Donations to the conservative student activist group Turning Point USA have more than doubled, leading it to expand its footprint to some 2,000 colleges, universities, and high schools, and deploy thousands of supporters to challenge the wave of young liberal protests tearing down statues and calling the United States systemically racist.
In new tax documents, the Indiana-based group and its affiliates, one of which hosted President Trump in the packed Phoenix Dream City Church yesterday, showed contributions jumped from $10 million in 2018 to $24 million in 2019, and gross receipts at over $30 million.
The seven-year-old organization started by Charlie Kirk and initially funded by conservative donor Foster Friess, had gross receipts of just $4.3 million in 2015.
The new numbers show that Turning Point USA has become one of the best-funded student activist groups at a key time in the Trump presidency and culture wars challenging the nation.
It is often under fire on liberal campuses and attacked by liberal media. For example, Kirk was called a “right-wing provocateur” by the New York Times.
“We’re growing,” Kirk told Secrets, who called his organization a “battle tank.” He added, “This is a multidimensional culture war machine that is going to fight for the soul of our country and to save America from what the Left is trying to do, and people should get comfort that Turning Point USA is in a very strong position.”
The nonprofit group that promotes the Constitution, free markets, and capitalism is forming chapters daily and has 847 on campuses. It has members on over a thousand others.
It recently set up a political group, Turning Point Action, that has endorsed Trump’s reelection. At the Phoenix event yesterday, Trump praised the group and Kirk, who has hosted college events with Donald Trump Jr. and Trump’s partner, Kimberly Guilfoyle, the national chair of the Trump Victory Finance Committee.
“I’ll tell ya, Charlie is some piece of work who is mobilizing a new generation of American student activists. That’s what you really are,” said Trump to about 3,000 people.
More than just having a close relationship with the Trumps, and leading Students for Trump, Kirk was behind those who urged the president to sign an executive order designed to protect free speech on college campuses. It came after a TPUSA member was assaulted while organizing on the Berkeley campus of the University of California.
The tax documents cover July 2018 through June 2019. They show that salaries of the group, which numbers at nearly 200, total $5.7 million. Kirk, who was paid $292,423, said he is fielding a team of campus activists.
It also contributed nearly $7 million to its endowment and spent over $5.2 million on its list of events, including conventions for black, Hispanic, and women students.
Fundraising support was offered by Friess, who set up “challenge” grants, and conservative philanthropists Bill and Rebecca Dunn and the Jack Roth Charitable Foundation. Others include Tom Sodeika, president of Precision Payroll of America, Rabine Group Founder Gary Rabine, and Doug DeGroote.
“We are so thankful for donors like Foster, but honestly, the base of what allows us to do what we do is the $5, $10, $15, $20 contributor,” said Kirk. He added that current fundraising is running “as good if not better this year” and that small donations have doubled.
While some conservative student groups are focused on education, Kirk’s has broadened his focus to the culture war battle and challenging recent protesters.
“We are big believers at Turning Point USA, and also my own advocacy, of not allowing widespread lies to go without being refuted, and this idea that America is systemically racist is a disgusting lie. It is one of the most pernicious and malevolent lies,” he said.
“We fight for the free market, the Constitution, and American exceptionalism, not American ‘apologism.’ So we have gone more assertively and more aggressively than ever in the history of our organization, even, quite honestly, against other conservative organizations. It’s unbelievable that that is discussed in center-right circles because I believe we are systemically decent,” he added.
And while he is closely tied to Trump, Kirk said that TPUSA has a long-term goal to expand. “What we have built is thinking about the 100-, the 200-year game. The Left and the Chinese think that way, and it’s about time the conservative movement think that way,” he said.
