In August, a New York Times report revealed that Marble Freedom Trust, one of far-right political powerbroker Leonard Leo’s nonprofits, received a jaw-dropping $1.6 billion contribution from secretive industrialist and conservative mega-donor Barre Seid. It was the largest single contribution ever given to a nonprofit focused on politics. While Seid and Leo remain relatively unknown to the broader public, we should all be concerned with the influence they wield over our judiciary and the impact of this unprecedented windfall on our democracy.
Barre Seid, a Chicago-based manufacturing magnate, is not new to the far-right political scene. Seid has a long history of donating to “dark money” organizations linked to Leo and the Koch brothers. In 2014, Seid donated significant funds to the hard-right legal non-profit Competitive Enterprise Institute, which played a role in attempts to overturn the Affordable Care Act.
Seid also allegedly contributed $20 million to George Mason University in a successful effort to rename its law school after the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.
