Most of the $640 million in new generous donations from Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ ex-family, MacKenzie Scott, is being distributed to nonprofits advocating for various causes, including aiding migrants who commit crimes and supporting male-born transgender athletes competing against women.
Scott may provide 67 immigrant advocacy organizations a total of $122 million for legal aid and other assistance, according to an analysis of 361 awards she announced Tuesday through her foundation, Yield Giving.
The notable winners include the Florida Immigrant Coalition, which staunchly opposes Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ assault on refugees who commit acts, and the Tennessee Immigrant & Refugee Rights Coalition, which is fighting that country’s efforts to increase unlawful immigrant protection. Both organizations received $2 million prizes.
Before announcing the $640 million in new donations, Scott had already given away $16.5 billion of the fortune she acquired after divorcing Amazon founder Jeff Bezos in 2019.
Scott’s various awards include $117 million to 67 detainee advocacy groups and various organizations helping jailbirds and ex-cons, and $72 million to 43 groups promoting “gender identity,” sexual orientation, and other LGBTQ causes – such as championing the rights of natural boys who identify as transgender girls to compete in female sports.
She’s also earmarked another $18 million to 10 groups pushing clean energy.
“Bezos’ wife is using the profits he made through capitalism to fund the rope that will hang capitalism,” said Mike Gonzalez, a senior fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation, drawing on former Soviet revolutionary leader Vladimir Lenin’s famed quote: “The capitalists will sell us the rope with which we will hang them.”
Scott’s use of Bezos’ money is yet another example of woke philanthropic groups created through the fruits of capitalism – such as the leftist Rockefeller Foundation – using their dollars to undermine free-market principles, added Gonzalez.
“These things that she’s donating money to – whether it’s transgender ideas, helping illegals, prisoner rights, climate change – they’re all trying to transform our system away from capitalism,” he said.
Scott — an author of two novels and the third wealthiest woman in the US — was married to Bezos for nearly 25 years and has four children with him. She parted ways with Bezos in 2019 with a jaw-dropping $38.3 billion in Amazon stock.
Florida Immigrant Coalition, which vehemently opposes Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ crackdown on migrants who commit crimes, received a $2 million award from Scott.
Prior to Tuesday’s announcement, she handed out $16.5 billion of her fortune to groups she and her team researched and selected.
In December 2022, she launched a database of her charity under the name Yield Giving.
Scott then began soliciting applications from community-led nonprofits seeking financial assistance. Applicants were required to have budgets between $1 and $5 million and missions “to advance the voices and opportunities of individuals and families of meager or modest means,” Yield Giving said on its website.
Scott’s awards announced Tuesday include $72 million specifically for LGBTQ causes.
The $640 million awarded by Yield Giving during its first round of handouts is more than double what Scott pledged, with 361 of the 6,350 charities who applied getting awards of either $1 million or $2 million.
Megan Peterson, executive director of Gender Justice, cheered Scott’s $2 million “gift” to her nonprofit, saying in a statement it “could not come at a more crucial time” with “a conservative legal movement threatening our fundamental rights here in Minnesota, North Dakota, and across the United States.”
“Building and sustaining a world free of gender barriers requires community organization, education, and changing the ways we talk and think about gender,” added Peterson, whose group recently won lawsuits regarding access to emergency contraception and the rights of trans youth to play sports that are not their biological gender.
Of the $72 million Scott handed out for LGBTQ causes, at least $16 million went to nonprofits leading the charge for transgender athletes in female sports, including ACLU of Alabama, Baltimore-based Soccer without Borders, and OutFront Minnesota.
Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-Staten Island/Brooklyn), who has backed legislation seeking to maintain fairness in female sports by ensuring biological boys aren’t participating, said Scott’s spending on such lefty causes is “unfortunate — but it’s her personal money.”
“Democrats running cities across America do this every day with our money, and that’s the real battle we need to keep fighting,” she said.
Bezos’ ex-wife donated millions to undocumented people, former prisoners, LGBTQ organizations, and clean energy initiatives.
In a note on her website, Scott wrote she’s grateful to Lever for Change, the organization that managed the award-selection process, and evaluators who are vital “agents of change.”
Reps for Lever for Change and Scott did not return messages.
Elon Musk blasted Scott for her past charitable donations in an X post he has since deleted: “Super-rich ex-wives who hate their former spouse should… be listed among ‘Reasons that Western Civilization died.'”
