Telecommunications Companies' Gifts to Minority Groups Questioned

[Source: The Chronicle of Philanthropy, October 5, 2010]

Public-interest groups are raising questions about major telecommunications firms’ donations to minority organizations that have run advocacy campaigns to back mergers and regulatory changes favored by their corporate benefactors, according to the Los Angeles Times.

AT&T, Comcast, and other big telecommunications companies have given millions of dollars in donations, products, and services to minority groups like the League of United Latin American Citizens, the NAACP, and the National Urban League.

Leaders of those groups have written to the Federal Communications Commission opposing "net neutrality," the principle that Internet providers should not restrict content on their networks, and other positions advanced by telecommunications companies.

Advocacy groups say there is no link between the corporate support and their public positions. But Malkia Cyril, executive director of the Center for Media Justice, asserted, “When you give national civil-rights groups millions of private dollars, there's no firewall strong enough to keep that money out of their policy.”

Read an opinion article from the new issue of The Chronicle of Philanthropy about the ways net neutrality affects nonprofits.