Thousands of pages of confidential internal think tank emails and documents published by the New York Times on August 7 shine a revealing spotlight on how some of the nation’s most prominent think tanks are used by corporate donors to promote specific policies — while concealing the financial interests involved.
The emails provide a “smoking gun” of evidence that corporations that donated to non-profit think tanks like The Brookings Institution were promised specific receivables in return.
For example, Lennar Corp., a home building company and Brookings donor was offered a spot as a Brookings senior fellow for one of its executives. “‘He would be a trusted adviser,’ an internal Brookings memo said in 2014 as the think tank sought one $100,000 donation from Lennar,” the Times reported.
While critics of the institutions may have long suspected that corporate donors receive special treatment from the think tanks they back, think tanks have managed to maintain an air of independence and the respect of many policy makers in Washington DC.
The newly revealed emails are striking in part because they reveal how corporate interests have affected left-wing think tanks like Brookings, which are sometimes regarded as less under the corporate thumb than right-wing overtly pro-corporate think thanks like the American Enterprise Institute or The Heartland Institute.
The documents show the precise ways that corporate donors are able to control the messages coming out of the think tanks they fund behind the scenes, while still preserving a public veneer of independence.
“The likely conclusions of some think tank reports, documents show, are discussed with donors — or even potential ones — before the research is complete,” the Times reported. “Drafts of the studies have been shared with donors whose opinions have then helped shape final reports. Donors have outlined how the resulting scholarship will be used as part of broader lobbying efforts.”
This tight control could throw…