Niagara Leader

Congresswoman Claudia Tenney (NY-24), co-chair of the Election Integrity Caucus, has reintroduced the End Zuckerbucks Act. The legislation seeks to amend the Internal Revenue Code to prohibit 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organizations from directly or indirectly providing funds for the administration of elections.

In the 2020 election, Mark Zuckerberg used a non-profit organization called the Center for Tech and Civic Life (CTCL) to distribute $350 million to local boards of elections in left-leaning county governments in Texas, Ohio, Nevada, Minnesota, Georgia, Florida, Arizona, and Pennsylvania. This was done under the premise of “making voting safer amid the pandemic.” However, less than 1% of those funds were spent on PPE or other measures to implement safety protocols at voting sites.

This funding - 92% of which went to left-leaning districts - was provided with little oversight on spending. Reports suggest it was used to fund advertising, vehicle purchases, and other activities unrelated to the pandemic.

Since then, CTCL has been using its subsidiary organization, the Alliance for Election Excellence, to provide heavily discounted services to certain jurisdictions. These include in-depth consulting services that can help shape the voting process without democratic input from residents.

“Allowing private, billionaire donors with corrupt political agendas to fund our elections undermines public trust in our elections and threatens our self-governing Constitutional Republic,” said Congresswoman Tenney. “So far, 28 states have banned Zuckerbucks, reiterating the urgent need to do so on the federal level. We must ban billionaires and corrupt special interest groups from spending millions to influence our election administration and voting policies.”