MLive fails to report on the long standing connection between the US Chamber of Commerce and West Michigan
On Wednesday, MLive posted an article entitled, U.S. Chamber of Commerce taps West Michigan business leader for advisory role.
The MLive article was brief, with some information about the person appointed to the advisory board and a listing of the other current board members. However, the article failed to do two important things. First, there was no mention of the fact that several other people from West Michigan have played a significant role with the US Chamber of Commerce. The MLive article also omitted any history or critical perspective about the US Chamber of Commerce since it was founded in the early part of the 20th Century.
The MLive writer could have mentioned that Amway co-founder Jay Van Andel was appointed as the Chairman of the US Chamber of Commerce from 1979 to 1980. This meant that Van Andel was the head of what is known as the largest lobbying organization in the United States, according to Source Watch.
Not only is the US Chamber of Commerce the largest lobbying group in the country, they have a long history of getting the US Government to defend the economic system of Capitalism and work to silence and even repress those that are anti-Capitalists. In fact, in 1934 the US Chamber of Commerce convinced the US Justice Department to set up an agency “to investigate, record, control, and prosecute all subversive agitators,” according to Alyssa Katz’s book, The Influence Machine: The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Corporate Capture of American Life.
Getting back to Jay Van Andel’s tenure as the Chairman of the US Chamber of Commerce, it is important to note that during the 1970s there was tremendous pressure from the public and numerous citizen-led groups to push the US Government to adopt more regulatory standards for consumer products.
In response, the US Chamber of Commerce created astroturf group (fake group) called Citizen’s Choice, that sought to undermine efforts for further regulation. As the Chairman of the US Chamber of Commerce, Jay Van Andel decided to house this astroturf group in the Chamber’s headquarters. At the same time, Van Andel used the Amway corporation’s 300,000 distributors at the time to sign up as members of Citizen’s Choice to oppose business and consumer product regulation, as is documented in Katz’s book.
Jay Van Andel’s son Steve, was Chairman of the US Chamber of Commerce from 2001 – 2002, a fact that is also omitted in the MLive story. I’m not sure if the MLive reported was unaware of the West Michigan connection to the US Chamber of Commerce, or maybe they don’t want to talk about these connections and this history out of fear of retaliation from the Chamber and its members in Washington and in West Michigan.
For months now, we have all had our minds carpet-bombed by political ads on a variety of platforms. This is not surprising, since buying political ad space and time is what accounts for the bulk of campaign contribution spending by candidates.
In the case of incumbent Hillary Scholten, they have out raised and out spent their opponent, based on the latest campaign finance data just before the primary. Rep. Hillary Scholten is hoping to get re-elected, so many of their ads are either middle of the road on messaging or they embrace more conservative messaging like the issue of safety.
In one of Scholten’s most recent political ads, an ad that uses rather intense music and quick, zoom in video transitions. However, the narrative and the statistics used are what should concern people, especially people who care about immigration justice.
The person featured in this political ad, is Muskegon County Prosecutor D. J. Hilson. Hilson begins his comments about Scholten by say, “When it comes to our safety, Hillary Scholten is all about action.” When the prosecutor says “our safety” does he mean those of us who live in the 3rd Congressional district?
Hilson continues with some “evidence” that Scholten is committed to our safety, saying:
“As an attorney she worked in the Justice Department enforcing our immigration laws.” We all should be convinced by this “evidence”, despite any real concrete examples or her track record in the Justice Department on immigration matters, but Scholten does look impressive walking down steps.
Next Hilson says, “In Congress Scholten worked across the aisle to spearhead legislation to increase border security, hire 22,000 Border Patrol Agents and crack down on drug cartels. That is the type of action we need in Washington.” This part of the political is just plain bullshit. Increasing border security and Border Patrol Agents just means the further criminalization of immigrants who have fled political violence, economic despair and climate disaster, only to show up at the US/Mexican border and suffer further abuse.
