see it the same way Dudley does. UCAR has said the following about ozone in the troposphere:

Ozone occurs naturally at ground-level in low concentrations. The two major sources of natural ground-level ozone are hydrocarbons, which are released by plants and soil, and small amounts of stratospheric ozone, which occasionally migrate down to the earth’s surface. Neither of these sources contributes enough ozone to be considered a threat to the health of humans or the environment.

But the ozone that is a byproduct of certain human activities does become a problem at ground level and this is what we think of as ‘bad’ ozone. With increasing populations, more automobiles, and more industry, there’s more ozone in the lower atmosphere. Since 1900 the amount of ozone near the earth’s surface has more than doubled. Unlike most other air pollutants, ozone is not directly emitted from any one source. Tropospheric ozone is formed by the interaction of sunlight, particularly ultraviolet light, with hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides, which are emitted by automobiles, gasoline vapors, fossil fuel power plants, refineries, and certain other industries.

And this is what UCAR said about the negative impacts of tropospheric ozone:

While stratospheric ozone shields us from ultraviolet radiation, in the troposphere this irritating, reactive molecule damages forests and crops; destroys nylon, rubber, and other materials; and injures or destroys living tissue. It is a particular threat to people who exercise outdoors or who already have respiratory problems.

Ozone affects plants in several ways. High concentrations of ozone cause plants to close their stomata. These are the cells on the underside of the plant that allow carbon dioxide and water to diffuse into the plant tissue. This slows down photosynthesis and plant growth. Ozone may also enter the plants through the stomata and directly damage internal cells.

Rubber, textile dyes, fibers, and certain paints may be weakened or damaged by exposure to ozone. Some elastic materials can become brittle and crack, while paints and fabric dyes may fade more quickly.

When ozone pollution reaches high levels, pollution alerts are issued urging people with respiratory problems to take extra precautions or to remain indoors. Smog can damage respiratory tissues through inhalation. Ozone has been linked to tissue decay, the promotion of scar tissue formation, and cell damage by oxidation. It can impair an athlete’s performance, create more frequent attacks for individuals with asthma, cause eye irritation, chest pain, coughing, nausea, headaches and chest congestion and discomfort. It can worsen heart disease, bronchitis, and emphysema.

Prior to Dudley’s appointment to OIRA, Scott Silver, executive director of Wild Wilderness, wrote in an email exchange with Media Transparency that “Dudley would be the most anti-regulatory zealot within the Bush Administration, bar none. Her ideology is based upon a core belief that regulations are generally bad and there should be no regulation unless it can be proven to be cost effective and supported from within the market place.”

The Cost is Too High report said that Dudley’s radicalism put her “right at home at Mercatus”—which was “founded by corporate interests and endowed by large corporations, free-market oriented foundations, and leaders from the corporate world”  and “has long operated at the intersection of money, power, and influence in order to promote corporate special interests at the expense of the public interest.”

Note: Susan B. Dudley is a Research Professor of Public Policy and Public Administration and is serving as the Director of the Regulatory Studies Center at George Washington University.

SOURCES & FURTHER READING

EPA Nemesis: Mercatus Center Another Koch Think Tank (Sourcewatch/Center for Media and Democracy)

Koch Industries Climate Denial Front Group Mercatus Center (Greenpeace)

From Promoting Acid Rain To Climate Denial: Over 20 Years Of David Koch’s Polluter Front Groups (Think Progress)

The White House’s Agents Of Environmental Corruption (Think Progress)

Koch’s Web of Influence (Center for Public Integrity)

Koch-Powered Tea Party Pushes Climate Denial Bill In New Hampshire (Think Progress)

Covert Operations: The billionaire brothers who are waging a war against Obama. (The New Yorker)

The White House’s Agents Of Environmental Corruption (Think Progress)

Does Bush know how to pick ‘em or does he know how to pick ‘em? (Daily Kos)

The Cost is Too High: How Susan Dudley Threatens Public Protections (Public Citizen & OMB Watch)

Bush Nominates Anti-Regulatory Zealot To Head ‘Super-Powerful’ Public Safety Office (Think Progress)

Stop Susan Dudley: The air you breathe depends on it (Public Citizen)

Dudley Do-Wrong of George Mason University (Media Transparency)

With Senate on break, Bush appoints officials: The three, including a contentious regulatory director, most likely would not have been approved by lawmakers. (Los Angeles Times)

I Am OMB and I Write the Rules (Washington Post)

On First Day Of New Congress, Koch Operatives Met With GOP Chairman Planning To Gut The Clean Air Act (Think Progress)

ALEC Exposed: The Koch Connection (The Nation)

Exclusive: Tea Party Billionaire David Koch Denies Climate Change, Shrugs Off His Carbon Pollution (ThinkProgress)

The Koch Energy and Commerce Committee (Turley Blog)

Koch Industries multibillionaire Koch brothers bankroll attacks on climate change science and policy (Climate Science Watch)

The Most Important Think Tank You’ve Never Heard Of (Richard C. Young)

Rule Breaker: In Washington, Tiny Think Tank Wields Big Stick on Regulation (Mercatus)

