Movement Strategy Center Action Fund (MSCAF)

Background

The Movement Strategy Center Action Fund was recognized as tax-exempt by the Internal Revenue Service in August 2007 and is the political arm of the Movement Strategy Center, a left-of-center activism organization that fiscally sponsors several activist groups focused on the Bay Area. ^{1 5 3}

The organization stated that in its earliest form it supported Oakland Rising, Bay Rising, and other Bay Area organizing groups sponsored by the Movement Strategy Center and that it later became the vehicle for the civic engagement activities of the MSC’s fiscally sponsored projects, among them the Positive Women’s Network USA, an HIV advocacy group. ³

For most of its existence, the entity was financially dormant. Reported revenue fell to $2,406 in the fiscal year ending June 2022, recovered to $30,000 in 2023 and $50,500 in 2024, and then rose more than tenfold to $530,966 in the fiscal year ending June 2025, as the organization appeared to experience an increase in activity. ¹

Activities

The Movement Strategy Center Action Fund operates three programs: fiscal sponsorship for organizations seeking what it calls a temporary or permanent home for 501(c)(4)-eligible activity, collaborative funds that pool money from institutional and individual donors, and a passthrough grantmaking program that the group says cedes decision-making to grassroots recipients. ⁶

Oakland Rising Committee

Through its 2022 nonprofit tax return, Movement Strategy Center Action Fund’s reported fiscally sponsoring the Oakland Rising Committee, a political action committee affiliated with Oakland Rising Action (ORA). ⁴ Oakland Rising Committee describes itself as advancing a “progressive agenda for Oakland’s working-class, immigrant and communities of color living in the flatlands of Oakland.” As of 2026, ORA had a disclaimer on its website noting that the MSCAF was its fiscal sponsor. ⁷

In October 2024, ORA mailed a voter guide to roughly 60,000 voters endorsing Nikki Fortunato Bas for the Alameda County Board of Supervisors and Jovanka Beckles (D) for state senate, and urging votes against two pending recalls of left-wing Oakland-area officials on the grounds that the efforts were funded by “right-wing agitators” and were fundamentally undemocratic. ⁸

In February 2025, the group mailed endorsements for a municipal special election to approximately 80,000 voters, including support for the mayoral campaign of former U.S. Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA). ⁹

California local campaign finance records list the Oakland Rising Committee with roughly $714,000 in cumulative receipts. As of 2026, those filings identified the committee’s sponsor as the Center for Empowered Politics, a San Francisco-based left-of-center organization, rather than the MSCAF. ¹⁰

In March 2025, ORA issued a release asserting that technology venture capitalists, hedge fund investors, and real estate corporations had spent $3.8 million to “buy” Oakland’s 2024 elections, and describing rival civic organizations Empower Oakland and the Abundance Network as “fake” community groups and front organizations. The release said such organizations were manipulating the public with fear tactics and were celebrated by conservative media and right-wing extremists. ¹¹

Campaigns on Behalf of Recalled Officials

Through Oakland Rising Action, MSCAF opposed the ultimately successful recall of two left-wing local officials, Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price and Oakland Mayor Sheng Theo, in 2024. ¹²

ORA declared its opposition to the recall of District Attorney Pamela Price and characterized the recall committee, Save Alameda For Everyone, as a small group of right-wing advocates backed by corporate money. ¹² Under the banner of a campaign called Protect the Win, the group alleged widespread signature-gathering fraud by recall proponents and pressed the county Board of Supervisors not to schedule a recall election. ^{13 14} Voters recalled Price on November 5, 2024, by a margin of roughly 63 percent to 37 percent. ¹⁵

The same voter guide urged rejection of the recall of Mayor Sheng Thao, whose home had been raided by the Federal Bureau of Investigation in June 2024. ⁸ Thao was removed from office in November 2024 by a 60 percent to 40 percent vote and later indicted by a federal grand jury in January 2025 on charges including bribery, conspiracy, and mail and wire fraud. Prosecutors alleged that she accepted $95,000 in payments disguised as wages for a no-show job held by her partner and that a family of recycling contractors financed a $75,000 mailer attacking her political opponents in exchange for city business. Thao pleaded not guilty. ¹⁶