Reports are now surfacing that BLMs profits were around 900 million as opposed to 90 million. And if that is the case where has all the money gone? And what percentage has been used to help the black community?
DAILY MAIL ARTICLE BELOW
BLM co-founder Patrisse Cullors admits she LIED when she denied using group’s $6m LA property ONLY for official business: Reveals she hosted parties for Biden’s inauguration and her son’s birthday.
- In an interview with The Associated Press, Cullors conceded she had made mistakes and regrettable decisions when it came to managing funds
- Cullors denied claims organization brass misused millions in donation dollars
- In the interview, Cullors, 38, said she used the seven-bed Studio City palace – purchased in cash by BLM in October 2020 – for her own recreation twice
- She previously issued a statement denying she’d ever lived there or used the property for her personal gain
- The first instance saw her hold a party to toast Joe Biden and Kamala Harris’s inauguration as president and vice president in January 2021
- Then, in March 2021, she used the luxury property – whose purchase has sparked fury among other racial justice campaigners – for her son’s birthday party
By ASSOCIATED PRESS and ALEX HAMMER FOR DAILYMAIL
PUBLISHED: 01:03 EDT, 9 May 2022 | UPDATED: 16:00 EDT, 9 May 2022
BLM’s controversial co-founder Patrisse Cullors has admitted she lied when she said she had only ever used the group’s $6million LA mansion for official business.
Cullors, 38, told the Associated Press Monday that she used the opulent seven-bed Studio City compound – purchased in cash by BLM in October 2020 – for her own recreation twice.
The first instance saw her hold a party to toast Joe Biden and Kamala Harris’s inauguration as president and vice president in January 2021.
Then, in March the same year, she commandeered the luxury property – whose purchase has sparked fury among other racial justice campaigners – for her school-aged son’s birthday party.
Cullors said of her earlier decision to lie: ‘I look back at that and think, that probably wasn’t the best idea.’
She previously issued a statement denying that she’d ever lived there or used the property for her personal gain after its purchase was revealed by New York magazine, triggering allegations of racism from BLM.
The purchase of the 6,500 square-foot Studio City property – which officials previously said was reserved exclusively for official foundation business – was disclosed last month by NY Mag.
News of the previously under-wraps transaction – made more than a year and a half ago – triggered a firestorm of criticism concerning the financial practices of the foundation’s top brass, which have already come into question in recent months.
Black Lives Matter raised $90million in the wake of George Floyd’s murder, and still has an impressive $60million of cash at hand.
Explaining the reason behind the luxurious purchase, Cullors told AP: ‘We looked at commercial buildings and we looked at homes and then we found this really amazing space that’s a sweet spot between commercial and residential.’
She went on to justify its purchase by highlighting how the mansion had a soundstage which enabled BLM to produce podcasts. 
Black Lives Matter co-founder Patrisse Cullors, pictured here during an interview with The Associated Press in Los Angeles last week, has admitted she lied when she said she had only ever used the group’s $6million LA mansion for official business. The interview saw the former BLM leader – who resigned last spring -address claims she misused donated funds
This is the luxurious Studio City property BLM co-founder Patrisse Cullors has now admitted she used for personal, non-BLM business, after previously denying doing so 
The property was bought as a haven for black artists – but Cullors commandeered it to host a Biden-Harris inauguration party, and to celebrate her son’s 21st birthday, she revealed in an interview last week 
Cullors threw a birthday party for the son she has with Damon Turner (pictured at left with the BLM cofounder in 2020) at the $6million Southern California mansion in March 2021. A charity run by Cullors donated $86K to Turner’s clothing company the year prior, after the foundation garnered nearly $100million in donations in 2020
After receiving the email asking for comment on the house’s existence last month, BLM officials reportedly circulated an internal memo with possible responses to the outlet’s query concerning the alleged purchase.
The responses ranged from: ‘Can we kill the story?’ to: ‘Our angle – needs to be to deflate ownership of the property,’ the magazine reported.
At the time, Cullors – who attested the property was bought as a ‘safe space’ for black creatives, activists and thought leaders, and that its purchase was never disclosed because it needed renovating – angrily hit back at her detractors, describing criticism she was facing since the purchase was made public as ‘racist and sexist.’
Cullors, meanwhile, defended the purchase while speaking to the AP last week, arguing that the opulent home was bought to bring further value to the BLM empire.
‘We really wanted to make sure that the global network foundation had an asset that wasn’t just financial resources,’ she said, ‘and we understood that not many black-led organizations have property. They don´t own their property.’
