Ever since a fake grassroots organization from the United Kingdom named the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) was publicly called out by Senator Josh Hawley (R) on July 18th, 2021 for being a “foreign dark money group,” a growing chorus of inquiring voices has been asking for full disclosure on who is funding this foreign influence operation to suppress the constitutionally protected speech of American citizens on matters of life and death significance.
That funding information is finally becoming available and there are at least nine, mostly foreign, and ostensibly charitable NGOs pouring money into them. This article will briefly review the history of CCDH’s campaign, and end with a list of their funders. This is not an exhaustive list, and is intended only for other researchers to continue to analyze and compile data further revealing this mostly still invisible, yet clearly powerful and malignant network.
A Review of The Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) Foreign Influence Operation
On March 24, 2021, a newly formed, shadowy, foreign group calling itself the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), published a report titled, THE DISINFORMATION DOZEN: Why platforms must act on twelve leading online anti-vaxxers,” claiming that only 12 individuals were responsible for the majority of the anti-vaccine content online, namely, the document stated: “Just twelve anti-vaxxers are responsible for almost two-thirds of anti‑vaccine content circulating on social media platforms.” Those 12 individuals include presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., myself, Dr. Joseph Mercola, Dr. Sherri Tenpenny, and varioius other prominent health advocates.
The organization pretended to be a grassroots movement, yet it wielded immense power, including being able to put its talking points directly into the mouths of elected officials across the pond, including the sitting president of the United States himself, who suggested that exercising free speech on topics related to the Covid jabs may be equivalent to murder.
Since then, not only have thousands of news articles republished CCDH’s false accusations, but the White House press secretary, the US Surgeon General, the President of the US, a comittee of the U.S. Congress and 14 state attorney generals further reified and globally distributed this ‘digital hit list‘ without any critical inquiry into its accuracy and clearly foreign and highly suspect provenance.
(1).png)
That widely disseminated list (referenced 84,700 times on Google) has now been found out to be entirely factually inaccurate; It turns out that CCDH’s report contained statistics in error by an outlandish factor of 300 fold; which is why Facebook’s VP of Content Policy described it as a “faulty narrative,” “without evidence.” Not a single acknowledgement, correction, retraction, or apology has been issued by CCDH, or anyone who promoted the report thus far, despite the immense damage the report wrought to all affected.
.png)
A Growing Number of Inquiring Minds Are Asking Who Are CCDH’s Dark Money Funders?
After several years of relative quiet, there has been a recent upswell of interest in the story, and more specifically, in who it is that is funding CCDH and why.
Most recently, independent journalist Paul Thacker published a report titled, “Twitter Files: Who Are the People Claiming RFK Jr. is “Disinformation”?,” wherein he asked the following salient questions directly to CCDH:
“Who runs Imran Ahmed and @CCDHate? Is it governments? Is it pharma interests? I asked. Imran Ahmed won’t respond.”
In response to this post, Elon Musk called CCDH CEO Imram Ahmed a “rat,” and posted the following question:
“Who is funding this organization? They spread disinformation and push censorship, while claiming the opposite. Truly evil.” (Twitter: 7/18/23)
While I do not approve of name-calling on either side, Elon’s presumably tongue-in-cheek designation of Imran as a ‘rat,’ does not compare to what Imran and his organization did to target US citizens like myself, labeling us as criminals, including calling us ‘profiteering killers,’ “selling death,” for sharing true information about the dangers of mRNA covid jabs. (Learn more about the Stanford Virality Project’s efforts to coverup true stories of vaccine injuries and deaths here).
More concerning perhaps is how CCDH’s rhetorical points made it into several Department of Homeland Security terrorism bulletins equating free speech and open debate about mRNA vaccine safety and efficacy, or Covid origins, as possible new forms of domestic terrorism.
