Browse sourced findings, connection research, and open questions. Each entry retains the status and qualifications recorded with the research. A connection research note is not automatically a verified network-map relationship.
Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: D&P Judith Ellis role and TBI Cheryl Miller role verified from official organization sites. IVF director roles are secondary reporting said to rely on Idaho SOS records; exact primary filing/identity match still unresolved.
Defend and Protect Idaho's current official website identifies Judith Ellis as its treasurer. Take Back Idaho's current official website identifies Cheryl Miller as a board member. Separately, April 2026 Observer/Honor Idaho reporting states that Idaho Secretary of State nonprofit corporation records for Idaho Values First list Judith Ellis, Cheryl Miller and Rolando Ruano as current directors. If those reported corporate records refer to the same individu…
Read note and sources →Research finding · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: Revenue and grant amounts verified from filing-derived records; concentration established, but legal control and downstream earmarking are not established.
Western Futures Fund’s dependence on a small number of large institutional grants is quantitatively significant. WFF’s FY2022 filing reports total revenue of $3,427,856. Sixteen Thirty Fund’s reported 2022 grant to WFF was $2,225,000, equal to approximately 64.9% of WFF’s total reported revenue for that year. In FY2024, WFF reported $8,735,000 total revenue; grants received included $2,750,000 from Sixteen Thirty Fund and $1,780,000 from New Venture Fund. …
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: Verified organization-to-organization grant relationships from IRS-derived Schedule I records. Coordination and earmarking not established.
IRS-derived grant records show Western Futures Fund (WFF) funded several Idaho or Idaho-linked advocacy/electoral nodes across 2022–2024. WFF gave Votes Idaho Corporation $562,000 across three grants in 2022–2024; Conservation Voters for Idaho $145,000 in 2023; Idahoans United for Women and Families $60,000 in 2024; and Way Back PAC $200,000 across 2022–2024, including $100,000 in 2024. WFF's FY2024 filing reports receiving $2.75 million from Sixteen Thirt…
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: IRS-derived funding and program-description facts verified; no identity link to America Votes’ Idaho state table or common control is established.
Votes Idaho Company is not described in its latest filing merely as a single-issue advocacy organization. Filing-derived program descriptions say it organized workshops, seminars and educational events; facilitated coordination among various issue-advocacy groups to amplify collective impact; provided a platform for organizations to share resources, best practices and strategic insights; and organized regular meetings, conferences and webinars to foster co…
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: IRS-derived organizational grants verified; no same-dollar pass-through from America Votes to Sixteen Thirty or Western Futures is established.
Tioga Fund creates another crossline among major democracy/election-adjacent funding nodes. IRS-derived grant records show America Votes gave Tioga Fund approximately $1.1 million in 2021. Tioga’s outgoing grant records show it gave Sixteen Thirty Fund $100,000 in 2020, $55,000 in 2021 and $292,000 in 2022, approximately $447,000 total; it also gave Western Futures Fund $100,000 in 2022, with filing-derived purpose data describing that WFF grant as “Democr…
Read note and sources →Research finding · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: PRIMARY IRS VERIFIED. Formal board and outsourced day-to-day management are both documented; individual decision authority remains unresolved.
Western Futures Fund's FY2024 public filing reports three independent voting board members: Michael Hennesy (president), Jeremy Krones (treasurer), and Christopher Hirsch (secretary), each with $0 reportable compensation. The filing reports no salary/wage expense. Separately, Schedule O states Blue Moon Strategies is responsible for day-to-day operations as management consultant. Schedule C reports $2.67M paid from WFF funds to four PACs in 2024: Your Comm…
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: PRIMARY VERIFIED grant purpose; contemporaneous Idaho Open Primaries work verified separately. Idaho earmarking/pass-through remains unproved.
Unite America Institute’s own 2023 Form 990 Schedule I provides the purpose of its $25,000 grant to Mormon Women for Ethical Government Foundation (EIN 82-2899244): “TO CREATE, PRODUCE, AND DISSEMINATE EDUCATIONAL CONTENT ON THE PROBLEMS WITH THE CURRENT ELECTION SYSTEM AND POTENTIAL SOLUTIONS.” This is primary grant-purpose evidence, not merely a grant-database inference. The grant occurred in the same year MWEG’s Idaho chapter formally joined the Idahoan…
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: Verified multi-hop organizational funding relationships. Specific-dollar tracing/earmarking is not established.
