Activists urge Minneapolis Foundation to rescind 2022 donation to Alpha News

Activists are urging the Minneapolis Foundation, one of the state's largest community foundations, to rescind a 2022 donation to the conservative Minnesota news site Alpha News.

Communities United Against Police Brutality (CUAPB), a police watchdog group, sent a letter Tuesday to the foundation and CEO R.T. Rybak demanding it rescind a $11,500 grant a donor gave to Alpha News two years ago and apologize to the community.

"Your website is filled with references to cultivating change and building racial equity. It is appalling that you would allow the Foundation to act as a conduit to Alpha News, a group with a proven record of racism," wrote Michelle Gross, CUAPB president, in a letter signed by eight other community leaders.

The Minneapolis Foundation responded Tuesday by saying that while none of its employees had directed money to Alpha News, individuals who have set up funds with the foundation had directed $20,000 in eight grants to Alpha News over the past two years.

The foundation grants nearly $100 million a year. The statement didn't specifically address the activists' demand to rescind the donation.

In 2021, the Minneapolis Foundation and other large local foundations funded liberal advocacy groups and racial justice organizations, some of whom were behind the unsuccessful city amendment to replace the Minneapolis Police Department following the murder of George Floyd in May 2020.

"Like community foundations across the country, we grapple with the best way to balance our commitment to both diversity of opinion and racial equity," the foundation said in a statement, adding that it started a "thorough review" of its policies last year.

While the foundation makes recommendations, donors can direct their dollars wherever they want — whether it's out of state or to global disaster relief. Foundations have legal control over donations, but they usually follow a donor's recommendation on where to send their money.

In Tuesday's letter, CUAPB and other advocacy groups including Black Lives Matter Minnesota and the Racial Justice Network said the Minneapolis Foundation's grant to Alpha News "likely [was] used to produce or promote" the news site's film, "The Fall of Minneapolis," which they say blames Floyd for his own death while denying the police violence that killed him.

"If a donor wanted you to direct funds to the Proud Boys, would you abide by such a request?" they wrote, asking the foundation to review its practices for donor-advised funds.

In its statement, the foundation said it does a due-diligence review of donor-advised grants.

Many of the organizations behind Tuesday's letter also spoke out in 2020 against the Minneapolis Foundation for leading police accountability efforts under Rybak, who they said failed at police oversight when he was mayor of Minneapolis from 2002 to 2014.