Cullors says she was paid $120,000 in ‘consulting fees’ by BLM, and claims she wanted to pay to hire the mansion for her son’s birthday
Speaking to AP, Cullors said she intended to pay a fee to rent the property for her son’s birthday. Cullors is in a relationship with a woman, and her son’s father is musician Damon Turner.
Black Lives Matter has since confirmed that it had billed her – but it’s unclear how much for, if she was charged the same rate as anyone else, and if she has since settled up the supposed debt.
Records show that Turner’s Los Angeles-based clothing company, Trap Heals, was started just days before partnering with Cullors’ foundation.
The company received an $86,000 donation later that year from a nonprofit run by Cullors – on of several transactions that have raised eyebrows amid the recent scrutiny of the group’s finances.
In the interview, Cullors angrily denied claims BLM brass misused funds, roughly three months after the organization ceased online fundraising following a demand by the California attorney general to show where nearly 100 million in donations received in 2020 went.’The idea that (the foundation) received millions of dollars and then I hid those dollars in my bank account is absolutely false,’ Cullors said, calling those claims ‘a false narrative.’
Cullors said she had been paid $120,000 in consulting fees by BLM, which raked in $90 million in donations in the wake of George Floyd’s murder. ‘It’s impacted me personally and professionally, that people would accuse me of stealing from black people.’Questioned by AP about what BLM’s donations have been spent on, Cullors continued: ‘No I have never used BLM donations to pay for any of the properties that I’ve owned in the past or owned right now.’
She admitted hiring both her mom and brother to work at the mansion, but denied doing so was corrupt, and said BLM had just been looking for ‘folks’ with ‘skillsets’ to work at the lavish compound.
Cullors denies it was corrupt to hire her mom and brother to work at the opulent compound – and says her ultimate ambition is to abolish the police and prisons
The former BLM co-founder went on to deny accusations of cronyism for employing both her mom and brother at the BLM compound.
Cullors said: ‘My brother is head of security, mom did work at the property – there’s also dozens of other people doing amazing work.
‘It’s not like I literally was like, I’m bringing all my family and friends in. Folks had skillsets. It’s been a really bizarre experience to know the truth and to have false and misinformation be spread about me, especially around my own personal resources that I worked my ass off to attain.’
Cullors claimed much of the criticism of BLM’s work was rooted in ‘white supremacy,’ and laid bare her woke ambition to abolish the police.
She said: ‘I have the wish for (BLM) to truly abolish the police and prison state.
‘I have the wish for movement leaders and people inside of our movement to be treated with care and dignity and love. I have the wish that black families who’ve been impacted by police violence get everything they deserve.’
Cullors, who resigned from the group last May amid reports she spent millions on a slew of lavish homes with donated dollars, conceded she had had made mistakes and poor decisions when it came to the managing foundation funds.
However, she denied feathering her own property portfolio with the tens of millions of dollars that gushed into Black Lives Matter’s accounts in the wake of George Floyd’s May 2020 murder.
Cullors says BLM struggled to process the tidal wave of cash that flowed into its coffers after George Floyd’s murder – and admits campaign group was hampered by ramshackle infrastructure
Cullors acknowledged that BLM was ill-prepared to handle a tidal wave of contributions in the aftermath of protests over George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis police in 2020. She said the foundation was slow to build the necessary groundwork to address the flood of financial contributions.
‘On paper, it looks crazy,’ she said. ‘We use this term in our movement a lot, which is we’re building the plane while flying it. I don’t believe in that anymore.’
She then declared: ‘The only regret I have with BLM is wishing that we could have paused for one to two years, to just not do any work and just focus on the infrastructure.’
Criticism over the foundation’s purchase of the Southern California property and its subsequent secrecy was wide-ranging and fervent last month, even coming from the foundation supporters such as Justin Hansford, the director of the Thurgood Marshall Civil Rights Center at Howard University.
He said the property purchase could be used as fodder by BLM’s already growing number of detractors, which may lead to possible donors shying away from black-led social justice organizations in the future. Black Lives Matter co-founder Patrisse Cullors denies wrongdoing.
‘That’s the thing that you don’t want to get out of hand,’ the professor and civil activist said after news of the property first surfaced last month.
Cullors went on to angrily and adamantly reject accusations that she had personally benefited in the six years she guided the BLM foundation, including media reports that she had purchased a slew of homes to the tune of more than $4.5million.
Following the flood of donations seen in the latter half of 2020 – making BLM the largest mobilization of a movement in US history – Cullors signed documents with Thousand Currents transferring $66.5million into the foundation’s accounts.
In February 2021, Black Lives Matter confirmed it took in $90million throughout 2020, distributed to their partner organizations, and had $60million remaining in its accounts.
