Charity raises legal questions by funding pro-Harris dark money operation
A report examines how Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund, a donor-advised fund, transferred $37.5 million in 2024 to Luminous future Fund, a pro-Kamala Harris dark-money group, despite Fidelity’s pledge not to fund political causes. Bright Future Fund, registered as a 501(c)(4), spent most of it’s 2024 revenue funding other 501(c)(4) groups, including Future Forward USA Action, which backed pro-Harris political ads, raising questions about the charity’s nonpartisan claims. Tax experts cited by the piece suggest Fidelity’s tax forms may have been technically inaccurate, implying an attempt to disguise or downplay a grant to a partisan political actor. Donor-advised funds allow donors to direct grants, with Fidelity typically not choosing recipients, and the funds can grow tax-free; donations to 501(c)(4) groups are generally not tax-deductible, creating further questions about the grant’s accounting and motives. Fidelity says its grants comply with the Internal Revenue Code and cannot be used for lobbying or impermissible purposes, but did not address the specific grant to Bright Future Fund. Critics note the opaque paper trail of nonprofit funding and the potential for donor-advised funds to influence politics under the umbrella of charitable activity, while supporters argue that debates over “nonpartisan” voter engagement are politically charged. The story highlights ongoing concerns about transparency,tax reporting,and the role of donor-advised funds in political spending.
Major charity raises legal questions by funding pro-Harris dark money operation
The Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund, the nonprofit arm of the financial giant bearing the same name, transferred $37.5 million to a dark money group that assisted then-Vice President Kamala Harris during the 2024 presidential election, despite pledging not to give money to political causes, tax records show.
Bright Future Fund, the pro-Harris dark money group, received $37.5 million from the Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund in 2024, according to tax filings first reported on by the Free Press. Unlike traditional 501(c)(3) charities, which are barred from participating in electoral politics, the Bright Future Fund is registered with the IRS as a 501(c)(4), a type of nonprofit organization with a broad license to engage in political spending.
Notably, the Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund claimed on its tax forms to have only transferred funds to 501(c)(3) organizations, a statement that critics say appears to be inaccurate given its transfer to the 501(c)(4) Bright Future Fund.
Patrick Sternal, a tax lawyer and former adviser at the IRS’s office of chief counsel, told the Free Press that the Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund’s tax forms were “technically inaccurate” and that “it raises questions about whether Fidelity was trying to disguise or downplay their grant to a highly partisan group that worked to benefit the Harris campaign.”
Brian Mittendorf, a professor at the Ohio State University specializing in nonprofit accounting, shared Sternal’s view, stating that it appears the charity “filled out its tax forms incorrectly by saying there were no non-501(c)(3) recipients.”
The Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund is donor-advised. This means that Fidelity itself is not directly choosing where the funds held by its charity are sent. In a donor-advised fund, individual philanthropists or philanthropic organizations maintain accounts holding assets. The fund itself manages these funds, allowing them to grow tax-free. At the time of the donor’s choosing, they can request that the donor-advised fund donate assets from their account to another nonprofit organization.
Donor-advised funds typically reserve the right to deny a transfer to an organization, raising questions as to why Fidelity made a payment to a 501(c)(4).
The donation to a 501(c)(4) through the Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund is potentially problematic because donors generally receive an immediate federal income tax deduction after giving to the donor-advised fund. Donations to 501(c)(4)s, however, typically are not tax-deductible.
A Fidelity spokesperson told the Free Press that its charitable arm “complies with its obligations under the Internal Revenue Code with respect to its grants” and that grants “cannot be used for lobbying, political activity, or for other impermissible purposes.” They did not directly address the payment made to the Bright Future Fund, according to the Free Press.
The Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund bears the legal responsibility for ensuring that the funds it provided to the Bright Future Fund are used for strictly charitable, not political, purposes, according to tax experts cited by the Free Press. Per Fidelity, the funds given to the Bright Future Fund were to be used for “nonpartisan voter engagement, mobilization, and education.”
Nominally nonpartisan get-out-the-vote initiatives have drawn criticism from the Right in recent election cycles, facing allegations that they tend to target demographics favorable to the Democrats, thus offering a net benefit to the party under an apolitical charitable auspice. Defenders, meanwhile, counter that conservatives are trying to stop people from exercising their right to vote for similarly partisan reasons.
Almost all of the Bright Future Fund’s $40.6 million in 2024 revenue came from the Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund, records show. During 2024, the Bright Future Fund gave millions to other 501(c)(4) organizations, making it possible that some of the funds transferred by Fidelity ended up being used for political purposes. Nonprofit organizations, however, do not publicly provide enough of a paper trail to determine, definitively, whether this was the case. About $20 million of the Bright Future Fund’s 2024 expenditures went to Future Forward USA Action, the main dark money group that bankrolled pro-Harris ads during that year’s election.
“How Bright Future Fund can claim with a straight face that they spent almost $40 million on ‘nonpartisan’ get-out-the-vote activities, while at the same time funneling tens of millions of dollars to support [former President] Joe Biden and Harris, is beyond me,” Caitlin Sutherland, director of Americans for Public Trust, told the Free Press.
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