A multi-hop organizational funding path is documented across filings. Western Futures Fund granted Western State(s) Strategies $13,500 in 2022 and $10,000 in 2024 (aggregate about $23,500; grant databases round to about $24,000). Western States Strategies, EIN 93-1316666, is a Portland 501(c)(4) affiliated with Western States Center and is also known as Western State Strategies. The Democracy Program Political Fund, a 527 whose stated purpose is 'to influe…
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: Verified operational/public-advocacy role from contemporaneous reporting. Campaign-wide strategic control and any Idaho Solutions organizational role in Prop 1 remain unproved.
Cindy Wilson’s connection to Idahoans for Open Primaries is stronger than coalition proximity alone. Idaho Capital Sun reporting from October 2023 identifies Wilson, acting with Mormon Women for Ethical Government, as personally gathering signatures for the Open Primaries initiative in Meridian and quotes her explaining why she was supporting the initiative through MWEG. Associated Press imagery/reporting from April 2024 likewise identifies Wilson with MWE…
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: Verified NEA→IEA $500K ballot-initiative funding and verified IEA endorsement of Reclaim's Quality Education Act; direct earmarking of those funds to Reclaim/QEA not proven.
The National Education Association's FY2022 federal LM-2 report lists four payments to the Idaho Education Association totaling exactly $500,000, each described as 'Ballot Init support grant': $101,000 on Jan. 10, $250,000 on Mar. 22, $101,000 on Apr. 25, and $48,000 on Aug. 31, 2022. During the same period, IEA publicly and unanimously endorsed Reclaim Idaho's Quality Education Act, which was the major statewide citizen education initiative Reclaim was qu…
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: Strong direct-Idaho secondary evidence plus verified national 501(c)(3) grant route; legal entities and earmarking kept separate.
The Veterans branch now has two distinct Unite America funding routes that must be kept legally separate. First, contemporaneous 2024 Idaho campaign-finance reporting based on Idaho Secretary of State data states that Veterans for Idaho Voters received more than $109,000 in donations, including a $100,000 contribution directly from Unite America PAC; the group ran Facebook ads supporting Proposition 1. Second, Unite America Institute’s 2023 Form 990 Schedu…
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: PRIMARY FEC VERIFIED direct Way Back→Colin Nash campaign contribution; personnel/electoral crossline established. No Votes Idaho grant pass-through or coordination is established.
Way Back PAC, whose January 2026 FEC Statement of Organization identifies Western Futures Fund as its Connected Organization, made a $1,000 contribution on September 30, 2025 to Colin Nash For Boise for Nash’s Boise City Council campaign. The primary FEC Schedule B row identifies the recipient as Colin Nash For Boise, gives a Boise address, labels the payment a contribution to a non-federal committee, and includes the memo ID - Colin Nash (Boise City Counc…
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: PRIMARY leadership/initiative role plus current campaign-finance spending verified. Western Futures $60K general-purpose grant is documented, but no specific WFF dollar is traced to a vendor or initiative expense.
The Western Futures→Idahoans United branch now has an identifiable Idaho strategist and a detailed expenditure profile. Western Futures Fund’s FY2024 grant records report a $60,000 general-purpose grant to Idahoans United for Women and Families. In a sworn January 2025 declaration to the Idaho Supreme Court, Melanie Folwell stated that she is Idahoans United’s executive director and member, has held the leadership position since 2024, and in that role orga…
Read note and sources →Research finding · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: Verified from IRS-derived FY2025 filing data. Financial scale, contribution dependence and Dixon compensation established; donor identities remain unresolved.
IRS-derived FY2025 Form 990 data for Idaho Solutions Inc. (EIN 33-2605998), Kimberly, Idaho, reports approximately $83,000 total revenue, all reported as contributions and grants, approximately $45,000 total expenses, approximately $39,000 year-end net assets, and $0 liabilities. Chenele Dixon is reported as Secretary/Treasurer with $12,000 compensation. The filing reports a 55% program-service expense ratio. Idaho Solutions is recognized as an active 501(…
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: Verified authorship/personnel-history overlap; paid vendor/client relationship between Atlas and Idaho Leaders United NOT established.
Idaho Leaders United’s own updates page attributes numerous 2024 posts to Amanda Watson, including member profiles and issue statements. Watson is independently identified by Atlas Strategic Communications and public records as Atlas’s founder/president; Atlas’s own materials describe the firm as an issues-centric communications/public-affairs agency specializing in strategic communications, public engagement, media, paid media and stakeholder work. Idaho …
Read note and sources →Research finding · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: Verified from sworn declaration and contemporaneous reporting. No adverse inference from education, employment, scholarships, or academic interests.
Luke Mayville co-founded Reclaim Idaho in Sandpoint in 2017. In a sworn declaration filed in Idaho litigation, Mayville said his Reclaim role included setting strategic priorities, fundraising, media communications, opinion writing, drafting initiative proposals, and statewide volunteer/leader recruitment. He said he attended North Idaho College, graduated summa cum laude from the University of Oregon in 2008, received McNair and Gilman scholarships, studi…
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: Strong secondary campaign-finance aggregation; primary Idaho Sunshine transaction row/date/purpose pending.
