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Shocker: Why Some Are Saying Never Trump Commentator Bill Kristol Has Actually Been a Democrat for Years

Matt Vespa
Matt Vespa  |  February 19, 2020 5:10 PM

Well, it shouldn’t shock anyone, but Bill Kristol, the former head honcho over at the now-defunct Weekly Standard, is pretty much a Democrat. He admitted to it earlier this month. The Daily Caller also captured some pretty funny responses to this non-shocking revelation. It was a long time coming. 

When Sen. Martha McSally (R-AZ) slammed CNN reporter Manu Raju last January as a liberal hack, Kristol, who is a contributor for the anti-Trump network, responded by saying he was one as well (via the Hill):

Former "Weekly Standard" founder Bill Kristol defended CNN's congressional reporter Manu Raju … with Kristol stating that "if it’s liberal to hold public officials in our liberal democracy accountable for doing their job" then he guesses "he's liberal."

The commentary from Kristol comes one day after Sen. Martha McSally (R-Ariz.), after being asked by Raju whether she wanted new evidence against President Trump to be considered as part of his impeachment trial, refused to answer the question while calling him a “liberal hack.”

Kristol, a staunch online critic of  Trump going back to the early days of his candidacy, criticized McSally for taking "high fives" from conservatives over the encounter. 

As for who funds the Bulwark, well, it’s a cast of characters that are hardcore allies of liberal America, including Planned Parenthood. The Federalist posted a story from Hayden Ludwig who tracked the monies that fund this project:

Kristol, currently editor-at-large of the decidedly anti-Trump media outlet The Bulwark, has been funded from the start of his rebellion by big left-of-center donors like Pierre Omidyar and the Hewlett Foundation.

As of 2018, he’s also been backed by a nonprofit connected to a massive network of left-wing groups funding the anti-Trump “Resistance.” That network of “dark money” is run by a powerful for-profit company called Arabella Advisors—and its influence is far-reaching and virtually unreported by the mainstream media.

Specifically, Kristol’s Bulwark website is run by the 501(c)(3) Defending Democracy Together Institute (DDTI), the sister organization of his 501(c)(4) Defending Democracy Together (DDT), which runs the Never Trump attack group Republicans for the Rule of Law. The Hopewell Fund, which is one of the four main nonprofits operating in Arabella’s shadowy network, forked out $75,000 to DDT in 2018.

Sarah Longwell, executive director of DDT and publisher of The Bulwark, says Kristol’s groups receive funds “from all sorts of people who care about democracy and the rule of law,” but she declines to name any individual donors or any conservative foundations (which must disclose their grants).

The foundations that send monies through the Hopewell Fund’s hands read like a Who’s Who of left-wing money: The Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation, which heavily funds Planned Parenthood and groups that push for population control; the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, a massive pass-through that sends tech titans’ cash to activists at places like the American Civil Liberties Union and the Tides Foundation; and the Democracy Fund, the philanthropy of eBay founder Omidyar, which has given to Common Cause Education Fund and the Campaign Legal Center, both liberal stalwarts. In fact, Democracy Fund shows up again in this story: they gave DDT $1.6 million in 2018.

Again, these folks are not your friends. Even if you disagree or hate Trump and you lean to the right on political issues, these people will never welcome you. In fact, they will happily destroy you in their long-running crusade to transform the country into Venezuela. Your guy lost an election. Trump won. Deal with it. The rest of the party has. The country, for the most part, has—so what’s the deal here, Never Trumpers. I get the reasons. For the most part, I was against Trump in the primary, but when the writing was on the wall—the mission changed. At the end of it all, the goal of the 2016 election was preventing Hillary Clinton from becoming president. That was more important—and Trump was the best guy to do it. He won the nomination. He’s now president and he’s produced some great things for the country, not the least being the booming economy. Still, you scour and would rather become Democrats than accept a man who has accomplished or is pushing an agenda that conservative Republicans have spent the better half a century promoting. That’s a win in anyone’s book. Just saying.