The Family Research Council is fundraising against Chick-fil-A as part of its annual “Giving Tuesday” effort to drum up cash.
The Giving Tuesday movement began in 2012 as a day designed to boost charitable donations, but it has become the latest battleground in the culture wars between the political left and right.
The Christian advocacy group’s decision to trash Chick-fil-A represents a new skirmish developing in recent months. FRC President Tony Perkins has previously spoken critically of Chick-fil-A and now has taken the new step of fundraising against the restaurant.
“Breaking news just days ago revealed that not only has Chick-fil-A abandoned donations to Christian groups including the Salvation Army, it has donated to the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) — one of the most extreme anti-Christian groups in America,” Mr. Perkins wrote in a fundraising appeal for Giving Tuesday. “As you know, the Family Research Council’s mission is to magnify your voice here in Washington, D.C., which then reverberates all across America. … The opposition just strengthens our resolve to stand firm for the truth.”
Chick-fil-A’s donation to the SPLC particularly angered the Family Research Council, given a shooting aimed at FRC employees in 2012. A gunman rushed the group’s Washington offices, planning to smear Chick-fil-A sandwiches on his intended victims. He credited the SPLC with inspiring his actions.
FRC’s Giving Tuesday fundraising appeal included a “special $100,000 challenge match” in which donations up to the six-figure limit would be matched by unnamed donors.
The group’s liberal opponents mounted similar campaigns Tuesday. Planned Parenthood’s Giving Tuesday drive included a nearly identical fundraising pitch while warning that its opponents “won’t stop in 2020.”
“Thanks to an anonymous donor, you can make TWICE the impact. Every Giving Tuesday gift to Planned Parenthood will be matched, dollar-for-dollar, up to a total of $100,000,” Planned Parenthood said in its fundraising appeal. “You know what’s at stake: Affordable, high-quality reproductive health care. Safe, legal abortion. Comprehensive sex education.”
The “Giving Tuesday” movement is intended to counter the consumerism of the “Black Friday” and “Cyber Monday” efforts kick-starting the holiday shopping season.
In 2018, the 92nd Street Y counted nearly $400 million raised online for Giving Tuesday across the United States. The group’s running tabulation says more than $1 billion has been raised online in the U.S. for Giving Tuesday since the onset of the movement in 2012.
• Ryan Lovelace can be reached at rlovelace@washingtontimes.com.
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