Donald Trump‘s biggest gay supporter, professional troll, Breitbart tech editor, and writer slash intern manager and credit taker Milo Yiannopoulos appears to have borrowed a play from his preferred presidential candidate’s book when it comes to questionable charity dealings.
Related: Yiannopoulos Appears At Gay Pro-Trump Rally After Twitter Ban
In one of his desperate attention grabs, Yiannopoulos created the tacky, albeit slightly amusing, Yiannopoulos Privilege Grant exclusively for white men back in January. Because, after all, isn’t it finally time that white men got a leg up in America after all of these years zero years of collective oppression?
It may have been little more than an obvious publicity stunt from a self-hating lost boy meant to piss of non-assholes everywhere, but it has managed to raise between $100,000 to $250,000 to date, Yiannopoulos told The Daily Beast. Yet no one has received a cent so far, despite the fact that the money was supposed to go out in “early summer 2016.”
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So where is it? In Yiannopoulos’s personal bank account, he admitted in an interview with The Daily Beast.
Related: Milo Yiannopoulos Admits He’s Sexually Attracted To Donald Trump
Canadian conservative YouTube personality Margaret MacLennan says she was tasked with running the grant. She recently tweeted alleging Yiannopoulos was wiring money from the fund into his bank account, kicking off the controversy.
We all know I clearly profited from donations made to the Grant. @NormalBot pic.twitter.com/je8MHetIaf
— Mar-A-Lago (@MargaretsBelly) August 17, 2016
While Yiannopoulos claims lawyers are busy drafting paperwork to make it a legal charity, experts say the way donations were accepted was unethical and possibly illegal, The Daily Beast reports.
According to Pace University law professor James Fishman, Yiannopoulos’s charity must file a Form 1023 for tax-exempt status with the IRS within 27 months of the first month it was incorporated.
“Given the amount of money raised, I think it is inexcusable that this organization has not filed the Form 1023, or found an exempt 501(c)(3) organization willing to serve as the fiscal sponsor of the organization you mention,” Fishman said, adding that a fiscal sponsor is a “sponsoring organization that controls the books of the not yet exempt nonprofit, which can bootstrap on the fiscal sponsor’s exempt status.”
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“There’s state and federal laws against fraud and misrepresentation for declaring a scholarship fund prior to getting an exemption,” Ellis M. Carter, a lawyer specializing in nonprofit groups said. “They need to be honest about their status if they’re not a 501(c)3.”
While there was an initial promise that an application page would open on the website by the spring of 2016, it has still not appeared. The grant’s website includes a contact form but above that it reads, “applications are not yet open” and “please do not write to us if you are a prospective Grant applicant.”
“The initial flurry of interest in the Privilege Grant, and my skyrocketing media profile, left us behind on logistics,” Yiannopoulos said in a statement to The Daily Beast on Thursday. He also announced a new “administrative lead,” Colin Madine, after a series of questions about the program from The Daily Beast and on social media.
“This was compounded by our previous administrator leaving the team. I am pleased to have Colin leading the Privilege Grant team so we can begin to help students achieve their college dreams in short order,” he added.
Under the heading “When will Grants be available?” the website now reads, “The Privilege Grant will run a pilot grant program for the Spring semester of the 2016-2017 school year, with applications opening in the winter. The full grant program will be administered for the 2017-2018 school year. More details will be released in the coming months.”
Yiannopoulos was previously questioned by British investigators over unpaid wages during his tenure as the editor-in-chief of a tech blog called The Kernel, which was acquired by the parent company of The Daily Dot in 2014.
jdboston617
Ooops… I’m boycotting The Daily Beast after the Olympics Grindr scandal. I stopped reading after seeing the source…
Brian
Milo is hilarious, the most subversive gay-identifying guy in America. He’s rocking an extremely staid and stereotypical gay scene.
I’m certain this financial thing will be sorted out.
UltimateSin
Anyone who donated to this deserves to lose their
money.
Ogre Magi
I hope Milo Yiannopoulos realizes that after what he said about Leslie Jones no black man is gonna ever pork him again?
jefflassiterart
He’s vile. I listened to him twice on the Joe Rogan podcast. He’s like a less masculine Ann Coulter.
inbama
I bet she leaves tracks.
Goforit
jefflasseterart…. Hell, at least half of us are less masculine than Coulter.
Stilinski26
Daily Beast? Lol