Organization type: 501(c)(4) social welfare nonprofit (formerly Alliance for America’s Future, IRS-registered 2010; renamed 2015) Principal: Steven Law, President and CEO Registered address: Shared with Senate Leadership Fund super PAC, Haymarket, Virginia Priority: P2 — Network-level financial infrastructure; primary conduit of undisclosed contributions to the Senate Leadership Fund super PAC; documented but not individually alleged criminal conduct

Role

One Nation is a Section 501(c)(4) “social welfare” nonprofit that functions in practice as the issue-advocacy companion to the Senate Leadership Fund (SLF), the super PAC aligned with Senate Republican leadership. Because 501(c)(4) organizations are not required to disclose their donors under federal law, the identities of the individuals and entities financing One Nation are not public — a structure that critics, including CREW and Issue One, describe as “dark money.”

One Nation’s operations are almost entirely oriented around U.S. Senate races. It runs “issue ads” that praise or criticize sitting senators without expressly urging a vote (thereby avoiding classification as express electioneering), and it transfers large sums to the Senate Leadership Fund, which does the explicit electioneering. As of June 30, 2026, One Nation had transferred approximately $70.7 million to SLF since January 2025 — roughly 26–28 percent of that super PAC’s cycle receipts.

Background

Formation and 2015 Takeover

One Nation is not a newly created entity. The organization was originally registered with the IRS in 2010 as the Alliance for America’s Future by Barry Bennett, who later served as a senior adviser to Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign. The IRS granted Alliance for America’s Future 501(c)(4) tax-exempt status within weeks of its application in 2010.

In 2015, Karl Rove associates — led by Steven Law, a former chief of staff to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell — took control of Alliance for America’s Future and renamed it One Nation. Reporting by OpenSecrets in May 2015 described the takeover as strategic: Crossroads GPS, Rove’s original 501(c)(4) vehicle, had applied for tax-exempt status the same year Alliance for America’s Future did (2010) but did not receive its exemption until 2016. Taking over an entity that already held IRS approval provided operatives with a fully-formed 501(c)(4) apparatus without waiting on their own pending application.

Leadership and Shared Infrastructure

Steven Law is president and CEO of One Nation. He simultaneously heads:

• Senate Leadership Fund (super PAC aligned with Senate Republican leadership)
• American Crossroads (super PAC founded by Karl Rove)
• Crossroads GPS (501(c)(4) sibling of American Crossroads)

According to InfluenceWatch, One Nation shares its Haymarket, Virginia office address with the Senate Leadership Fund. Its executive director is Alexander Latcham; Jennifer Fay serves as COO.

The overlap of principals, staff, and address between the 501(c)(4) (One Nation) and the aligned super PAC (SLF) is structurally similar to the Crossroads GPS / American Crossroads pairing that Steven Law also runs.

Regulatory Framework

Under 26 U.S.C. § 501(c)(4), organizations classified as social welfare entities:

• Are exempt from federal income tax
• Are not required to disclose donors on their publicly-available Form 990
• Must have social welfare — not political intervention — as their primary purpose
• May engage in political intervention as a secondary activity, subject to IRS interpretation

The scale and share of One Nation’s spending devoted to political advertising and to transfers to a super PAC have been the subject of ongoing debate over whether such organizations remain within the “primary purpose” test — a debate that has not, to date, resulted in an adverse enforcement action against One Nation.

Documented Actions

1. 2020 Cycle — $172 Million from Anonymous Donors (Calendar 2020)

Evidence: According to IRS Form 990 filings reviewed by CREW (Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington), One Nation raised more than $172 million in 2020 from contributors whose identities the organization is not required to disclose. Two single gifts accounted for a substantial share of the total:

• A single anonymous contribution of $33 million
• A second single anonymous contribution of $13.5 million

SourceOpenSecrets, “Senate GOP ‘dark money’ group passing millions to super PAC, avoiding disclosure,” October 2020. https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2020/10/senate-gop-dark-money/SourceCREW, “Boosted by 8-figure donations, McConnell-aligned nonprofit raised $172 million in 2020,” 2021. https://www.citizensforethics.org/reports-investigations/crew-investigations/boosted-by-8-figure-donations-mcconnell-aligned-nonprofit-raised-172-million-in-2020/One Nation’s admitted political activity for the year — reported on the Form 990 political-activity schedule — consisted of transferring $77.5 million to the Senate Leadership Fund, the super PAC also led by Steven Law. The organization reported total expenditures exceeding $195 million for the year. Additional 2020 grants included $6.9 million to Unite for Colorado, $2.5 million to the American Exceptionalism Institute, $1.5 million to the Government Integrity Fund, $1 million to the 2020 Republican National Convention host committee, and $590,000 to Crossroads GPS.

