American Freedom Alliance

"The American Freedom Alliance (AFA) claims to be a non-political, non partisan, movement of concerned Americans which identifies threats to western civilization.

The AFA is anti-climate science, anti-evolution and Islamophobic in its outlook.

One boardmember is a former California GOP head, and the group's legal status has unusual aspects.

June "Green hell" literary cafe with Monckton and Milloy
"What the Greens really seek, with increasing success, is to dictate the very parameters of your daily life--where you can live, what transportation you can use, what you can eat, and even how many children you can have." 

June climate denial, anti-sustainability conference
In June 2011 AFA was the host of the climate skeptic conference "Big Footprint: Is Green the New Tyranny" at the UCLA Faculty Center. Speakers on the programme were (see ref. page for more detail):
 * Christopher Monckton, who paired a swastika with a quote recommending acceptance of mainstream climate science.
 * Ed Berry
 * Terry Botwick, producer of Cool It
 * Francis F. Chen
 * Michael Coffman
 * James Delingpole
 * Alex Epstein
 * Larry Greenfield
 * Dan Happel
 * Christopher Horner
 * Matthew Malkan
 * Phelim McAleer
 * Ann McElhinney
 * Steve Milloy
 * Benny Peiser
 * David Prentice of the Family Research Council
 * Richard Rothschild
 * Michael Shaw
 * Jeffrey Schwartz
 * Wesley J. Smith of the creationist Discovery Institute
 * Brian Sussman
 * Tom Tamarkin
 * Paul Taylor
 * Stanley W. Trimble
 * Peter Wood, president of the National Association of Scholars; author of books published by Encounter Books

2009 Creationist film lawsuit against California Science Center
"'The American Freedom Alliance is, perhaps, best known for its on-going legal action with the California Science Center over the cancellation of an AFA event to be held at the centre in 2009 at which it intended to screen a 'teach the controversy' film called Darwin's Dilemma, which explores the 'Mystery of the Cambrian Explosion in Fossil Records.' At the time, Avi Davis, executive director and senior fellow of the American Freedom Alliance, said: 'New scientific evidence makes it vital that we take a close look at the numerous inherent scientific problems of the Darwinian theory of evolution.' The AFA has subsequently fought the case on the grounds of freedom of expression.'"

Personnel
As of June 2011, personnel were:

Board of Directors

 * Barak Lurie, attorney with Lurie & Park
 * Heidi N. Nietert, finance
 * Shawn Steel, Republican National Committee member and former California GOP chair who was instrumental in the effort to recall California governor Gray Davis
 * Dr. Robert Hamilton, Santa Monica pediatrician
 * David Horwatt, IT

Staff
Avi Davis is Executive Director and Senior Fellow, and Rueben Gordon is Assistant Director.

Fellows
As of June 2011:
 * Avi Davis
 * Robert Spencer
 * The late Tashbih Sayeed (actually Tashbih Sayyed, 1941–2007)
 * Babu Susseelan (actually Babu Suseelan)

The "About Us" "Mission" page has a different "Fellows" list, showing three: Davis, Spencer, and Stephen Coughlin.

AFA assertion: incorporated in California, 501(c)(3), tax deductible
"American Freedom Alliance is incorporated in the State of California as a nonprofit public benefit corporation. It is a non profit organization under Section 501 (c) 3 of the Internal Revenue Code. Contributions to AFA are tax deductible under Section 170 of the Code. EID 68-0643445."

Registered in California ("Active", in Sec. of State "Corporations" database)
The Secretary of State's "Business entities" search shows the AFA as active, with entity #C3085842 and a filing date of 2008-02-07.

...but not as a charity? ("Not registered", on AG Charitable Trusts database)
AFA is located in California, but the Calif. Attorney General Registry of Charitable Trusts website shows the AFA as "not registered"

Federally: though extant by 2007, still no Form 990s 4 1/2 yrs later
Although the AFA has been sponsoring events since at least 2007, , Guidestar (which shows AFA's ruling date as April 2009) shows no income and no Form 990 filings for the group.

July 2011 claim: AFA Form 990 filing "under review"; but still no 990 in December
In a July 2011 email, AFA head Avi Davis said the AFA had filed its Form 990, but he did not provide a copy, saying it was "under review". .

Davis did not respond to subsequent requests for clarification and additional information, and by early December, Guidestar still showed no Form 990 for the organization.

One funder is the Fairbrook Foundation
"The AFA's funding is unclear, but tax returns (pdf) for the Fairbrook Foundation - a charitable foundation set up by computing multi-millionaires Aubrey and Joyce Chernick, which supports a wide range of Jewish and pro-Israeli groups - show that the foundation has donated more than $100,000 to the AFA since it was founded in 2007."

(Actually, it's more than $200,000, according to Fairbrook's 2008 and 2009 Form 990s on Guidestar: $170,000 in 2008( or ) and $39,500 in 2009..)

Contact
Address:
 * 11500 W. Olympic Blvd., Suite 400
 * Los Angeles, CA 90064
 * USA


 * Phone: (310) 444 3085
 * Fax: (310) 444 3086
 * Website: www.americanfreedomalliance.org

External resources

 * NeoCon Europe American Freedom Alliance

External articles

 * Climate sceptics flirt with intelligent design and Islamophobic group
 * European Freedom Alliance European Freedom Alliance