Earlier this year, DailyMail.com also revealed the group blew $12.7million of those funds on ‘professional fees’, according to the charity revenue and expenses statements that were included in its application for tax-exempt, nonprofit status in August 2020.
Cullors said she became the foundation’s full-time executive director that year, charged with ensuring it had the organizational infrastructure to handle the massive influx of donations and would use the resources to further its mission.
However, neither of those reports included records of the $6million property purchase made months earlier.
As donations and support grew, an array of local BLM chapters transformed into a nonprofit organizations run by Cullors that have also now come under scrutiny.
Cullors personal property empire has come under scrutiny – as have the other nonprofits she’s been linked to
Last April, Cullors slammed the scrutiny over her $4.5million empire of four homes purchased following BLM’s successful crowdfunding campaign as a ‘racist and sexist’ attack by the ‘right-wing media.’
‘Organizers should get paid for the work that they do. They should get paid a living wage,’ Cullors said at the time, responding to criticism chiding the activist for using donated dollars for personal gain.
‘The fact that the right-wing media is trying to create hysteria around my spending is, frankly, racist and sexist and I also want to say that many of us that end up investing in homes in the black community often invest in homes to take care of their family,’ she said.
The assertion followed an expose published by the New York Post early last year that revealed Cullors had bought three other homes – two in Los Angeles and a sprawling ranch in Georgia – since 2016 at a total cost of around $3million.
This includes the $415,000 ‘custom ranch’ on 3.2 acres in Conyers, Georgia, which boasts its own pool and airplane hangar.
Additionally, the spending spree saw Cullorssnap up two Los Angeles homes, including a three-bedroom home in Inglewood for $510,000 and four-bedroom home in South LA for $590,000.
Then, in April of that year, it emerged Cullors had bought a $1.4million home in the largely white district of Topanga Canyon, Los Angeles – valuing her property empire at roughly $4.6million.
BLM’s Global Network filtered its donations through a group called Thousand Currents – which made it even more complicated to trace the cash.
Solome Lemma, executive director of Thousand Currents, said at the time of the allegations over misused funds: ‘Donations to BLM are restricted donations to support the activities of BLM.’
Since then, the group has been tied to several charities set in place by Cullors, that have subsequently made payments to Cullors and her business partners, according to a report released earlier this year on the organization’s spending.
Included in the the scrutiny into BLM’s finances was a report that the group transferred $6.3million to Cullor’s spouse, Janaya Khan, and other Canadian activists to purchase a mansion in Toronto in 2021, as well as several other charities whose finances raise ‘red flags’ concerning the foundation’s spending.
The report also showed how Cullors had designated some of the $90million the nonprofit made in 2020 to prison reform charities.
One of the groups, Reform LA Jails that Cullors founded, had received $1.4million, of which $205,000 went to the consulting firm owned by Cullors and Khan, New York Magazine reported.
Reform LA Jails then gave $270,000 to Christman Bowers, treasurer of the Black Lives Matter PAC; $211,000 to Asha Bandelle, a friend of Cullors’ who co-wrote her memoir; and another $86,000 to Trap Heals LLC, an entertainment, clothing and consulting company started by Damon Turner, the father of Cullors’ child.
In April 2021, reports began emerging – provided by the National Legal and Policy Center – which showed Cullors had amassed a $3.2million property empire by buying four properties – three in the Los Angeles area and one outside of Atlanta. 
Cullors bought this house in South Los Angeles – one of four she owns following a slew of real estate purchases the former BLM leader made in 2020 to the tune of more than $4.5million
The activist also bought a home in Conyers, Georgia, after receiving a stream of donations and creating several nonprofit charities with BLM fundsBLM co-founder defends her $3 million property portfolio
Cullors now owns three properties in Los Angeles – including this one in the hills above the city. All were purchased in 2020 following the success of the foundation’s fundraising campaign
She also owns the above home, valued at $1.4million, which is located in scenic Topanga CanyonBLM founder under fire after blowing millions on home
The revelation saw many within BLM turned against Cullors, questioning where she had accumulated the money. Cullors has written two books, has a deal with YouTube, and signed a production deal with Warner Bros. in 2020 to develop programming ‘for children, young adults and families.’
However, amid the furor she stood down and announced that two people were taking over as executive directors – Makani Themba and Monifa Bandele.
Yet Themba and Bandele in September said that they had never taken up the roles, following disagreements with leadership.
‘Although a media advisory was released indicating that we were tapped to play the role of senior co-executives at BLMGN, we were not able to come to an agreement with the acting Leadership Council about our scope of work and authority,’ they said in a statement.