Two days after Elon’s question, a national, nonprofit organization called American First Legal Foundation launched a multi-front investigation into what it calls “Government Collusion with Pro-Censorship UK-Based Nonprofit “Center for Countering Digital Hate ,” including freedom of information requests to Health and Human Services, the FBI, Dept. of Homeland Security, and the Department of State.
On that same day, July 20th, Robert F Kennedy Jr. gave testimony at the House Judicial Subcommitte Hearing on the Weaponization of the Federal Government where he called out CCDH as “this very shady group from England that is funded by dark money and should be looked into,” further bringing national and long overdue attention to them.
Clearly, the tide has turned, and foreign influence operations colluding secretly with the US government, media, and Big Tech companies to suppress protected speech will no longer be tolerated by a fast awakening population of US citizens fed up with the wholesale dismantling of the US Constitution.
In order to contribute to the collective effort to shed a sterilizing light on the dark agenda spear-headed by astroturfing organizations like CCDH, I have compiled a list of the following 9 funders of CCDH, all of which were made available through fullly verifiable and public, open source intelligence gathering approaches.
9 Dark Money Sources Funding The Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH)
The list that follows are mostly UK-based ‘philanthropic’ foundations who provided funding to CCDH; all of whom contributed to suppressing the First Amendment rights of not just the 12 US citizens on the disinformation dozen list, but countless others who were affected by their censorship efforts, and as a result were deprived of the medical ethical principle of informed consent as a result.
#1 Paul Hamlyn Foundation
A UK charity, founded in 1972, it describes itself as an “It is an independent grant-making foundation, making grants to individuals and organisations in the UK to help people overcome disadvantage.” The foundation’s trustees include the former General-Director of the BBC Tony Hall, Baron Hall of Birkenhead, and Sir Anthony Saltz, former Board of Governer of the BBC. On Oct. 4th, 2021, the Paul Hamlyn Foundation gave CCDH a £100,000 grant earmarked for “Growing the digital presence and impact of Center for Countering Digital Hate.” [Source: GrantNav]
#2 Esmee Fairbairn Foundation
A UK charity founded in 1961, and one of the UK’s largest independent funders, it describes its mission: “to improve our natural world, secure a fairer future, and strengthen the bonds in communities in the UK.” On October 20, 2021, the Esmee Fairbairn Foundation gave CCDH a £200,000 grant earmarked: “Towards core costs including the salary of the head of digital, to disrupt the spread of online hate and misinformation.” A second grant was awarded Jan 30th 2023 for £13,333 earmarked: “Towards core costs as a Cost of Living Uplift.” [Source: GrantNav]
#3 Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust
A UK-based organization, it is is one of three grant making trusts, independent of each other, set up in 1904 by Quaker businessman Joseph Rowntree. JRRT was set up as limited company, not a charity, able to fund political causes. Funder of CCDH’s oldest grant on record, £53,400 was awarded on Dec. 11, 2020, under the title “Project Whistleblower: to create and operate a secure whistleblower portal to empower internal dissidents within social media companies.” [Source: GrantNav]
#4 Oak Foundation
According to InfluenceWatch, “The Oak Foundation (and its U.S. affiliate Oak Foundation USA) is a left-leaning environmentalist grantmaking foundation. Headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, the Oak Foundation was formed in 1983 and maintains offices in the United States, the United Kingdom, Denmark, Bulgaria, India, Zimbabwe, and Tanzania.” According to it’s 2020 Annual Report, they provided CCDH with a $100,000 earmarked with the following description: “To support Centre for Countering Digital Hate by shining a spotlight on digital misinformation platforms that are polluting the public discourse on issues such as climate action, women’s rights, and racial equality.
#5 Barrow Cadbury Trust
A UK charity founded in 1920 by a Quaker family known most for its chocolate business, ostensibly to “tackle profound social ills, including juvenile crime and urban poverty.” Listed on CCDH’s original “About Us” page here as a funder, the details of how much it contributed, and if it still an active contributor are unknown. Noteworthy is that one of CCDH’s officiers, SARAN, Sarah Ayesha is also Barrow Cadbury Trust’s Migration programme manager.
