James Nederlander Still Donating Thousands to GOP

James Nederlander(Photo by Bruce Glikas/Getty Images)

In June 2020, James Nederlander, president of the Nederlander organization, faced backlash over thousands of dollars in donations to Donald Trump and other GOP organizations. in response to the backlash, Nederlander pledged to donate $50,000 to Black Lives Matter.

But despite the public backlash from within the theatre industry, that hasn’t stopped Nedarlander from giving money to GOP politicians and PACs as recently as November 2021.

My initial report on his political donations was published on June 5, 2020. According to records, Nederlander donated to over a dozen politicians on June 8, 2020. While most were Democrats, he did donate $1,000 to Republican Senator John Cornyn of Texas. Cornyn’s criticism of gay marriage was front and center during the confirmation hearings of Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson.

Just six months later, Niederlander donated $1,000 to Florida Republican senator, Marco Rubio. Rubio recently pledged his support for Florida’s controversial Parental Rights in Education bill (dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” bill by its critics).

This past November, he donated two payments of $5,000 to Nikki Haley’s Stand for America PAC. Haley, positioning herself as a power player in the GOP has made it her PAC’s goal to support the election of GOP candidates across the country. While Haley is seen as an opponent of Donald Trump’s influence on the party, that hasn’t stopped her from endorsing a slew of controversial, anti-Gay & Trans, anti-Union, candidates such as Sen. Ron Johnson, Herschel Walker, and Sarah Palin.

It was fair to call Nedlander’s donation practices into question in 2020 and it’s fair to call them into question now. While he pledged to make a $50,000 donation to the now-controversial Black Lives Matter organization, he didn’t apologize for his past donations nor did he say he would cease donating to such figures.

Is Nederlander free to do whatever he wants with his money and donate to political causes as he chooses? Yes, of course. But it’s also fair to call into question a Broadway power player donating funds raised by members of the theatre community, to politicians and candidates that want to inflict irreparable harm on that same community.

With his donations, can he control what politicians do? Depending on the amount, sure. But the GOP has made it crystal clear what their intentions are for members of the LGBTQIA+ community, women, Dreamers, BIPOC, among plenty of others.

Nederlander is a producer of the soon-to-open “A Strange Loop”. I find it disturbing that he has no problem earning money off the show's employees and then using that money to fund politicians that want to strip those employees of their rights. And if you watch what these politicians are saying, that’s very much what they want to do.

I don’t expect everyone to be angered by this. I’m sure there are many who don’t have a problem with what Nederlander is doing. At the same time, I’m willing to bet most of those folks have never had their rights targeted by political strategies. You can disagree with me, but I have a huge problem with James Nederlander basically saying to the Broadway community, “Make me money, so I can give it to people who will ruin your lives.”