Black Lives Matter activist and New York Daily News columnist Shaun King is shutting down a nonprofit organization he started just months ago and will return all donations he’s received since last September, he announced on Facebook.
King’s move came just hours after The Daily Caller published an expose detailing his inconsistent statements involving charities he’s started in recent years. TheDC found no records of incorporation for Justice That’s All, an organization for which King began taking donations in Sept. 2014, just after the shooting death of Michael Brown. (RELATED: Charities Touted By Black Lives Matter Activist Shaun King Appear To Have Never Existed)
A business partner of King’s also disputed a claim the activist made in 2013 that their company would direct some of its revenues to an affiliated nonprofit foundation. That charity never existed, the business partner told TheDC.
“At the impassioned request of my family, friends, and closest advisors, I have decided to cease the operations of Justice Together,” said King, who formally registered Justice Together in June.
The ambitious project, which had Black Lives Matter activist Deray McKesson and journalist Glenn Greenwald on its board of directors, sought to create a 50-state coalition to fight police brutality.
But after months of ignoring volunteers working on the project, King announced earlier this month that he was downsizing the organization to just one chapter. Volunteers and donors were unhappy with King’s management, and many called him out on social media. Others compared his work on Justice Together to his handling of Justice That’s All, which also closed down without notice in November or December of last year.
“Unfortunately, I am afraid my best intentions have become a hindrance,” King wrote Tuesday. “Toward that end, we have refunded every single donation that we’ve ever received (all the way back to September of 2014) and will no longer be accepting donations privately or publicly. We will securely and permanently delete your contact information from all databases.”
It is unclear from King’s Facebook post if TheDC’s reporting prompted the move. It is also unclear how much in donations King raised for Justice Together and Justice That’s All.
King’s critics had also accused him of failing to provide information about donations and spending. Some volunteers claimed that when they questioned King about that, they were ridiculed and blocked on social media. That sparked further accusations that King’s operations were not above-board.
King said that he will continue to write for the Daily News, where he was hired last month. Prior to that, King wrote for the left-wing Daily Kos.
While admitting that he has caused his supporters “disappointment,” King said that he was unable to devote his full attention to Justice Together because of the “attacks my family has continuously suffered these past three months.”
That’s a likely reference to the scrutiny King has come under about other aspects of his past. TheDC revealed in July that a story King has told on numerous occasions about an incident at his high school in 1995 in which he said he was attacked by a group of white racists was not matched by a police report filed at the time. The report, and the investigating detective, did not characterize the incident as a hate crime, as King has said. The fight involved a girl, according to the report and several witnesses.
In August, Breitbart News reported that the man listed on King’s birth certificate is a white man, a revelation which was at odds with his claim to be bi-racial. King responded to that article in an essay, saying that his mother cheated on the man listed on his birth certificate with a “light-skinned black man.” Nevertheless, King is still routinely accused on social media of lying about his race.