Transparency USA's current Idaho 2026-cycle committee aggregation for Veterans for Idaho Voters Inc. reports $78,457 in total contributions and identifies Idahoans for Open Primaries as a $75,000 entity contributor. If the underlying Idaho Sunshine transaction row confirms the aggregation, that single contribution represents about 95.6% of V4IV's reported cycle contributions. V4IV is the Idaho affiliate of Veterans for All Voters and was a formal member of…
Read note and sources →Research finding · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: Primary tax-filing extraction; upstream donor attribution to these payments is not established.
Western Futures Fund FY2024 Form 990 Schedule C reports payments from the organization’s funds of $1,500,000 to Your Community PAC, $970,000 to Retire Career Politicians Inc., $100,000 to Way Back PAC, and $100,000 to Wyoming Way PAC. The filing separately describes an Electoral program involving leadership development related to potential candidates for public office and grants to political organizations, with approximately $2.9 million in program expense…
Read note and sources →Research finding · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: PRIMARY VERIFIED governance plus Idaho grants. Former-administration personnel link established; Obama administration/federal funding or direction is NOT established.
A direct former-Obama-administration governance link exists at Sixteen Thirty Fund during years in which the fund made direct Idaho grants. The Obama White House archive identifies Raul Alvillar as an Associate Director for Public Engagement. Harvard's Institute of Politics biography states that Alvillar worked on Barack Obama's 2007 presidential campaign, served in several Obama administration roles including Associate Director of the White House Office o…
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: PRIMARY VERIFIED funding links and contemporaneous Idaho policy activity. Same-dollar earmarking, personal direction and bill-specific funding are NOT established.
A same-year 2021 institutional chain now directly connects George Soros-funded Open Society Policy Center to a national funder that gave money to an Idaho organization actively engaged in Idaho legislative-policy advocacy. Open Society's own historical annual report describes Open Society Policy Center (OSPC) as a nonpartisan 501(c)(4) public-policy organization 'funded directly by George Soros.' OSPC's primary 2021 Form 990 Schedule I lists eighteen separ…
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: Verified c4 grant amounts/purpose and official Idaho partnership; Idaho earmarking/downstream transfer not established.
Open Primaries’ 501(c)(4), Open Primaries Inc. (EIN 47-1494685), received a $340,000 FY2023 grant from Unite America Inc. (the separate 501(c)(4), EIN 82-1106814). IRS-derived records reproduce the Unite grant purpose as “TO BUILD PUBLIC SUPPORT FOR OPEN OR NONPARTISAN PRIMARIES.” Open Primaries’ official Idaho page lists Reclaim Idaho and Idahoans for Open Primaries as its Idaho state partners. Open Primaries’ own research page also lists a declaration by…
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: Verified direct grant relationships; Common Ground contact with WSC does not establish that these funders supported Common Ground or Idaho activity.
Western States Center, which Common Ground—United We Stand says Dixon and Conrad met during their 2024 national coalition-building effort, has a broad institutional funding base. IRS-derived 2019–2024 grant records identify approximately $385,000 from Foundation to Promote Open Society across four grants and approximately $352,000 from New Venture Fund across two grants, alongside larger totals from Meyer Memorial Trust, Fidelity Charitable, Catena Foundat…
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: Verified contact, affiliate structure and organization-to-organization transactions; no causal or same-dollar connection from Common Ground to Idaho PAC spending established.
Common Ground — United We Stand's December 2024 newsletter says Chenele Dixon and Charlie Conrad met with Western States Center and that the meeting led to additional connections with pro-democracy/effective-government organizations. Western States Center's current website states it is the joint website of Western States Center, a 501(c)(3), and Western States Strategies, a 501(c)(4); Western States Strategies separately describes itself as organized and o…
Read note and sources →Connection research · 2026-09-15
Recorded status: Verified personnel/campaign links from City of Boise filings, campaign materials, nonprofit filings and contemporaneous reporting. No organizational control/coordination inference.
Multiple documented personnel links connect the Reclaim/Votes Idaho/Idahoans United orbit to Boise Mayor Lauren McLean's political network. Yvonne 'Sam' Sandmire, who served as Reclaim Idaho's Ada County co-chair during the 2018 Medicaid campaign and later as a Reclaim Idaho Fund director, was officially appointed political treasurer for Lauren McLean for Boise in 2019; McLean's second-term campaign site continued to identify Sam Sandmire as treasurer. Luk…
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