#6 Laura Kinsella Foundation
A UK charity registered in Jan 6, 2012, set up by Stephen Kinsella OBE, a commercial solicitor. There is no public website for the foundation, so little is known about what it does, or who runs it. It is Listed on CCDH’s original “About Us” page here as a funder, without details of how much it contributed or if it still actively involved.
#7 Pears Foundation
A UK charity established in 1991 focused on Israel-related projects, including combating anti-semitism, and whose income is generated by the William Pears Group (a property company) contributed to CCDH a total of 150k pounds, 50k in 2019-2020, and 100k in 2021-2022. Not only does the Pears foundation donate to global organizations such as UNICEF, but they themselves receive government funding, making it difficult to know if these foundations are simply front organizations funneling taxpayer money into organizations effectively suppressing the rights and speech of those taxpayers. For instance, The U.K. Dept for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport awarded a 5,00,000 pound grant to The Pears Foundation earmarked to “respond to the needs of the most vulnerable and marginalised people affected by the COVID-19 crisis, ” in Sept of 2020: https://grantnav.threesixtygiving.org/search?recipientOrganization=GB-CHC-1009195
#8 Hopewell Foundation
According to InfluenceWatch, “The Hopewell Fund is a 501(c)(3) funding and fiscal sponsorship nonprofit managed by Arabella Advisors, a Washington, D.C.-based philanthropy consulting firm.” According to its website, “The Hopewell Fund is a 501(c)(3) public charity that specializes in helping donors, social entrepreneurs, and other changemakers quickly launch new, innovative social change projects.” Notorious for being a dark money source for astroturfing campaigns from the political Left, CCDH received a $15,000 grant from Hopewell in 2021, according to InfluenceWatch.
#9 Unbound Philanthropy
A tax-exempt 501c3 non-profit organization founded in 2003 (unstaffed until 2008), the organization is a “New York City-based left-wing donor affinity group that primarily funds groups that support left-of-center liberal expansionist immigration policies,” and has “close ties to George Soros‘s Open Society Foundations through the group’s executive director, Taryn Higashi. Higashi sits on an advisory board of Open Society Foundations and is an alumna of the left-of-center Ford Foundation, where she worked on immigrant and refugee issues,” according to InfluenceWatch. While their website does not list CCDH as a grant recipient, Unbound Philanthrophy is listed on CCDH’s original “About Us” page here as a funder, also without details of how much it gave or with what intention.
This is only a preliminary exploration of the funding sources behind CCDH. Just as revealing are the key people who founded the organization, as well as the foundations and government organizations that fund the charities listed above. In future articles we will explore these connections in greater depth. If you are interested in learning more, please read the following excellent articles which dive deep into CCDH’s agenda.
- CCDH – The Centre for Cancel Culture and Digital Hypocrisy, Part 1
- CCDH – The Centre for Cancel Culture and Digital Hypocrisy, Part 2
Calls to Action
- If you are concerned about the role of foreign influence operations like CCDH in the US, and wish to support those whose protected speech has been quashed, please consider taking part in our More Than 12 campaign on Stand for Health Freedom (501c4).
- Please remember to stay abreast of our updates on our free Greenmedinfo.com newsletter. It’s free and you can subscribe here to either the daily or weekly email.
- Familiarize yourself with RFK Jr’s presidential campaign and his commitment to hold accountable CCDH, the government, pharmaceutical companies, and the media at www.Kennedy24.com
- Greenmedinfo.com has been under unprecedented attack over the past three years, and is now in a stage of rebuilding and shoring up its security. Please contribute in any of 4 easy ways at our REBUILD GreenMedInfo.com campaign. Thank you in advance for your support!
- Have a tip or testimonial? Are you a citizen investigator who has additional information on CCDH’s shadowy funding network? Please email us at info@greenmedinfo.com
