Hold Gates accountable and fight billionaires’ hoarding of wealth

Demand wealth taxes and tax reform!

Contact your WA State Legislators

This year, members of the Washington State legislature introduced a proposal for a new tax on extreme wealth among billionaires. Check out these bills and send a comment to your State Senator and Representatives about why these bills are so important:

Senate Bill 5486: https://tinyurl.com/WASB5486

House Bill 1743: https://tinyurl.com/WAHB1743

You can also find these bills by typing in the bill numbers here: https://app.leg.wa.gov/billinfo/

Sample message: Dear [Senator / Representative LastName], my name is [Name] and I am one of your constituents, based in [City or District]. I’m contacting you because I’m concerned about the undue influence and growing wealth of billionaires, even as many Americans are struggling with rising costs of living and stagnating wages. [optional: insert personal story or perspective] This is why SB 5486 / HB 1743 is so important to me. Please support this bill so that we can have a fairer and more just tax system in Washington state.

 

Contact your members of Congress

At the federal level, call or email your Congresspeople to let them know why they should continue pushing for a wealth tax on billionaires and reforms to the tax code to stop billionaires from evading taxation through private foundations.

Find your Senators here: https://tinyurl.com/findmyUSsenator

Find your Representative here: https://tinyurl.com/findmyUSrepresentative

Sample message: Dear [Senator / Representative LastName], my name is [Name] and I am one of your constituents, based in [City / State]. I’m contacting you because I’m concerned about the undue influence and growing wealth of billionaires and their ability to evade taxes through charitable donations, even as many Americans are struggling with rising costs of living and stagnating wages. Proposals to increase taxation of the 1% and close loopholes have stalled out in Congress; I urge you to fight for new and existing legislation to ensure fairer taxation policies that allow all of us to thrive.

 

Demand more investigation and oversight!

Write to the Washington State Attorney General at https://tinyurl.com/contactWAAG and your members of Congress demand an investigation into how the Gates Foundation uses its tax-free money earmarked for charity to fund private business interests:

Sample message: Dear [Attorney General / Senator / Representative LastName], my name is [Name] and I am one of your constituents, based in [City / State]. I’m contacting you because I’m concerned about the activities of the Gates Foundation, which are increasingly difficult to place under the common definition of charity. As outlined in the book “The Bill Gates Problem,” the foundation is donating funds to several questionable entities, including the elite private high school the Gates children attended, organizations directed by Gates Foundation board members and managers, and private companies in which the Gates Foundation and/or Bill Gates has an equity stake. They’re spending large sums of money to promote the public image of Bill and Melinda Gates and operating with a degree of opacity that makes it difficult to follow the money or verify that foundation funds are being spent in a manner worthy of tax benefits. I urge you to aggressively enforce existing rules and to fight for new rules that make sure that the massive tax subsidies the public provides to the Gates Foundation are not spent on self-serving projects that deliver no public benefit.

 

Support AGRA Watch and the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa (AFSA)

Sign up for Community Alliance for Global Justice’s newsletter: https://cagj.org/enews/

Follow AFSA’s work promoting African-led agroecological solutions and fighting the influence of billionaires and corporations over African food systems: https://tinyurl.com/afsanewsletter

Watch our short film series, Rich Appetites: How Big Philanthropy is Shaping the Future of Food in Africa, co-produced by AGRA Watch and AFSA and share with at least one friend! https://www.richappetitesfilm.com/

Summary: Billionaire philanthropists, led by Bill Gates and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, are pushing US-style industrial agriculture around the globe—including in Africa. Industrial agriculture is the single largest cause of biodiversity loss worldwide, fails to solve hunger, and hurts small-scale farmers and the planet. Learn more in five short films: The Foundation, Seeds, Money, Science, & Agroecology in Action.

 

Tell USAID: Oppose the Gates-funded AGRA initiative

Join AGRA Watch and our partners in demanding that the US Agency for International Development stop using taxpayer dollars to fund the Gates Foundation’s AGRA initiative, which aims to industrialize African farming and open markets for corporations. Send an email to USAID: https://tinyurl.com/defundagra

 

Opt Out of Standardized Tests

If you are a teacher, administrator, parent, or student, join the national Opt Out movement. Read Jesse Hagopian’s account of how Seattle’s Garfield High School has successfully mobilized against standardized tests and the Gates Foundation-imposed Common Core curriculum: https://tinyurl.com/jessehagopian