[ad_1]<\/p>\n
Steve Sampson, an Arabella spokesman, sought to downplay the firm\u2019s role or comparisons to the Koch network, casting it as providing administrative services rather than strategizing how to build the extra-party infrastructure of the left. \u201cWe work for the nonprofit, not the other way around,\u201d he said in a statement.<\/p>\n
On the left and right, dark-money hubs mixed politically oriented spending with less political initiatives. The Koch network\u2019s main financial hub gave $575,000 to the LeBron James Family Foundation. Hopewell gave nearly $3.8 million to a clinic that provides abortion services and more than $2 million to a Tulane University fund.<\/p>\n
In weighing which nonprofits to include in its analysis, The Times considered both their spending on politically oriented efforts, as well as their relationships with allied groups. Some major institutions, such as the National Rifle Association and the Sierra Club, are involved in politics but were excluded because they spent heavily on membership-oriented activities. <\/p>\n
The analysis includes three of the five Arabella-administered nonprofits, among them one charity, the Hopewell Fund. It donated to groups that work to reduce the role of big money in politics, but it also gave $8.1 million to a dark-money group called Acronym, which spent millions of dollars on Facebook advertising<\/a> and backed a company called Courier Newsroom<\/a> that published articles favoring Democrats<\/a> and received millions of dollars from dark money groups. It was paid $2.6 million by a nonprofit linked to House Democratic leadership to promote articles.<\/p>\n