An organizer of the major Christian-oriented pro-Hillary Clinton organization Faith for Hillary and Clinton faith adviser works for a liberal super PAC that attacks Christian values and was formed by a liberal operative that accepts money to attack Christians.
Faith for Hillary’s co-leader Burns Strider is vice president of the super PAC American Bridge 21st Century, which was formed in 2010 by Media Matters for America founder David Brock.
Strider, a former senior adviser to Nancy Pelosi, served as Hillary Clinton’s senior adviser and director of faith outreach during Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign. Faith for Hillary, which is applying for PAC status, recently launched the website Faith Voters for Hillary.
But Strider’s work for Brock might present some complications for Clinton’s Christian outreach, considering that Brock is in business to target Christians. Brock admitted as much when he applied to the IRS for Media Matters’ tax-exempt nonprofit status.
“It is common for news and commentary by the press to present viewpoints that tend to overly promote corporate interests, the rights of the wealthy, and a conservative, Christian-influenced ideology,” according to Media Matters’ tax-exempt nonprofit application.
In 2006, the ARCA Foundation gave Media Matters a $50,000 grant to “to support a Religious Broadcasting Project to expand the monitoring and fact checking of religious broadcasts,” according to an ARCA Foundation tax return.
Media Matters has staunchly defended Obamacare’s contraceptive mandate, which was opposed in a landmark civil court case by the Catholic organization the Little Sisters of the Poor.
American Bridge 21st Century, meanwhile, recently attacked Rick Santorum for “his opposition to the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act and his extreme opposition to both birth control and abortion even in the case of rape,” and critically published Santorum quotes opposing contraception to attack Santorum’s “extreme record on women’s health” and “War on Women.”
American Bridge also attacked a women’s group supporting pro-life 2013 Virginia gubernatorial candidate Ken Cuccinelli, stating, “among the list of Cuccinelli supporters one will find some of the same women who rushed forward to defend Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock, who called a pregnancy resulting from rape ‘something that God intended.'”
“It’s not surprising that they place Cuccinelli in the same company,” the PAC stated. “Many of these women have been affiliated with the organizations and candidates who are most adamant about denying women the opportunity to make decisions about their own body or curtailing their access to health care.”
