Coachella Co-Owner donated $325k to anti-LGBTA orgs in 2016
According to a report by Pitchfork, in 2016, Golden voice owner and co-owner of Coachella, Philip Anschutz donated about $325,000 to organizations with an explicit anti-LGBTA message through his Anschutz Foundation. Those organizations included Dare 2 Share Ministries, Young Life, The Navigators, Center for Urban Renewal and Education, and Movieguide Awards. The CEO of Dare 2 Share, for instance, blogged through the organizations official channel that " “Homosexuality is a Satanic perversion of God’s gift of sex.”
Notaby, these donations come to light after a July 2016 report by LGBTA advocacy group Freedom for All Americans. In that report, the group found that Anschutz donated $190k to anti-LGBTA groups from 2010-2013. At that time, Anschutz stated: "Recent claims published in the media that I am anti-LGBTQ are nothing more than fake news—it is all garbage. I unequivocally support the rights of all people without regard to sexual orientation.” It is unclear if the 2016 donations were made before or after his July 2016 statement.
For his part, Anschutz has denied that he is anti-LGBTA once again. In a statement, he said, in part, "Over the past year, the Foundation has stopped funding certain organizations after it was brought to our attention that some of their activities were inconsistent with our values. This is an ongoing process in which we continue to investigate the organizations that we support, as some of these groups may have initiatives that extend beyond the scope of the objectives sought by the Foundation in supporting them."