Rep. Scholten has supported bipartisan legislation known as the Dignity Act. However, the Dignity Act is not Comprehensive Immigration Reform, nor does it address more structural elements of root causes of immigration, such as the US role in supporting military and trade policies in Latin America that have destabilized most of the region, along with the fact that more and more people are being displaced and forced to flee their homelands because of Climate Change. (See Todd Miller’s excellent book, Storming the Wall: Climate Change, Migration and Homeland Security.)
What the immigrant justice movement is demanding – a movement led by immigrants – is more humane policies and practices when people show up at the border, such as expanding the US asylum policy. Unfortunate, the Biden Administration has done just the opposite. Biden has used Section 212(f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, which was previously used by former President Donald Trump. This policy has restricted and limited immigrants from applying for asylum, which has sparked numerous legal challenges. In fact, the deputy director of the ACLU Immigrants’ Rights Project, Lee Gelernt, said of Biden’s restrictive asylum policy: “This is not a ‘win’—it’s a monstrosity. Asylum is a human right.”
On the matter of “cracking down on the drug cartels”, the political ad provides no evidence or verification of said claim. Using a staged image of what are meant to look like drugs on a table in front of a cop is no evidence. But that doesn’t matter, because it sounds like tough on crime shit. In fact, what Hillary Scholten and the Democratic Party is doing is adopting a slightly milder version of what Trump wants to do regarding immigration policy.
In a recent article entitled, Kamala Harris Surrenders to Trump on Border Security and Endorses the War On Drugs, writer Phil Wilson states:
Harris has adopted a strategy of offering a feast to the reactionary right while cunningly spreading crumbs for progressive voters. She told us, effectively, that the vast majority of people desperately attempting to seek safety on US soil will be sent back to the starvation, death squads, cartels and paramilitary forces that chased them to the US border. These people, often undertaking perilous journeys across nearly impenetrable jungles, mountains and deserts, flee for their lives. They come to the US to be rejected and maligned by those guarding the borders of one of the most underpopulated nations on earth.
Wilson ends his article by saying, “Trump has proven that there is a massive market for bluster, bullshit, impossible promises and dummied down, simplistic narratives. Harris and the Democrats have taken notes and want a piece of the action. There is no border crisis, but no end to ambitious politicians who want to scream for higher walls and more Draconian punishment for the most vulnerable people, those trapped between the rock and hard place of US power.”
Besides supporting Israel’s genocidal policy against the Palestinians, Rep. Scholten is pushing a harsh, militarized US border policy that makes a mockery of the words ascribed on the Statue of Liberty, and instead embraced xenophobic nationalism.
Outgoing US President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned the American people about the Military Industrial Complex in his farewell address in January of 1961. Eisenhower said:
“We have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. . . . This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. . . .Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. . . . In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.”
Indeed, the US Military Industrial Complex has only grown since Eisenhower warned us. The US weapons cartel/industry is one of the most powerful lobbies in DC, providing millions annually to both the Republicans and the Democrats, according to data from the Center for Responsible Politics.
Another way that the military industrial complex has impacted the US, is through the massive Pentagon spending that goes to universities and other institutions for research purposes. William Hartung, who has been writing about and researching Pentagon spending in recent decades, just published an article entitled, The Pentagon Goes to School: The Battle for the Soul of American Science. In that article, Hartung states:
The divestment campaigns launched last spring by students protesting Israel’s mass slaughter in Gaza brought the issue of the militarization of American higher education back into the spotlight.
And now, Pentagon-funded research is once again on the rise, driven by the DOD’s recent focus on developing new technologies like weapons driven by artificial intelligence (AI). Combine that with an intensifying drive to recruit engineering graduates and the forging of partnerships between professors and weapons firms and you have a situation in which many talented technical types could spend their entire careers serving the needs of the warfare state. The only way to head off such a Brave New World would be greater public pushback against the military conquest (so to speak) of America’s research and security agendas, in part through resistance by scientists and engineers whose skills are so essential to building the next generation of high-tech weaponry.