‘As a result, we did not have the opportunity to serve in this capacity.’
Themba and Bandele said they did not know who was now running BLM, as their discussions never progressed.
Two other people remained on the board, after Cullors’ departure – Shalomyah Bowers and Raymond Howard, according to undated documents obtained by The Washington Examiner.
Cullors acknowledged that a lack of transparency about the foundation´s board and staffing drove perceptions that things were amiss. And when the organization was transparent – revealing that it had raised millions – the reaction wasn’t what she expected.
‘I thought practicing radical transparency with black people would have been received well,’ she said. ‘What was unhelpful about releasing it was not getting enough people allying with us about it. We weren´t the only organization to receive millions of dollars.’
In addition to promoting her latest book, ‘An Abolitionist´s Handbook: 12 Steps to Changing Yourself and the World,’ Cullors is focused on the Crenshaw Dairy Mart.
It’s a former convenience store in Los Angeles that was converted into an artist collective and gallery, which overlaps with her activism on criminal justice issues. Cullors is also well into a multiyear programming development deal with Warner Bros.
In the year since her resignation, the BLM foundation hasn´t hired new leadership or publicly discussed plans for money still sitting in its coffers.
Two veteran civil rights organizers who were announced last May as interim senior executives for the foundation said they never began serving in that capacity, citing in a statement a failure to reach an agreement with BLM´s leadership council about the scope of their work and decision-making authority.
It was only earlier this month that the foundation announced a new board of directors, which leaders said will grow in the coming months.
And it was only recently that the foundation caught up with its financial filings: In California, where it had been deemed delinquent in submitting required charity disclosures from 2020, the state Registry of Charitable Trusts now shows the foundation is current.
Records show a small number of people with responsibility over the foundation. A 990 filing submitted to the IRS for January through June 2020, lists Cullors as an uncompensated executive director and the foundation’s only employee.
At that point, still under the fiscal sponsorship of a well-established charity, the BLM foundation reported no revenue, assets, contributions or expenses.
The filing lists just two board members, including Shalomyah Bowers, who is the president at Bowers Consulting, a firm that has provided operational support to the BLM foundation for two years.
In a phone interview, Bowers said the organization had been working since Cullors´ departure to sort out its infrastructure.
He said the organization underwent an independent financial audit which, along with the expected May release of its latest 990 filing, will show that ‘nothing impermissible or nefarious has happened’ with BLM’s finances.
‘We are now a foundation that is deeply devoted to investing in organizations that are committed to doing the work of abolition (and) committed to building black power,’ he said.
Cullors is far from the only black activist to withstand questions about her money, her motivations and her leadership. Elders in the civil rights struggle often speak of attacks, both from within and outside of the movement, meant to discredit or stop social change.
On Saturday, Candace Owens, the black conservative political pundit and opponent of the BLM movement, arrived uninvited with a camera crew at Cullors’ Los Angeles-area home.
In an Instagram video shared with millions of followers, Owens said she was there to film a documentary about BLM’s finances and ask questions about the foundation’s property (which is not at the same address as Cullors’ home).
‘The constant harassment, online and offline, that I’ve experienced is unacceptable and dangerous,’ Cullors said.
Black Lives Matter co-founder Patrisse Cullors sits in an abolitionist pod, a garden in the form of a geodesic dome, during an interview with The Associated Press in Los Angeles, Wednesday
Still, legitimate questions of accountability should not be dismissed, said Garza, the BLM co-founder who was not involved in the BLM organization after 2015.
‘I think it is important to be transparent about what is actually happening,’ Garza said. ‘And my assessment is that because there was a lack of response (to public questions), specifically from the global network foundation, it allowed for people to fill in the blanks.’
She added: ‘If there is impropriety (in the foundation), we should talk about it. I don´t think we should sweep that under the rug, but we haven´t established that.’
Cullors knows that she gave critics an opening when she issued a statement denying suggestions that she had lived at the Studio City property or taken advantage of it for personal gain.
She later acknowledged to the AP that, during a four-day stay at the property, she had used the compound for purposes that were not strictly business.
She said in January 2021, while seeking refuge at the property amid threats on her life, she hosted a small party to celebrate the inauguration of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.
The gathering included about 15 people, including BLM Los Angeles chapter members and other prominent movement supporters, she said.
And in March 2021, she held a private birthday party for her son at the property, for which Cullors said she intended to pay a rental fee to the foundation. The foundation confirmed it had billed her, and it said it was reviewing its policies to prevent such uses in the future.
Cullors said, in hindsight, she should not have used the property that way.
She conceded Wednesday to the AP: ‘I look back at that and think, that probably wasn´t the best idea.’