Meet Koch Industries (Oil Watchdog)

Mercatus Center—Koch Industries: Still Fueling Climate Denial [REPORT] (PolluterWatch)

Koch Industries: Still Fueling Climate Denial [REPORT] (PolluterWatch)

Koch Industries: Still Fueling Climate Denial 2011 Update (Greenpeace)

Koch Industries: Secretly Funding the Climate Denial Machine (Greenpeace)

The Kochs’ Mercatus Center and Environmental Deregulation (The Green Market)

Does This Matter? Eliminating the EPA? (Watchdog Progressive)

REPORT: Koch Fueling Far Right Academic Centers At Universities Across The Country(ThinkProgress)

FSU Accepts Funds From Charles Koch In Return For Control Over Its Academic Freedom (ThinkProgress)

Billionaire’s role in hiring decisions at Florida State University raises questions (St. Petersburg Times)

VIDEO: Why Oil Billionaire David Koch Is Secretly Funding Astroturf To Repeal CA Clean Energy Law AB 32 (Think Progress)

Wegman scandal rocks cornerstone of climate denial (Think Progress)

Institute for Humane Studies (IHS) – Koch Industries Climate Denial Front Group (Greenpeace)

Climate Change Deniers Without Borders: How American oil money is pumping up climate change skeptics abroad—and how they could derail any progress made in Copenhagen. (Mother Jones)

Bush Obstructs EPA, OSHA, CDC Regulations (Mother Jones)

Koch Industries and Lobbying in Washington (Desmogblog)

Koch and George Mason University (Desmogblog)

Still Hiring Tree Haters (Tom Paine)

Another big time fox nominated to be gatekeeper to the henhouse (Watching the Watchers)

Charles Koch’s Assault on Academic Freedom (Mother Jones)

In Washington, Tiny Think Tank Wields Big Stick on Regulation: With White House Ex-Staffers, Mercatus Helps Zap Codes It Says Restrict Business (Wall Street Journal)

Statutory Interpretation in the Era of OIRA (Georgetown University law Center)

Testimony of Susan E. Dudley

Before the Subcommittee on Clean Air, Wetlands, Private Property and Nuclear Safety

Committee on Environment and Public Works

April 24, 1997

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Mercatus Center Founders Circle 2004

List provided to Public Citizen by the Mercatus Center

ombwatch dudley rept 2006

Altria Corporate Services, Inc.

Anschutz Foundation

The Armstrong Foundation

W. H. Attebury

Richard A. Bacas

Bachman Foundation

Elliot A. Baines

Mr. & Mrs. Frank E. Baxter

Bochnowski Family Foundation

Castle Rock Foundation

Dorothy Byrne

Patrick M. Byrne

Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation

Paul G. Chelew & Shirley F. McKenzie

Arthur A. Ciocca

Richard W. Colburn

Covenant Foundation

Garland & Carolyn Cox

E. L. Craig Foundation

Dan E. Cullen

D & D Foundation

David H. Koch Charitable Foundation

Mr. & Mrs. Jeremy S. Davis

The Shelby Cullom Davis Foundation

Earhart Foundation

Exxon Mobil Corporation

Freddie Mac

Philip M. Friedmann

Larry & Mary Futchik

Edwin A. Gallun, Jr.

General Motors Corporation

The Gillette Company

Mr. & Mrs. Thomas C. Graham

Richard R. Greer

Elmer R. Haile, Jr.

Harold E. Hamilton

Philip D. Harvey

IFREE

John E. & Sue M. Jackson Charitable Trust

Ruth H. Jackson Charitable Trust

Jeld-Wen Foundation

Craig W. Johnson

John P. Kavooras

Mr. & Mrs. Michael L. Keiser

Randy Parris Kendrick

Mr. & Mrs. Richard Korpan

Dr. & Mrs. Benjamin LeCompte, III

Allan W. & Lois J. Lund

Natalie C. Lund

Mr. & Mrs. Bartley Madden

E. Pierce Marshall

Miriam & Emmett McCoy Foundation

John T. & Libby Menefee

Microsoft

Joseph R. Mitchell

The Modzelewski Charitable Trust

Dorothy Donnelley Moller

The Hon. Herbert N. Morgan

Albert G. Oaks

Pfizer Inc.

Mrs. Dorothy Pollak

The John William Pope Foundation

Robert A. Pritzker

James M. Rodney

Sarah Scaife Foundation Inc.

Dwight C. Schar

James W. Shields

Dr. Vernon L. Smith

Henry M. Staley Charitable Trust

State Farm Insurance Companies

Jackson T. Stephens, Jr.

Sunmark Foundation

William Thomas

James C. Thompson

James E. Upfield

US Chamber of Commerce

UST Public Affairs Inc.

Alex C. Walker Educational & Charitable

Foundation

The Walton Family Foundation, Inc.

F. William Weber

Mr. & Mrs. Jerry A. Wenger

Prof. & Mrs. John O. Whitney

Joseph H. Wilkens

Christopher & Patricia Witzky

Betty K. Wolfe

Sam Wyly

Fred M. Young, Jr.

Norma E. Zimdahl

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