Podcast
Who Funds that?
Hosted by Capital Research Center · EN
The podcast where we go beneath the surface to reveal the web of connected influence, money, and motivation driving the news, sourced primarily from our website InfluenceWatch.org, the Capital Research Center's online encyclopedia of the donors, non-profits, and influencers driving politics. You can watch the video version of the podcast at: http://bit.ly/2rnQygY
Listen to all episodes of the "Who Funds That?" Podcast at Ricochet.com.
Listen to all episodes of the "Who Funds That?" Podcast at Ricochet.com.
13episodes
Episodes
Newest firstAll episodes
Who Funds That? EP6: Can Treasury Fix Nonprofit Tax Returns
1w ago00:35:34Tap to summarizeToday we’ve got a very important and exciting topic to cover: The nonprofit tax return (Form 990)! Now please don’t turn your podcast dial—this actually matters way more than you think, even if you aren’t a nonprofit accountant, because 990 disclosures are so very important to discovering “Who Funds That” in nonprofit advocacy. The Trump administration has proposed major changes to the “990” that “are intended to detect misconduct and hold wrongdoers accountable.” We’ve invited our colleague Robert Stilson, who has written extensively on fixing the nonprofit tax return, to offer his ideas on what the Trump administration should do. Treasury Announces Form 990 Transparency Initiative to Expose Hidden Funding and Strengthen OversightSome Suggestions for Improving the Form 990Thinking About Fiscal Sponsorship: The Form 990 Black HoleThinking About Fiscal Sponsorship: Potential ReformsTides Center
Transcribe →
"Who Funds That?" EP5: Ohio’s Medicaid Millions
2w ago00:35:34Tap to summarizeSeven buildings with 288 companies. Empty offices with unopened government notices in the mail slots. Convicted fraudsters vaguely warning that they know who journalists’ families are. It’s all real, and it’s all been uncovered in Columbus, Ohio, where millions of taxpayer dollars are disappearing into questionable home healthcare businesses and the state government and the businesses have few answers to many, many questions. Joining us to discuss their Ohio Medicaid investigation are Luke Rosiak, an investigative reporter for the Daily Wire, and Capital Research Center’s investigative researcher Parker Thayer.Medicaid MillionairesHe Was Convicted For Defrauding The Government. Now Medicaid Pays His Wife Millions.Ohio Restores Medicaid Anti-Fraud Measures After Daily Wire InvestigationInside Ohio’s Home Health Empire: 7 Buildings, 288 Medicaid Companies, $250 MillionNo One Is Safe: Homecare Fraud Schemes Are Ripping Off Americans In Every State
Transcribe →
Who funds That? EP4 Democrat Union Bosses, Republican Workers
3w ago00:26:59Tap to summarizeAs working-class Americans demonstrate increasing willingness to support conservative political candidates, some ostensible conservatives—some perhaps in service to their think tank’s funders in left-wing Big Philanthropy and others perhaps in the delusion that Big Labor will lead them to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue—have argued that the path to working-class support is through union bosses’ marble and stone palaces in Washington, D.C. and other big blue cities. Today’s guest brings warnings that that way lies madness—or at least self-inflicted defeat, because those palaces still serve the Left as they have for (at least) almost a century. Today Tom Jones of the American Accountability Foundation brings the receipts, with documentation on how private-sector unions that have Republican members have been using their (often forced) dues to fund the Institutional Left.see lessScathing report claims nation's oldest labor union 'betrayed' MAGA members through 'shocking' spendingDUKE: A Shaky Ceasefire And A Union BetrayalMaking the AFL-CIO great again: labor policy in 2026Some local Teamsters groups announce Harris endorsements after national union declines to do soDoes Big Labor truly represent the American worker?Big Labor sees pensions as a “weapon”
Transcribe →
Who Funds That? EP 3: Justice Samuel Alito (with Mollie Hemingway)
May 500:35:53Tap to summarizeWhen conservatives wax poetic about their favorite Supreme Court justices from what one might call the “Federalist Society era” of Republican appointments, Clarence Thomas and the late Antonin Scalia take precedence. The oldest may prefer the late William Rehnquist, for a time the lone “originalist” on the court; the youngest may prefer Neil Gorsuch, the libertarian radical appointed by President Donald Trump in 2017. But today’s guest argues for Samuel Alito, appointed as George W. Bush’s second choice for the vacancy created by the retirement of Sandra Day O’Connor in 2005, as perhaps the most consequential of them all. Mollie Hemingway, editor-in-chief of The Federalist, joins us to discuss her latest book: Alito: The Justice Who Reshaped the Supreme Court and Restored the Constitution.Alito: The Justice Who Reshaped the Supreme Court and Restored the ConstitutionAlito: The fulcrum of the conservative CourtDemand JusticeProPublicaBrett Kavanaugh’s Would-Be Assassin Gets Time Off for Trans Behavior
Transcribe →
Who Funds That? EP2 with Corey DeAngelis: Maryland Lawmakers and the Teachers Unions vs. Parents
Apr 2800:26:24Tap to summarizeMaryland, for my sins my home state, is almost completely controlled by the teachers unions—this was proven during COVID-19, when the state had among the longest school closures in the nation. But the end of the pandemic did nothing to curb Maryland teachers unions’ ambitions, which are now focused against private education, which the unions and their allies in state government hope to ideologically compel to follow the party line. Today’s guest, Corey DeAngelis of the Heritage Foundation among other places, focuses on an effort by the union-backed state legislature to require private schools in the state to acquiesce to gender transitions—even schools that have sincere religious objections to gender transitions likely protected by the First Amendment. He joins us today to discuss what this effort by blue-state teachers-union-controlled legislatures can tell us about parental rights campaigns across the country.Maryland’s assault on private educationTeachers Unions Extort States Unwilling to ResistInfluenceWatch Podcast #397: Teachers Unions Target TargetBREAKING: Chicago Teachers Union just sent out curriculum for public school teachers and it indoctrinates kids by calling Trump fascist.