In this important article, Hartung provides a link to DoD contracts with universities and other research facilities, 469 to be exact, that have received funding from the Pentagon.
Pentagon funding for Michigan Schools and one research facility in Grand Rapids
It was no surprise to see that schools like U of M and MSU are on the list of schools to receive massive funding from the pentagon, as both major Michigan universities have a long history of providing research and training for the US military.
What follows is a list of places that the Pentagon has provided funding to in Michigan, with the first number being the ranking in the 469 recipients, along with the amount of money they received in 2022:
- #15 – University of Michigan: $82,277,000
- #86 – Michigan Technological University: $20,345,000
- #99 – Michigan State University: $16,019,000
- #141 – Wayne State University: $8,457,000
- #272 – Van Andel Research Institute: $941,000
- #292 – Western Michigan University: $650,000
- #323 – University of Detroit Mercy: $387,000
- #338 – Saginaw Valley State University: $325,000
- #401 – Eastern Michigan University: $87,000
- #425 – University of Michigan, Dearborn: $53,000
- #433 – Central Michigan University: $44,000
- #438 – Calvin University: $40,000
I sent Emails to both the Van Andel Research Institute and Calvin University to ask them what kind of research they were doing with the money they received from the Pentagon contract. If I get any answers I will publish their responses.
The fact that so many universities and other research institutions have received large sums of money from the Pentagon should be cause for concern, even outrage. On top of the fact that in Michigan alone, the combined contracts come to roughly $130 Million. Now, just imagine how many student scholarships could have been provided for $130 Million.
As someone who has been monitoring the Grand Rapids area news media over the past 4 decades, I have certainly seen how sectors of power get a different type of treatment by local news agencies.
This preferential treatment was on full display in a WOODTV8 story from Monday, September 30th, with a digital headline that read, “Amway hires new president and CEO.”
Considering the power that the Amway Corporation and the founding families – DeVos and Van Andel – have in this community, what channel 8 posted was no surprise. However, I believe it is still worth showing people just how WOODTV8 acquiesced to the company, which is often referred to as a pyramid scheme.
The Amway Corporation sent out a Press Release on Monday morning, which I am including here below in its entirety. The parts that are bolded in the Amway Press Release are what WOODTV8 posted as a “news” story.
Amway, the world’s largest direct selling company, today announced that its Board of Directors has appointed Michael Nelson as President & Chief Executive Officer, effective immediately. Nelson succeeds Milind Pant, who had served as CEO since January 2019.
“Amway is looking to the future with energy and confidence,” said Board Co-Chair Steve Van Andel. “We’re ready to build on the momentum of recent years, grow from our strengths and answer market needs of today in a way that only we can. The Board is thrilled to welcome Michael to this crucial position, and we’re certain that he brings exactly what Amway needs to continue leading, growing and thriving in the industry – now and well into the future.”
Nelson brings more than three decades of Amway experience to the office, having held critical leadership roles in Strategy, Supply Chain, Human Resources, and Technology, among many other disciplines across the organization. His expertise spans business strategy, people management and development, and global operations, making him uniquely suited to the CEO position. His tenure with Amway also gives him a deep understanding of the company’s legacy, its strengths in developing science-based health and wellbeing solutions, and its vital partnership with Amway Business Owners around the world.
“This business is special, and no one understands that better than Michael,” said Board Co-Chair Doug DeVos. “He knows who we are, where we can go and how we can get there. Today, that’s especially valuable as Amway pursues a bold and innovative agenda toward growth. We believe Michael is a leader who will honor all that’s special about Amway, and help us grow because of it.”
As President and CEO, Nelson will lead nearly 14,000 employees supporting one million Amway Business Owners across the globe. The Amway business, started by Jay Van Andel and Rich DeVos more than 60 years ago, will continue to be a private, family-owned company with a family-led board of directors.
