The $7 billion Climate United scandal

That’s “billion, with a “b.” Minnesota has much experience with brand-new nonprofits getting multi-million-dollar grants from the state government. The Feds have managed to go over the top in this latest scandal.

The New York Post reports:

In one case, former Vice President Kamala Harris handed over a check for nearly $7 billion to Bethesda, Maryland, based group Climate United Fund, which does not appear in the IRS’s charities database, and has no federal filings.

The non-profit fund had only been incorporated in Delaware on November 30, 2023, according to public records, five months before Harris handed over the cash in April 2024.

Vice President Harris? No, really. Here is the press release put out by Climate United back in April of last year:

The Climate United Coalition Will Manage $6.97B from the EPA’s Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund

Vice President Kamala Harris and EPA Administrator Michael Regan Join With Climate United to Announce Historic Investments

And who is Climate United? No one seems to know. Their website documents surprisingly little activity for a multi-billion-dollar operation. From the April press release:

Climate United is a partnership of three non-profits—Calvert Impact, The Community Preservation Corporation (CPC), and Self-Help [Credit Union]

As nonprofits go, all three are significant operations, but nothing of the scale that suggests they are ready to administer a multi-billion-dollar government grant.

To date, Climate United has announced only (only!) $360 million in grants. But they invite more proposals to access their “green bank.”

That this would become a political football was known from the get-go. Bloomberg Law published a “Republicans pounce” article as soon as the grant was announced last April, with the Climate United grant being the largest single piece of a $20 billion effort funded by the EPA.

And that $20 billion was part of an even bigger fund. The Post reports:

The cash for the charity came from a huge $370 billion climate slush fund of taxpayer money overseen by John Podesta, a political consultant who was chair of Hillary Clinton’s failed 2016 bid for president and White House chief of staff to Bill Clinton.

The Post also reports that the new EPA administrator under Pres. Trump is asking his inspector general look into the transaction:

Now Lee Zeldin, the new EPA chief said he wants to claw back the cash doled out by the climate fund. On Monday, he called on the agency’s inspector general to investigate.

We wish him the best of luck.