Transcribe →
Who Funds That? EP1: Cutting Class for the Radical Left
Apr 2100:33:54Tap to summarizeHello, I’m Michael Watson joined by Sarah Lee and this is our first episode of Capital Research Center’s “Who Funds That?” podcast. I am fond of reminding anyone who will hear me that organized labor is an institutional pillar of “Everything Leftism,” the omnibus ideology of progressive-liberal-socialist politics that relies on every single issue—yes, including that one—has one right answer and every issue relies on all issues following the party line. Today’s guest, Rhyen Staley of Defending Education, found documents from the Sunrise Movement, the radical left mobilization group that has shifted focus from the Green New Deal and environmentalism toward the full Everything Leftist agenda, that further prove these ties. He joins us today to discuss his research on Sunrise Movement’s guide to planned school disruptions and the role of the teachers’ unions in supporting them.A Sunrise Movement training guidebook calls for students to ‘take action monthly’ to ‘disrupt business as usual’ to bring about a ‘political revolution’Newly obtained slides from a Sunrise Movement membership meeting calls for a ‘political revolution’ that includes the ‘need to structurally change the foundations of this country’ to achieve ‘Eco-socialism, [a] multi-racial democracy, and Green New Deal legislation’A May Day 2026 Host Toolkit includes training information for a “coordinated day of action” and promotes tactics such as a school ‘walk-in’; NEA provided $1.7M in funding to organization involved with training.K-12 Student Walkout and Protest Tracker
Transcribe →An update on the new podcast
Apr 700:00:35Tap to summarizeThis is not the Influence Watch Podcast. After our 400th episode, we said we'd be back with our new format and new name on April 7th, but we're making bigger changes and they'll take a little bit more time. You'll be able to see us in video format on YouTube and we're upgrading our microphones so we sound as good as we possibly can. But getting all that in order is taking a little bit longer than we initially expected. We look forward to joining you all once again on April 21st.Thank you for sticking with us at Capital Research Center and Influence Watch as we relaunch the "Who Funds That?" podcast.
Transcribe →
Ep. 400: 2026: A Look Ahead at Who Funds That
Mar 1700:29:31Tap to summarizeHello, I’m Michael Watson and this is the 400th episode of the InfluenceWatch Podcast. For us, it is a time for looking back and a time for looking forward—we will have a special announcement at the conclusion of today’s episode. Joining me to discuss their work at Capital Research Center are our director of communications and external relations and my usual co-host Sarah Lee, investigative researcher Parker Thayer, and senior research analyst Robert Stilson.Big Philanthropy “decolonizes” itselfTrump’s labor agencies get to work for independent workersSuspicious immigration NGO rakes in tax dollars in Columbus
Transcribe →
Ep. 399: Will Wealth Tax Wreck the Economy?
Mar 1000:24:48Tap to summarizeYou may have seen news reports that California is facing something called “outmigration,” in which residents – including some of that state’s most wealthy – are picking up and moving to greener pastures in states not dedicated to taxing them to death. California’s billionaires are most recently eyeing a ballot measure to be voted on this November that would essentially serve as a 5% excise tax for the crime of being billionaires. This has led to many of the state’s prominent entrepreneurs like Google’s Sergey Brin, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg, and Paypal’s Peter Thiel to make their objections known with their feet and their moving trucks. But what if a federal wealth tax were imposed, like the one recently introduced by Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Ro Khanna, and there was nowhere to run? And, given how much these individuals give to philanthropy – for better or worse – what would happen to that giving if Sanders and Khanna were to succeed? Joining us to discuss is Andrew Wilford, Director of State Policy at the National Taxpayer Union Foundation, who has been writing about the possible calamities surrounding a wealth tax for many years. California Wealth Tax Proposal Achieves a New Feat in Tax Policy: Losing the State Money Before It Even Becomes LawThe Wealth Tax's Impact on Private CharitiesBernie Sanders’s Radical Wealth TaxBig Labor’s bid to kill its Golden State
Transcribe →
Ep. 398: The Mullahs' Friends in America
Mar 300:25:53Tap to summarizeAs we speak—it’s February 25th as we record, so commentary on the current situation may be out of date when you hear this—a naval armada of two fleet carriers and their accompanying surface-ship escorts sits off the Middle East as American diplomats pressure the Islamic Republic of Iran to renounce its nuclear ambitions and its expansionist agenda to dominate the region. Given the brutality of the Iranian regime—estimates suggest the regime killed at least 6,000 and perhaps in excess of 30,000 Iranians who protested against it earlier this year—you would think that Americans, even those who oppose armed conflict to depose the regime, would universally acknowledge the Mullah-ocracy’s evil. But you would be wrong. Joining us today to discuss those who don’t is our colleague Robert Stilson.Iran and the anti-American leftThe Anti-American Left: CommunophilismCRC News: Congress asks CRC about foreign funding of American NGOsCommunist Party USA (CPUSA)
Transcribe →