Schumer-aligned dark money group hauls in record $92 million from hidden donors

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Capital Research Center's Parker Thayer talks Chuck Schumer's massive dark money haul.

A dark money group aligned with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer raked in a record $92 million from anonymous donors to flood groups with money to elect Democrats, records show.

Majority Forward, a nonprofit affiliated with Schumer's Senate Majority PAC, pocketed the cash between July 1, 2019, and June 30, 2020, its most recently released tax forms show. The group pushed millions to other liberal groups during this time, including the New York Democrat's PAC and nonprofits that work on voter engagement efforts.

But as the left-wing group pulled in record cash, Schumer and other Democratic politicians assailed Republicans over their use of dark money, even as they quietly benefited from far more unidentified donor cash. 

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., meets with reporters before a key test vote on the For the People Act, a sweeping bill that would overhaul the election system and voting rights, at the Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, June 22, 2021. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite) (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

"Majority Forward is kind of a dark money empire that the Democrat Party really doesn't want to talk about, especially Chuck Schumer," Parker Thayer, an investigator at the Capital Research Center, told Fox News.

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"It's not just them either," he continued. "They control a network of four different dark money nonprofit groups as well, and all of this money eventually goes to Democrat-aligned PACs, and the initial donors behind it are essentially untraceable."

Majority Forward's latest money haul was a $16 million increase over its previous high of $76 million in contributions from its prior fiscal year. 

From mid-2015 to mid-2018, the group reported a combined $69 million in revenue, meaning its two most recent fiscal years eclipsed the three previous years before that by nearly $100 million in contributions.

Majority Forward did not respond to a request for comment. 

Schumer and other Democratic politicians, meanwhile, recently demanded right-leaning organizations publicly disclose their donors and chastised Republicans over their dark money ties. 

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Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of N.Y., walks away following a media availability on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, May 18, 2021. Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., is at left. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh) (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

In 2019, Schumer, outspoken dark money critic Rhode Island Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse and other Democratic politicians called on the Judicial Crisis Network, a right-leaning organization, to release a list of its donors who provided the group with more than $10,000 in donations.

The senators criticized the network for concealing "the identity of their donors," who "have contributed tens of millions of dollars used to fund political advertising campaigns in support of nominees like Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch," the Daily Beast reported. 

The politicians made the demand as they simultaneously benefited from their own judicial dark money groups, including Demand Justice and the Alliance for Justice. Both groups have undertaken initiatives to influence President Biden on judicial nominations. 

Schumer has also pushed the For the People Act, which contains provisions to make political nonprofits disclose donors who give more than $10,000. The bill also calls for nonprofits to file disclosure reports to the Federal Election Commission when they push more than $10,000 into election-related activities. 

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Majority Forward maintains close ties to Schumer's Senate Majority PAC, which raises cash to elect Democrats to Congress' upper chamber. J.B Poersch, a long-time Schumer ally, is president of both Majority Forward and the PAC. Both groups share office space and personnel. 

Majority Forward was the Senate Majority PAC's largest donor throughout the 2020 election cycle, meaning Democratic Senate candidates benefited from substantial amounts of dark money during the election, FEC records show. The nonprofit passed $51 million in contributions to the PAC and added hundreds of thousands of dollars for salaries in 2020. 

Majority Forward has so far pushed $4.3 million in donations to the PAC and added $155,000 for wages for the 2022 cycle, records show. 

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of N.Y., speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, Tuesday, Jan. 4, 2022. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh) ((AP Photo/Susan Walsh))

"The Democratic Party makes a big deal in public about getting rid of dark money, getting dark money out of politics, but the reality is even The New York Times is now reporting on this," Thayer told Fox News.

"Democrats use much more dark money than Republicans do, and they're more than willing to take that funding as long as it benefits them, but they'll still simultaneously call out conservatives and Republicans for using dark money as well," Thayer said.

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The New York Times recently reported that 15 of the most active Democratic dark money nonprofits spent $1.5 billion in 2020. By comparison, 15 of the most active Republican nonprofits spent around $900 million during this time. 

A liberal dark money network run by Washington, D.C.-based consulting firm Arabella Advisors raised an eye-popping $1.6 billion in anonymous cash in 2020, Fox News previously reported. It pushed $896 million in contributions and grants to liberal groups last year. 

The Arabella-managed network has positioned itself as one of the largest dark money networks in the United States.