“I’m honored and grateful to Doug, Steve and the rest of the Board for the opportunity to help guide this remarkable organization in our shared purpose,” said Nelson. “It’s a mission that’s been close to my heart for more than 30 years, and I look forward to partnering with the Board, my colleagues and Amway Business Owners to build on the legacy and success of the last 65 years. There’s tremendous potential and an even brighter future ahead.”
Nelson is a well-known leader in the West Michigan community, serving as a board member for the Grand Rapids Area Chamber of Commerce, Economic Club of Grand Rapids, The Right Place and the West Michigan Regional Air Alliance. His dedication and deep roots will continue to strengthen Amway’s longstanding commitment to contribute meaningfully to the West Michigan community.
As former CEO Milind Pant departs, the Amway Board of Directors wishes him the best in his future endeavors.
“The Board thanks Milind for his service and leadership over the last six years,” said Van Andel. “He steered us through global challenges and sharpened our business strategy. Today, we’re well positioned to continue leading and growing in the health and wellbeing industry.”
Besides channel 8’s re-printing of the majority of the Amway Press Release, they made no effort to talk about what this change means, how it might impact West Michigan, nor the implications of having a new CEO that has been strategically embedded in other institutions in the Grand Rapids Area…..which GRIID noted in Part II in my series on the Grand Rapids Power Structure.
In Part VI of the Grand Rapids Power Structure series, where I talked about the function of the local news media, I stated – “While there are nuances within various news media outlets, the main function of most news media is to serve and normalize power.” This example from WOODTV8 merely affirms the normalization of power in this city.
Violent crime is dropping and GRPD funding increases: Who controls the narrative controls public spending
Last week, WOODTV8 ran a story entitled, Data: Has violent crime dropped in West Michigan?
The story was based on FBI data, which states that violent crime decreased between 2022 and 2023, by 3%. West Michigan followed this trend and Grand Rapids nearly quadrupled the decrease, with nearly an 11% decrease.
In addition, if you look at the most recent FBI crime data, you can see that violent crimes continues to decrease in Grand Rapids.
Unfortunately, the decrease in violent crime nationally and locally is often not reflected in news coverage or in the political rhetoric of both Republicans and Democrats. The decrease in violent crimes is also not reflected in the bi-partisan commitment to increase funding for the cops.
This push to provide more funding for police is also the mantra that the Grand Rapids Police Department has been using, particularly Chief Winstrom. The calls to increase funding for police, especially after the national movement to defund the police in 2020, has been constant, and Grand Rapids elected officials have embraced this message. The City Manager and the Grand Rapids City Commission approved an increase in the GRPD’s budget from last year, a $3 million increase to be exact.
So what are we to make of the fact that violent crime is down, yet the GRPD, other police departments and and elected officials are not only embracing the “we need more funding for cops” mantra, they are actually pushing the fear narrative. Of course, part of the reason for the fear narrative is that we are in the midst of an election cycle and no politician or candidate wants to be seen as “soft on crime”, but despite the upcoming election politicians and candidates embrace the increase police funding narrative.
Embracing the increase funding narrative for cops is not only problematic, it does actual harm. Here are a few ways in which the increase funding for cops narrative is harmful:
According to https://mappingpoliceviolence.org/ police around the country have already killed 997 people this year, with a disproportionate number of those people being from BIPOC communities. In addition, as Alex Vitale, the author ofThe End of Policing points out, police departments also disproportionately spend the majority of their time policing poor and BIPOC neighborhoods, since this is what local power structures demand of them.
Second, the excellent report from Interrupting Criminalization entitled, Cops Don’t Stop Violence, deconstructs the whole notion of crime, how crime data is misused to serve policing interests and how police consistently engage in their own crimes against people they stop, detain and arrest. This report concludes with the following statement: It’s time to recognize that decades of pouring more money, resources, and legitimacy into policing in an effort to increase safety have failed — because policing is functioning as it is intended to: to contain, control, and criminalize Black and Brown communities rather than to prevent and reduce violence. It’s time to invest in meeting community needs and building non-police community safety strategies. It’s time to invest in just recovery.
