Just three years ago the Democratic Party was in disarray. Despite record high-dollar donations from affluent supporters, Democrats had failed to reclaim the White House and Congress. Shell-shocked by their defeat, George Soros and other wealthy liberals formed a loose-knit group to consider how to fund a political comeback. Their answer: Create a permanent political infrastructure of nonprofits, think tanks, media outlets, leadership schools, and activist groups—a kind of “vast left-wing conspiracy” to compete with the conservative movement. The group they created –called the Democracy Alliance (DA)— is meant to be a financial clearinghouse. The Alliance got off to a rocky start, but to date it’s brokered more than $100 million in grants to liberal nonprofits. The goal is not merely to elect Democrats this November, but to permanently realign U.S. politics.
