Soros-Sponsored Outlet Says Trump-Linked Groups Promote Right-Wing Agendas In Europe

LONDON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 27th October, 2020) US Christian groups linked to US President Donald Trump have spent millions of Dollars of "dark money" on fighting women's and LGBT rights across Europe, according to an investigative report released on Tuesday by openDemocracy, a UK-based political website funded by US billionaire George Soros.

"openDemocracy's scrutiny of thousands of pages of US financial filings reveal how these groups have spent more money in Europe (at least $88 million) than anywhere else outside of the United States, followed by Africa, Asia and Latin America," the report said.

It said that most of the money into Europe came from the so-called Christian "legal army" � the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) that which has close links to the Trump administration through its former staffers � and the Christian right legal advocacy group the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ), whose chief counsel is Jay Sekeluw, one of Trump's personal lawyers.

After revealing that together these two groups have spent at least $25 million on pushing their right-wing agenda, the media outlet said that Sekeluw will be coordinating any challenge brought by Trump against the US presidential election results on November 3.

In Europe alone, the Trump-linked Christian groups have been involved in at least 50 legal cases challenging sexual and reproductive rights at the European Court of Human Rights, and backing the Polish government�s abortion restrictions, the report added.

They have also supported the so-called "LGBT ideology free zone" declared by the Polish ruling party, backed contraception, abortion, divorce and same-sex adoption and trans rights restrictions across Europe, and supported campaigns for the death penalty for gay people in Africa.

In total, the US right groups have spent $270 million on pushing their agendas and pumping misinformation campaigns, including the coronavirus pandemic, the UK political website said.

According to openDemocracy, politicians and policy makers have responded with alarm to its investigative report and have called for urgent actions to further investigate these groups' activities, funding and spending, whether or not Trump wins his re-election on November 3.

"The help that we need in Europe from people within the United States is help in combatting prejudice and upholding rights and freedoms, not encouragement for those seeking to diminish them," UK lawmaker John Mann, member of the House of Lords, is quoted as saying.

In March 2019, openDemocracy made a similar accusation against US Christian right "fundamentalists" linked to the Trump administration and Trump former adviser Steve Bannon, claiming then that they had spent at least $50 million of "dark money" into Europe over the last decade.