Third, the news media feeds into the fear narrative, which justifies large police departments. Since January 1st, I have been monitoring MLive, WOODTV8, WZZM 13 and WXMI 17 on a variety of issues. The number one new theme is crime, as you can see in the image here on the right. Comparatively, during the same time period, there have only been 72 stories about local elections. However, what is even more instructive is the fact that of the 503 news stories from the four news agencies, stories that center on public safety, there have only been 11 stories where the GRPD actually prevented a crime. If the GRPD is not actually preventing crime, then what the hell do they actually do?
Lastly, maintaining narratives around fear and the need to increase police funding results in massive police department budgets, which ultimately means that other critical issues like housing, food, health care, education, climate justice, etc. will not be a priority.
The last talking point is critical, since it was central to the Movement for Black Lives creating the Defund the Police Toolkit. The Movement for Black Lives understood that policing is designed to control and repress communities that are demanding justice, and that police departments are a drain on how public tax dollars are spent. We need to flip the script on this narrative and demand better in our communities.
ArtPrize vs Local Election coverage in the Grand Rapids media market
It has been several years since GRIID has conducted a comparative study of local news coverage on ArtPrize and local elections.
2009 was the first time that I did a comparative study between ArtPrize and election coverage, which was followed by a similar study in 2010. In fact, in 2010, GRIID produced a 21 page report just on the Grand Rapids Press coverage, which you can find here.
For 2024, I kept the comparative coverage between ArtPrize and local election coverage in a shorter time period. I looked at the coverage from MLive, WOODTV8, WZZM13 and WXMI 17 between September 8 through September 29. In that 3 week time span, this is what I found. There were a total of nine stories done about local elections (by local elections I mean elections happening for seats within Kent County).
- MLive – 5
- WOODTV8 – 1
- WZZM13 – 2
- WXMI 17 – 1
Total Local Election stories – 9
During the same three week period there were a significantly larger amount of ArtPrize stories, with all four of the news agencies producing more ArtPrize stories than local election stories.
- MLive – 12
- WOODTV8 – 33
- WZZM13 – 17
- WXMI 17 – 12
Total ArtPrize stories – 74
This means that the ratio of ArtPrize stories compared to local election stories was a little more than 8:1.
Reporting Equity
Before I jump into some analysis, I want to be clear that I am not saying that the amount of stories devoted to ArtPrize is a bad thing. In fact, I watched and read all 74 stories and thought that much of this coverage was pretty good. I was intrigued by some of the artist themes, the various mediums used and the passion of many artists who wanted to highlight specific causes and issues.
What I am critiquing is the lack of local election coverage during the same period of time. Imagine if the same amount of effort and energy were put into local election coverage as was this case with ArtPrize. Would increased coverage have an impact on the public’s understanding of what are often called “down ballot” candidates? Would increased coverage result in increased voter participation or at the very least a more informed voting base?
It is difficult to know what the outcome would be if there was parity between ArtPrize coverage and local election coverage. However, there are certainly several reasons why I believe increased local election coverage is important for participatory democracy, reasons I will now address.
First, I believe it is important to qualify what I mean by increased coverage and will use MLive as an example, since they had 5 local election stories during the 3-week time period. Four out of the five local election stories that MLive posted were about a Grand Rapids City Commission race, two different Kent County Commission races and 1 local judicial race. Unfortunately, MLive has decided to provide minimal bios on each candidate and then ask them each 4 questions. Now, I am not opposed to candidate responses to questions posed by the news media, but that should never be the extend of the coverage.
In addition to asking candidate questions, local reporters should should be engaged in fact checking, verify the claims of candidates, providing insights into their campaign finances and engaging the public on issues that are of concern to them. Local elections are not primarily about candidates, but about issues that impact local communities. None of the things I just named were included in their local election coverage.
