Nonprofit Advocacy Group Received $158 Million To Help Immigrants Skirt Deportation

By Adam Andrzejewski for RealClearPolicy

The U.S. government entered into a $158 million contract with the Vera Institute of Justice to “provide immigration related legal services to unaccompanied minors.” While the federal government often engages in the contracting and funding of nonprofits, they typically try to avoid dealing with overtly political institutions. Not this time.

The Vera Institute for Justice is an overtly political, leftwing nonprofit organization. According to Jason Hopkins, an investigative associate with the Immigration Reform Law Institute, they are “a behemoth progressive nonprofit based out of New York City with well over a $140 million budget, which they use to fund a slate of progressive causes and initiatives across the country.”

There is nothing inherently wrong with political nonprofits. Both the right and the left have scores of them, though most receive their funding from private donors, not government contracts.

The Vera Institute, however, had nearly $137 million of its $174 million (78.7%) of total revenue from July 1, 2019 to June 30, 2020 come from government contracts, according to the Fox News investigation.

The purpose of the grant is to provide legal services to unaccompanied minors.

RELATED: Florida Joins Multi-State Lawsuit Against Biden Administration’s ‘Illegal’ Immigration Program

You may wonder why public defenders are not suited for the job. According to the Vera Institute, because they are not citizens, immigrants facing deportation are not entitled to public defenders. To fix this, the Vera Institute has created an entire workaround to U.S. law where, even though illegal immigrants aren’t entitled to free legal representation, the government still pays for it through organizations like the Vera Institute.

That’s a pretty savvy business model.

While the merits of this grant are controversial, one thing that shouldn’t be is the government funding overtly partisan institutions. A nonprofit that espouses views like defunding the police and releasing all illegal immigrants from ICE detention shouldn’t be funded with $150 million in taxpayer money.

Syndicated with permission from Real Clear Wire.

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