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Indiana’s attorney general slammed Black Lives Matter this week as a “scam” whose “house of cards may be falling” amid the growing legal attention into its murky $60 million coffers.
Todd Rokita said he was “concerned” about the activist group, which on Wednesday said it had “shut down online fundraising” after a legal letter from California’s Department of Justice, the Washington Examiner reported.
“It appears that the house of cards may be falling, and this happens eventually with nearly every scam, scheme, or illegal enterprise,” Rokita told the conservative outlet Wednesday.
“I see patterns that scams kind of universally take: failure to provide board members, failure to provide even executive directors, failure to make your filings available. It all leads to suspicion,” he said.
Both California and Washington recently ordered the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation to stop collecting donations because it was delinquent in crucial tax and charity filings.
BLM’s charity registration is also out of compliance in Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, New Jersey, North Carolina and Virginia, according to the Examiner.
Rokita did not reveal if Indiana was also investigating the group, but stressed that recent news on the group “certainly cause us to be concerned.”
The foundation’s finances have long been under suspicion after affiliates complained about not getting much-needed support — even as the group revealed it raised $90 million in 2020, with at least $60 million left over.
At the same time, BLM co-founder Patrisse Kahn-Cullors went on a real estate buying binge, forcing her to step down last May.
The Examiner recently revealed, however, that the two activists named as her replacements never took up the posts because of disagreements with the unnamed “acting Leadership Council.”
In his letter Monday, California Attorney General Rob Bonta gave the foundation 60 days to file tax and charity documents, warning that it was “prohibited” from “soliciting or disbursing charitable funds.”
He warned that its “directors, trustees, officers and return preparers” would be “personally liable for payment of all penalties, interest and other costs.”
A similar letter in Washington warned the BLM foundation that “all solicitations conducted on its behalf must immediately cease” in the state, with penalties up to $2,000 for each violation.
In a statement to The Post Wednesday, the group said, “We take these matters seriously and have taken immediate action.
“We have immediately engaged compliance counsel to address any issues related to state fundraising compliance.
“In the interim, we have shut down online fundraising as we work quickly to ensure we are meeting all compliance requirements.”
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