Second, robust local election coverage is vitally important because unlike national and statewide elections, only local news agencies can provide coverage of local candidates and issues. Let’s face it, we are all inundated with coverage during a Presidential election cycle – not that is very informative – and we read/hear tons of political ads for other larger political races all the time. However, when it comes to local elections we relying exclusively on local news agencies to provide robust, non-partisan coverage.
Third, local elected officials are more accessible to the public and are less influenced by deep pockets than the larger races. People living in Kent County and Grand Rapids have the ability to watch or attend local commission and school board meetings. Granted, those meetings are not all that democratic and transparent, but you can meet up with these politicians in person or at public forums outside of government meetings. This type of access decreases when we are talking about state and federal officials, which spend most of their time in Lansing or DC and when they are in their districts they often hold hold public meetings that are too brief, during the day – when most people are working – or require you to register in order to get the location of meetings.
Fourth, increased local election coverage should be part of a larger effort to develop a culture of civic engagement and participatory democracy. If local news agencies were serious about local politics they would not only increase their coverage of local election, but of local policies that impact all of us. Such a focus on policy would lead right back to the public, where more and more people would not be mere spectators in local elections and local policy decisions, but active participants in the process.
We can’t allow ourselves to settle for the minimum when it comes to how local elections/local policies and how our tax dollars are used. I believe that people are tired of business as usual politics and want more than rhetoric when it comes to things like community safety, structural racism, housing justice, food security, robust schools and vibrant ecosystems. We have to demand more and part of our demands is for the local news to actually provide critical information for us to be able to fully participate in our communities.
Palestine Solidarity Information, Analysis, Local Actions and Events for the week of September 29th
It has been almost 12 months since the Israeli government began their most recent assault on Gaza and the West Bank. The retaliation for the October 7 Hamas attack in Israel, has escalated to what the international community has called genocide, therefore, GRIID will be providing weekly links to information and analysis that we think can better inform us of what is happening, along with the role that the US government is playing. We will also provide information on local events and actions that people can get involved in. All of this information is to provide people with the capacity of what Noam Chomsky refers to as, intellectual self-defense.
Information
No End to Israel’s Killing Machine and U.S. Complicity
ISRAEL BOMBED LEBANON TODAY, KILLING HUNDREDS. THE U.S. IS SENDING MORE BOMBS
The World Says That Israel’s Unlawful Occupation of Palestine Must End
25 Arrested Blocking Netanyahu’s Motorcade to UN General Assembly
FROM GAZA TO LEBANON: ISRAEL’S BOMBING CAMPAIGN BACKED BY MEDIA PROPAGANDA
Analysis & History
Three Views: Israeli Forces Continue Their Assault on West Bank Palestinians with Impunity
Local Events and Actions
Palestine Solidarity Grand Rapids is hosting a screening of the film, Where Olive Trees Weep, Sunday, September 29th at 3pm, Fountain Street Church. https://www.facebook.com/events/453822167688541
Image used in this post is from https://visualizingpalestine.org/.
A visual representation of our Grand Rapids power analysis
What follows is a visual depiction of the Grand Rapids Power Structure, which I covered in a 10 Part series. You can go to this link to access all 10 posts to read my analysis. If we are serious about organizing for real change and collective liberation in this community, then we need to understand how power functions in Grand Rapids.
Event to focus on the history of the Grand Rapids Public Schools
On Saturday, October 26th, the community is invited to attend a 2 hour event that will shed some light on part of the history of the Grand Rapids Public Schools.
Join historians & guests from the GRPS Uncovered podcasts. This FREE workshop & lunch will explore the impact of history on community needs.
The event takes place on October 26th from 11am – 1pm, at 415 Martin Luther King Jr. Street SE Grand Rapids, MI 49507. To register for this free event go to this link.
