{"id":4402231487252,"date":"2026-05-01T12:42:49","date_gmt":"2026-05-01T16:42:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.philanthropy.com\/?p=4402231487252"},"modified":"2026-05-04T09:25:59","modified_gmt":"2026-05-04T13:25:59","slug":"sen-wyden-defends-nonprofits-against-ongoing-administration-attacks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.philanthropy.com\/news\/sen-wyden-defends-nonprofits-against-ongoing-administration-attacks\/","title":{"rendered":"Sen. Wyden Defends Nonprofits Against Ongoing Administration Attacks"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The U.S. Justice Department is run by \u201cthought police\u201d who are targeting nonprofit groups based on their viewpoints, said Sen. Ron Wyden, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, which oversees tax-exempt organizations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last week\u2019s criminal indictment of the Southern Poverty Law Center was the most recent and high-profile intrusion by the Trump administration into the operations of nonprofits, Wyden said during a video press conference Thursday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nonprofits are especially vulnerable, the senator said, because of the many ways the administration is using the powers of the federal government to threaten and intimidate them. He pointed to the creation of a law enforcement task force<\/a> with orders to investigate nonprofit funders, which the administration suspects, without providing evidence, of supporting political violence, and the use of the federal contracting process to threaten charities\u2019 tax-exempt status as a way to enforce the president\u2019s priorities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the Obama administration, GOP members of the Senate Finance Committee decried what they said was partisan behavior at the Internal Revenue Service under Lois Lerner, who then led the agency\u2019s exempt organizations division. They said the agency was holding up applications for nonprofit status from Tea Party-affiliated and other conservative-leaning nonprofits. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

While a Department of Justice investigation found instances of poor management under Lerner, it did not find evidence that granting tax-exempt status to applicants was guided by ideology, Wyden said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Under Trump, Wyden said, nonprofits are being explicitly targeted based on politics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe exact kind of IRS weaponization Republicans have been upset about for years is now basically happening in front of their eyes,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wyden was joined by Philip Hackney, a law professor at the University of Pittsburgh, and Diane Yentel, the president of the National Council of Nonprofits, which has four active lawsuits against the Trump administration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pattern of ‘Viewpoint Discrimination’<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The combined actions of the Trump administration, including executive orders, criminal indictments, and reframing of civil rights laws, has resulted in a pattern of \u201cviewpoint discrimination\u201d against progressive nonprofits, said Hackney, who previously served in the Office of the Chief Counsel of the IRS.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The administration\u2019s task force on political violence, which laid out its targets in a memo written by then-Attorney General Pam Bondi in September, was particularly concerning, he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat memo defined domestic terrorism to include adherence to what it called radical gender ideology and anti-American sentiment \u2014 language that could sweep in an enormous swath of lawful civil society activity,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the memo, Bondi directed the IRS to ensure that no tax-exempt entities are directly or indirectly financing political violence or domestic terrorism and called upon the agency to refer \u201csuch organizations, and the employees and officers of such organizations, to the Department of Justice for investigation and possible prosecution.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Neither the Department of Justice nor the Internal Revenue Service responded to inquiries.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

White House Deputy Press Secretary Abigail Jackson issued a statement that read:  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOn the campaign trail, President Trump made clear that his Administration would restore integrity to the Department of Justice and end the weaponization from the Biden Administration that targeted countless Americans \u2013 including the President \u2013 that the Biden Administration perceived as their political opponents. The President and his entire Administration is keeping that promise.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The push against progressive nonprofits also has extended into federal contracting, Yentel said. In a March executive order, the administration notified government contractors that they would have to certify that they do not engage in diversity, equity, and inclusion practices the White House considers illegal. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The National Council on Nonprofits led a push against the requirement that garnered signatures from 1,300 organizations and 20,000 public comments, but Yentel said the administration has indicated it plans to go ahead with its plans despite the opposition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This week\u2019s indictment of the SPLC portends even more aggressive action from the Trump White House, Yentel said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe administration is targeting, vilifying, and attempting to silence organizations which it disagrees with,\u201d she said. \u201cIt signals a broader willingness to challenge nonprofits in ways that could extend far beyond these individual cases.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Update: This article has been updated to include a response from the White House.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Senate Finance chair and nonprofit experts say the White House is discriminating against nonprofits based on their views.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":365113,"featured_media":4402231487797,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","cop_editorial_slug":"News-Daniels-WydenIRS0426","cop_asana_id":"1214306135511704","editorial_asana_id":"","editorial_doc_id":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[81925],"issue":[],"profile":[],"role":[191049],"series":[],"topic":[191096],"coauthors":[189896],"class_list":{"0":"post-4402231487252","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","6":"hentry","7":"category-news","8":"role-leading","9":"topic-government-and-regulation","11":"has-featured-image"},"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nSen. 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