Photo by Steve Eason on Flickr.
Recently, the Washington Examiner obtained financial statements from audits of Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation (BLMGNF). These documents revealed the organization funded the purchasing of a $8 million dollar Toronto mansion for BLM Canada. The bill of the real estate was only $6.3 million dollars, raising questions to how –or what– the remaining $1.7 million dollars were allocated.
This isn’t an isolated incident. BLMGNF has made questionable “financial moves” before. Last year, BLM’s co-founder Patrisse Cullors purchased a $6 million dollar palazzo in the heart of Los Angeles, CA, outright in cold-hard cash. The deal was signed on five months preceding the death of George Floyd, the jet-fuel that sparked an inflow of $90 million dollars worth of BLM donations. Most of which were individual.
Cullors was purchasing estates during the Floyd protests, too. According to property records obtained by The New York Post, four houses were bought up, totaling a value of $3.2 million dollars. One of the homes, valued at $1.4 million at the time, was a short distance away from Malibu. It was only a few months before did Cullors describe herself as a “trained Marxist“.
By the looks of things, these giant properties are “content houses”. Cullors and company recorded themselves reflecting over the past year since Floyd’s death in one of these properties. They were sure to broadcast themselves drinking campaign and ice-tea whilst enjoying a charcuterie board.
So, if BLMGNF funded a purchase of (another) $8 million mansion, where has the other $1.7 million run off to? Neither did the Canadian BLM branch nor the national entity provide comment for Washington Examiner. But it’s best for the interests of BLM to stay silent about their dealings because Cullors’ spouse was on the board of the Canadian BLM branch when the mansion was acquired.
Other financial disclosures indicate the of whole Cullors’ family are reaping the rewards of the George Floyd riots. Cullors brother, a former graffiti artist, secured nearly a million dollars for “private security services”. Damon Turnor, who has a child with Cullors, secured shy of $900,000 for his art firm.
BLM city chapters haven’t been as fortunate. Since publicity raised surrounding BLM’s staggering net worth — much of which was invested into the stock market — there’s been in-house fighting. A Philadelphia chapter leader noted to the Associated Press Cullors went failed to deliver on her promise to decentralize the organization’s power among BLM chapters. Supposedly, this was meant to facilitate a collective management of funds. “When resources came in, when opportunities came in, (the foundation) alone would be the ones to decide who was going to take advantage of them, without having to take any consideration of the other organizers whose work was giving them the access to these resources and opportunities in the first place .. ” said the chapter leader.
In an interview Cullors recognized the organization was ill-prepared for the massive in-flux of donations. The recent purchasing of real estate is an interesting means to amending their hiccups.
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