Participants are encouraged to listen to podcasts ahead of the event. If you attended or worked at GRPS, feel free to bring in memorabilia such as trophies, yearbooks, graduation programs, photos, jerseys or uniforms, school event tickets, etc. for a gallery walk.
We are recommending attendees to preview the GRPS Uncovered podcasts prior to attending the event. You may access them by clicking the link below:
West Michigan Foundation Watch: The Jandernoa Foundation
Foundations are a way for members of the Capitalist Class, which made their wealth by exploiting workers, to hide some of their wealth from taxation, only to then turn around and use foundation funds to undermine social movements and generate positive PR for themselves.
“In any case, the hidden hand of of foundations can control the course of social change and deflect anger to targets other than elite power.”
– Joan Roelofs, Foundations and Public Policy
Jandernoa Foundation
GRIID has always begun our Foundation Watch work by looking at the foundations associated with the most powerful family in West Michigan, the DeVos family. GRIID has already looked at the Dick and Betsy DeVos Foundation, the Doug and Maria DeVos Foundation, the Dan and Pamela DeVos Foundation, and finally the CDV5 Foundation. Last week, we also look at the other Amway fortune family, with a focus on the David and Carol Van Andel Foundation and the Steve and Amy Van Andel Foundation. Today, I want to look at another member of the Grand Rapids Power Structure, Michael Jandernoa and his foundation.
I am using the data from the foundation’s 990 document for 2022, which is the most recent year that is available. The Jandernoa Foundation has significantly smaller amount of assets, specifically $4,383,771 in the foundation’s account, which is just another way that members of the Capitalist Class to be able to hide their money from taxation.
Before I dive into how the Jandernoa Foundation distributed their funds, I wanted to point out that the foundation pays William Lawrence $163,214.00 to be the Executive Director, and they pay $253,487.00 for management/investments to 42 North Partners, which is a company owned by Michael Jandernoa.
The Jandernoa Foundation made contributions to dozens of entities in 2022, but there are some clear categories of groups they contributed to, such as the Religious groups, political organizations, Education-centered groups, and social service entities, to name a few. Below is a listing of each from these categories, with a dollar amount.
Religious Groups
- Degage Ministries – $100,000
- Diocese of Grand Rapids – $40,000
- Help Pregnancy Aid – $100,000
- Mel Trotter Ministries – $62,5000
Political Organizations
- Michigan Colleges Alliance – $40,000
- Gerald R Ford Foundation – $30,000
Education-centered groups
- Catholic Central High School – $2,400,000
- Davenport University – $300,000
- San Juan Diego Academy – $100,000
Groups receiving Hush $
- Feeding America – $200,000
- Heart of West Michigan United Way – $509,350
- Women’s Resource Center – $50,000
The Jandernoa Foundation provided funding to numerous Catholic entities, not only because Jandernoa is Catholic, but also because he supports the Catholic Church’s anti-Abortion stance, which is why the foundation gave money to Help Pregnancy Aid.
You will also notice that the foundation contributed to the Michigan Colleges Alliance, which is a group that support private colleges in Michigan and pushes for public money to go to private education. The foundation contribution to the Michigan Colleges Alliance compliments the work that Michael Jandernoa has done with the West Michigan Policy Forum, specifically to influence education policy in the state, as I noted in an article from 2019.
Lastly, none of the groups receiving hush money listed above challenge systems of power, nor do they seek to address the root causes of societal problems like housing insecurity or food insecurity.
In addition, the Jandernoa Foundation gets to buy their silence, making it very improbable that these groups will speak out against the public policy decisions that are adopted by the politicians that Jandernoa and other members of the Grand Rapids Power Structure are funding. In fact, according to FollowtheMoney.org, Jandernoa has given $4,716,171 to 346 different filers spanning 29 years, mostly to GOP candidates. Like most private foundations, their owners create social problems through exploitation and buying politicians, then turn around and contribute to charity groups that serve the very same people harmed by their wealth.
Grand Rapids Institute for Information Democracy 