Boeing Corp. donates more than $1 million to Obama Foundation

WASHINGTON — New million-dollar-plus donors to the Obama Foundation disclosed on Tuesday include the Chicago-based Harris Family Foundation helmed by King Harris and Boeing Corp., headquartered in the city.

Also joining the new million-dollar donor ranks in the last three months of 2018 are Doug Goldman, the former Levi Strauss CEO, and his wife, Lisa, who were in the elite ranks of fundraisers for former President Barack Obama’s White House campaigns.

Previous donors who contributed more money to total more than $1 million are Illinois Tool Works; Kevin Poorman, an Obama Foundation board member; and Lou Sussman, a former Obama Ambassador to Great Britain, and his wife, Marjorie, who were megadonors and fundraisers in Obama’s first run for president.

The Obama Foundation unfortunately only discloses the general range of donations each quarter and posts the names on its website — just the names, nothing else. That worked when Oprah Winfrey donated a million — there is just one of her — but many donors have more common names.

As I note each quarter, Obama Foundation chair Marty Nesbitt tolerates this clumsy, not totally transparent system which will only get more cumbersome as the years go by. Last year, Nesbitt’s foundation leaders changed what had been policy and declined to name any donors on the annual 990 document filed with the IRS.

The Obama Foundation needs to raise more than $500 million alone to construct the proposed Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park. Locating the center in the historic park is the subject of a pending federal lawsuit and a federal review. The names of donors are more important, since City Hall is demanding that the Obama Foundation fund an endowment covering the building costs of the center as part of the deal to give away 19.3 acres in Jackson Park for the complex.

Now a bit about the latest donors…

Boeing is a major supporters of the arts and museums.

King Harris and his family have long ties to Obama. His foundation is a major philanthropic player in Chicago and Harris is a major fundraiser for the Chicago Jewish community.

Obama awarded the National Medal of Arts to Joan Harris, a King Harris aunt, saying at the time in his remarks, “The 2013 National Medal of Arts to Joan Harris for supporting creative expression in Chicago and across our country. Her decades of leadership and generosity have enriched our cultural life and helped countless artists, dancers, singers and musicians bring their talents to center stage.”

Lisa and Doug Goldman were Obama “bundlers,” fundraisers who used their network of connections to raise money for Obama. They hosted a star-studded fundraiser for Obama at their home in Atherton, Calif., in May 2012.

New donors in the vast $250,001-999,999 are Barbara Stiefel, a Florida megadonor to Obama-related campaign funds; Alan Horn, the Walt Disney Studios chairman, and his wife, Cindy; and John Bakalar, a former top executive Rand McNally & Company in Skokie and his wife, Christine.

A group of Obama Foundation donors were in Hawaii earlier this month with Obama when the foundation hosted a new program with 22 “emerging leaders” from across the Asia Pacific.