The Moriah Fund is a 501(c)(3) organization that has contributed over $58 million dollars to left-of-center organizations in the since 2012.^[1] It has worked with major left-of-center groups to fund the left-wing agenda and is open with its desire to support organizations that have a direct impact on public policy.^[2]

The leadership of the Moriah Fund has ties with the Clinton administration and the liberal confidential donor consortium Democracy Alliance.^[3]

History

The Moriah Fund was founded in 1985 by Robert and Clarence Efroymson through their family fortune.^[4] The Efroymson family has a long history of philanthropic involvement with three generations serving on the board of the Indianapolis Foundation, which they helped to create in 1916.^[5] The Efroymson family also established the Efroymson fund through a $90 million grant to the Central Indiana Community Foundation (CICF). The donation was split between $75 million in 1998 and $15 million in 1999.^[6] The Efroymson Fund is now a donor-advised fund of CIFI.^[7]

The Moriah Fund’s upper echelon is tightly knit, with much of its leadership kept within the Efroymson family. Mary Ann Stein (née Mary Ann Efroymson) serves as the president of the Moriah Fund, and her three children are all on the board of directors.

Stein is the ex-wife of prominent liberal philanthropic advisor Robert Stein, who founded Democracy Alliance, a group of left-wing donors with the goal establishing “the activities of a permanent ‘left infrastructure.’”^[8][9] Robert Stein was previously a Democratic political staffer who campaigned for former Sen. Alan Cranston (D-California); worked as a strategic advisor to Ron Brown, the chairman of the Democratic National Committee and later U.S. Secretary of Commerce under Bill Clinton; served as the chief of staff for the Clinton-Gore transition team; and worked from 1993-1995 as the chief of staff for the Brown as Secretary of Commerce.^[10]

Politics

Social Liberalism

The Moriah Fund has financially supported many progressive agendas. In recent years, it has joined major left-wing philanthropies such as the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Ford Foundation, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, and the Carnegie Corporation of New York in funding the Sex Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS). SIECUS’s main message is one that “[downgrades]… marriage, [encourages]…teen condom use and [criticizes]…abstinence-only-before-marriage sex education policies.”^[11]

In 2014, the Moriah Fund was noted as being a top funder of pro-abortion organizations. The Moriah Fund has financially backed the D.C. Abortion Fund, which “pays for the abortions that federal law prevents the city government from funding.”^[12]

Moriah Fund is also a member of the Rights, Faith and Democracy Collaborative, an initiative of the left-wing Proteus Fund, which opposes conscience protections for religious people who object to abortion, same-sex marriage, and other social liberal initiatives which conflict with Abrahamic religious teachings.^[13]

Environmentalism

The Moriah Fund has also donated money towards environmentalist causes: notably, $135,000 to the Northern Forest Alliance between 1994 and 1996^[14] and $170,000 to the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC).^[15] The Moriah Fund also gave an undisclosed amount to the Citizens Clearinghouse on Hazardous Waste and as well as $45,000 to the World Resources Institute, which was designated for the FSC.^[16] Daniel Efroymson, the brother of Mary Ann Stein and a former vice-president of the Moriah Fund, was involved in environmental activism, serving on the board of the Indiana Natural Resources Foundation as well as serving as the national chair of The Nature Conservancy.^[17][18]

Israeli Left

The Moriah Fund is a major financial supporter of the New Israel Fund (NIF), a left-wing organization with the goal of promoting social justice and equality for all Israelis. Since 1999, Moriah Fund has granted $45,718,829 to NIF.^[19] NIF has organized demonstrations against Israeli legislation designating Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people^[20] and funded organizations involved in the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions campaign.^[21]

Structure

The Moriah Fund focuses on four areas of funding: left-of-center policy and activism in and relating to Israel; promoting left-wing economic policies; advancing women’s rights and sexual and reproductive health; protecting and advancing human rights.^[22] The guidelines on the Moriah Fund’s website specify that the organization is only interested in funding groups that have a direct influence on policy.^[23]

Finances

According to the financial statement on its website, the Moriah Fund controls $81,405,988 in total liabilities and net assets.^[24]

According to the Moriah Fund’s website, it granted $58,597,078.91 between 2013 and 2017. Recipients include Americans for Peace Now, Center for Community Change, Bend the Arc, Center for Law and Social Policy, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, Demos, Institute for Policy Studies, the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, the labor-union like Restaurant Opportunities Centers United, liberal donor advised fund Tides Foundation, Center for American Progress, Planned Parenthood of Metropolitan Washington D.C., National Women’s Health Network, National Women’s Law Center, Neo Philanthropy, New Venture Fund, People for the American Way Foundation, and the New America Foundation.^[25]

In 2001, the Moriah Fund gave $22,395,944 towards the establishment of the Efroymson Fund of the Central Indiana Community Foundation.^[26]

People

Judith Lichtman, Gideon Stein, and Mary Ann Stein serve on the board of directors for the Moriah Fund.^[27]

Mary Ann Stein also serves as the president of the Moriah Fund.^[28] She sits on the boards of Americans for Peace Now and the New Israel Fund, both of which receive money the Moriah Fund. Stein also co-founded the Fund for Global Human Rights.^[29]

Craig Cramer, Debra Delee of Americans for Peace Now, Kim Jones, Jane Fox Johnson, Judith Lichtman of the National Partnership for Women and Families, Norman Rosenberg, Mary Ann Stein, Noah Stein, Dorothy Stein, and Gideon Stein all serve on the program board for the Moriah Fund.^[30]