An advocacy group funded by liberal billionaire George Soros has poured $72 million into lobbying efforts since President Donald Trump took office, the Washington Free Beacon reported.
The amount Soros’s Open Society Policy Center, a nonprofit that focuses on domestic and international advocacy, according to its tax forms, is a big increase over what the total it spent its prior 14 years, the news outlet reported.
From 2002 to 2016, OSPC reported spending a total of $56.65 million, which works out to an average $4 million a year; since Trump was sworn into office, the group has averaged $25 million per year in lobbying-related expenditures.
Soros's group has both in-house lobbyists and provides grants to other liberal organizations for their lobbying, the Free Beacon reported. It reported spending $15.89 million throughout the third quarter, according to its filings.
OSPC has spent $24.41 million this year, in line with its record from last year.
Throughout 2018, it sank $31.5 million into lobbying and was among the top three lobbyist spenders, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics.
"We are proud of our work and fearless in meeting the moral obligation of the moment to support organizations opposing hate filled attacks on synagogues, communities of color, and immigrants and refugees," Tom Perriello, who leads OSPC's work, told the news outlet.
"On some of the issues we work on, there historically had been a bipartisan consensus. But an administration that casually and callously refers to lynchings and coups and calls parts of the Constitution ‘phony' presents historic challenges,” he added.