{"id":22590,"date":"2025-09-06T18:35:26","date_gmt":"2025-09-06T22:35:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/idavox.com\/?p=22590"},"modified":"2025-09-06T18:35:29","modified_gmt":"2025-09-06T22:35:29","slug":"ny-attorney-general-sues-vdare-peter-and-lydia-brimelow-for-self-dealing-and-abuse-of-charitable-assets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/idavox.com\/index.php\/2025\/09\/06\/ny-attorney-general-sues-vdare-peter-and-lydia-brimelow-for-self-dealing-and-abuse-of-charitable-assets\/","title":{"rendered":"NY Attorney General Sues VDARE & Peter and Lydia Brimelow for “Self-Dealing and Abuse of Charitable Assets”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Looks like the announcement that VDARE was shutting down was a ruse! And we are loving this! Trump’s White Supremacist advisor Stephen Miller loves Peter Brimelow. When he was a student at Duke University he and his friend Richard Spencer invited him to speak there. So you know he is really hating all this right now as much as we love it!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Letitia James, New York State Attorney General (press release)<\/a><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

NEW YORK \u2013 New York Attorney General Letitia James today filed a lawsuit against the VDARE Foundation (VDARE) and its leaders<\/a>, founder Peter Brimelow and his wife, Lydia Brimelow, for years of self-dealing and abuse of charitable assets in violation of New York law. The lawsuit alleges that the Brimelows diverted at least $2 million in charitable funds from VDARE to benefit themselves and their families, while the organization repeatedly failed to submit required financial filings or submitted untruthful certifications. VDARE also continued to solicit donations even after publicly \u2013 and falsely \u2013 declaring it had shut down. Attorney General James is seeking to recover monetary damages and permanently bar the Brimelows from soliciting for or managing any New York charity. Attorney General James is also asking the court to dissolve the VDARE Foundation and place the charity\u2019s remaining assets under court supervision to be redirected to legitimate charitable purposes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cCharities are intended to serve the public, not to bankroll castles or pad personal fortunes,\u201d said Attorney General James<\/strong>. \u201cThe Brimelows used VDARE like their personal piggy bank, draining millions in charitable assets to enrich themselves. New Yorkers deserve accountability, and we will not allow these bad actors to keep abusing the trust of their donors and the public. My office is taking action to ensure these funds are used for their intended charitable purpose, remove the Brimelows from control, and shut down this fraudulent organization.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

VDARE was originally established in 1999 as a New York charitable nonprofit under the name Lexington Research Institute, Ltd. Although it presented itself as a charitable research organization, in practice, its primary activity was operating VDARE.com, a blog dedicated to opposing immigration. From its inception, VDARE\u2019s board was limited only to the Brimelows, their family members, and close associates \u2013 a structure that enabled years of unchecked self-dealing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Peter Brimelow, Steven Bannon and Lydia Brimelow taking a selfie. For those asking, Peter is 77 and his wife Lydia is ummm….not. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

An investigation by the Office of the Attorney General (OAG) uncovered that in 2020, the Brimelows used $1.4 million of VDARE\u2019s charitable funds to buy a medieval-style castle in Berkeley Springs, West Virginia. The castle was purportedly acquired for VDARE to use for offices and conferences, but the Brimelows promptly moved their family in and then orchestrated a series of transactions transferring ownership of the property to companies they owned or controlled. These arrangements, structured by Lydia Brimelow\u2019s father, were rubber-stamped by a board dominated by the Brimelows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After transferring ownership of the castle to their family\u2019s out-of-state companies, the Brimelows set up a rent-back scheme, in which VDARE paid \u201crent\u201d to the Brimelow-controlled entities in exchange for continued use of the castle and its grounds. Through sham lease agreements and backdated loans, the Brimelows were able to extract hundreds of thousands of dollars from VDARE. Lydia Brimelow also pledged all of VDARE\u2019s assets as collateral for a loan from a company managed by her father. Any purported board review of these transactions was meaningless because the board itself was dominated by the Brimelows and family members.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When OAG began its investigation in 2022, the Brimelows repeatedly sought to obstruct it. They ignored lawful investigatory subpoenas, withheld records, and forced the OAG to go to court simply to obtain basic documents. Even after being ordered to comply by a judge, they continued to resist. VDARE has been held in contempt of court twice, owes tens of thousands of dollars in unpaid fines that continue to accrue, and still refuses to comply with court orders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Lydia Brimelow showing up on the Twitter show of VDARE fan Tucker Carlson back in February. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Attorney General James alleges these obstructionist tactics were part of a calculated effort to avoid accountability and cover up years of wrongdoing that continued even while OAG\u2019s investigation was underway. Indeed, as OAG\u2019s scrutiny increased, the Brimelows accelerated their asset-stripping: inflating monthly \u201crent\u201d payments from $6,000 to $33,000 in just four months, releasing companies under their control from more than $1 million in mortgage obligations, and quietly transferring the remaining shares of the castle to an out-of-state for-profit company believed to be controlled by Lydia Brimelow\u2019s father.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2024, VDARE publicly announced<\/a> it was shutting down and closed its website. By this point, millions of dollars in charitable assets had been funneled to family-controlled entities, leaving only $150,000 in VDARE\u2019s accounts. In total, VDARE sent:<\/p>\n\n\n\n