WASHINGTON — A Swiss billionaire is funneling his money into a pop-up progressive advocacy group claiming to support “working families” and denouncing President Trump’s plans to extend tax cuts as a giveaway to the ultra-rich.
Families Over Billionaires, which launched when Trump returned to the White House in January, was set up as a temporary entity to oppose the extension of Trump’s signature 2017 tax legislation — but its “eight-figure” fundraising campaign, through an array of pass-through organizations, is backed by the very wealthy.
That’s because the fledgling Families for Billionaires, which doesn’t even have a donation option on its website for the public, is actually a trade name of the massive liberal dark money Sixteen Thirty Fund, according to business records filed in Washington, DC.
Sixteen Thirty has received $280 million from the Berger Action Fund, an advocacy group that works with Swiss billionaire Hansjorg Wyss’ eponymous Wyss Foundation, past reports and disclosures from its affiliated groups show.
“Families Over Billionaires is nothing more than a front group for the dark money behemoth Sixteen Thirty Fund,” Americans for Public Trust executive director Caitlin Sutherland told The Post.
“It’s the height of irony that a group that has received at least $280 million from a foreign national is trying to brand themselves as fighting for American families.”
The fledgling group intends to use “paid media, rapid response, surrogate operations, and grassroots mobilization” to get its message out, a press release notes, while congressional Republicans draft Trump’s marquee tax legislation.
Wyss is a top backer of liberal causes in the US and his fortunes largely derive from the medical device maker company Synthes, which he sold to Johnson & Johnson over a decade ago.
Due to his Swiss citizenship, he is not legally allowed to donate to US political candidates, though he has done so between 1990 and 2006, while managing to avoid prosecution, per the Associated Press.
To comply with rules intended to block foreign influence in US elections, Wyss pumps cash into dark money groups — certain types of nonprofit organizations that are not legally required to disclose donors.
Much of his money has flowed to organizations like the Sixteen Thirty Fund and the New Venture Fund, which are both part of the dark money network run by Arabella Advisors.
Part of the behemoth Arabella Advisors
Arabella Advisors, which services a network of progressive nonprofits, including Sixteen Thirty, was founded in 2005 and has long championed left-wing causes. Arabella Advisors takes in management fees from those firms for handling human resources and legal matters.
“They created an intentionally complex web of interrelated organizations that espouse anti-corporatist beliefs and call themselves grassroots — but really serve to consolidate power into the hands of a few influential individuals,” a former New Venture Fund official told the Free Press, which first reported on the ties between the Arabella network and Families Over Billionaires.
The DC-based Arabella Advisors’ network of nonprofits is known to have raked in eye-popping amounts of cash across its vast network of progressive groups, including $1.3 billion in 2023.
Billionaires George Soros, Pierre Omidyar, Bill Gates and Reid Hoffman have publicly disclosed multi-million donations to the network.
Posing as grassroots
While the trade name of Families Over Billionaires is detailed in corporate documents, the group on its website portrays itself as a grassroots organization that enjoys support from labor unions “as well as leaders and advocates from across the country.”
Among the groups listed on its public website as a partner is Indivisible, another pop-up group that Republicans have accused of packing recent town halls to oppose the Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) budget trimming and federal workforce cutting efforts.
Indivisible, which enjoys Soros funding, launched in 2016 around the time of Trump’s first election victory and has organized protests in deep-red states like Montana as well as election swing states such as Georgia.
Additionally, influential unions like the National Education Association (NEA) and Service Employees International Union (SEIU) are listed as partners.
Families Over Billionaires held its first demonstration at the US Capitol last month, decrying House Republicans’ effort to pass border security, energy reform and tax cuts into law via a process known as budget reconciliation, which allows for a simple majority of Congress to approve legislation.
The group also blasted DOGE’s effort to root out government bloat, which has rankled unions that represent government employees.
“Donald Trump and Elon Musk would rather spend this money on tax giveaways to billionaires than help make sure seniors get their Social Security checks on time,” the group chided on social media earlier this month.
The group’s nascent social media accounts have posted various memes and other attacks against Trump and Republicans that rip into billionaires.
“In 2017, Trump and Republicans in Congress passed record-breaking tax giveaways for billionaires and big corporations,” the group also wrote in a Jan. 30 Facebook post boosted by Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.).
“Now, they’re doubling down, and proposing even more extreme handouts for those at the top. And they want to make you pay for it.”
Sixteen Thirty Fund has over two dozen active trade names listed on corporate filings with Washington, DC, including Protect Our Care, Stop Deficit Squawks, the Rural Victory Fund, Better IRS, Defend American Democracy.
Another one of Sixteen Thirty’s trade names listed in corporate documents, “The Payback,” claims to be a partner with Families Over Billionaires.
“We’re so proud to partner with Families Over Billionaires to hold our leaders accountable in the 2025 tax debate,” “The Payback” wrote on X back in January.
Similar to Families Over Billionaires, The Payback, which enjoys billionaire funding, purports to be a champion against corporations and the ultra-wealthy “scamming our tax system.”
“Families Over Billionaires is a nonprofit campaign working to ensure the American people understand what the 2025 tax fight is really about: Politicians in Washington trying to cut taxes for the rich at the expense of working people,” a spokesperson for the group told The Post.
“We follow all local, state, and federal law in our work.”
This article was updated to clarify Arabella Advisors’ connection to the Sixteen Thirty Fund and donations from the Berger Action Fund.