Pattern: Anonymous large-dollar giving routed through a 501(c)(4) into an aligned super PAC

2. 2021 Georgia Senate Runoff — $22 Million+ to SLF (November 2020 – January 2021)

SourceOpenSecrets, “GOP Senate groups have five times more cash for Georgia runoffs,” December 2020. https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2020/12/georgia-runoffs-gop-senate-groups-5x/SourceFactCheck.org, “Senate Leadership Fund,” March 2022. https://www.factcheck.org/2022/03/senate-leadership-fund-3/Evidence: Ahead of the January 5, 2021, Georgia U.S. Senate runoff elections (Loeffler v. Warnock and Perdue v. Ossoff), One Nation transferred more than $22 million to the Senate Leadership Fund. This transfer is documented in SLF’s contemporaneous FEC filings and constituted a material share of SLF’s Georgia runoff war chest. The Senate Leadership Fund used those funds for independent-expenditure advertising in the runoff races.

Pattern: Cycle-end concentration of 501(c)(4) funds routed into a super PAC for the closing electioneering push

3. 2025–2026 Cycle — Ongoing Transfers to Senate Leadership Fund (January 2025 – Present)

Evidence: For the 2025–2026 election cycle, One Nation has continued as the primary undisclosed-source funder of the Senate Leadership Fund. Per Issue One’s analysis of SLF’s FEC filings:

• March 2026: One Nation transferred $11.18 million to SLF in a single quarter, representing approximately 16 percent of SLF’s $72 million raised that quarter
• Cycle-to-date (January 2025 – June 2026): One Nation had transferred approximately $70.7 million to SLF, roughly 26 percent of SLF’s $175 million in cycle receipts
• By July 2026: One Nation reportedly raised approximately $53.5 million for Republican Senate campaigns for the year

SourceFactCheck.org, “Senate Leadership Fund,” August 2026. https://www.factcheck.org/2026/08/senate-leadership-fund-5/SourceIssue One, “Four main super PACs focused on control of Congress have raised nearly $120 million from allied dark money groups this election cycle,” 2026. https://issueone.org/press/four-main-super-pacs-focused-on-control-of-congress-have-raised-nearly-120-million-from-allied-dark-money-groups-this-election-cycle/SLF has publicly announced plans to spend approximately $350 million during the 2026 midterm cycle on television, digital, streaming, mail, and turnout operations. One Nation is by disclosed volume its single largest 501(c)(4) funding source.

Pattern: Sustained, cycle-over-cycle role as the undisclosed-donor pass-through to the aligned super PAC

4. Named Issue-Ad Campaigns (2020, 2024, 2026)

Evidence: One Nation’s political spending has taken the form of “issue ads” that praise or criticize sitting senators without express advocacy language. Documented campaigns include:

• 2020 cycle: Ads supporting Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA), and then-Sen. David Perdue (R-GA); ads attacking then-Sen. Gary Peters (D-MI) and then-Sen. Doug Jones (D-AL). Approximately $40 million in television ads across 11+ states by September 2020, plus over $2.5 million in Facebook and Google advertising.
• 2024 cycle: $4 million contribution to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce; $1 million to Coalition for Prosperous Communities.
• Early 2026: $5.5 million in ads supporting Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), including a Super Bowl television commercial.

SourceCREW, “Boosted by 8-figure donations, McConnell-aligned nonprofit raised $172 million in 2020,” 2021. https://www.citizensforethics.org/reports-investigations/crew-investigations/boosted-by-8-figure-donations-mcconnell-aligned-nonprofit-raised-172-million-in-2020/SourceInfluenceWatch, “One Nation,” accessed 2026. https://www.influencewatch.org/non-profit/one-nation-2/

Pattern: Issue-framed messaging targeted at sitting senators, positioned to avoid FEC classification as express advocacy

5. Stated Policy Priorities

Evidence: Per InfluenceWatch’s summary of One Nation’s public communications, the organization’s stated issue-advocacy priorities include:

• Confirmation of conservative federal judicial appointments, including Supreme Court justices
• Prescription drug pricing legislation
• Federal investment in artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency
• A federal school choice tax credit
• Border security funding

SourceInfluenceWatch, “One Nation,” accessed 2026. https://www.influencewatch.org/non-profit/one-nation-2/These priorities align closely with legislative and confirmation priorities of Senate Republican leadership. One Nation does not publicly disclose the specific policy criteria it uses to select which senators to support or oppose.

Pattern: Publicly-stated issue agenda aligned with the legislative priorities of the Senate GOP conference

Pattern Analysis

Cross-References

One Nation is a structural node in the post–Citizens United v. FEC (558 U.S. 310 (2010)) donor-disclosure architecture: an entity legally shielded from donor identification that transfers cash to an aligned super PAC that must disclose contributors but is itself not required to identify the original source of funds it receives from the 501(c)(4). It is one of several such arrangements operated by the same principals (see: Crossroads GPS / American Crossroads).

Related profiles:

• defending-the-republic-profile (unrelated principal, distinct scandal; useful contrast — an example of a 501(c)(4) that faced federal grand jury scrutiny for the conduct of its fundraising, whereas One Nation has not)

Related skills:

• corporate-intelligence-investigator (Form 990 review, FEC cross-referencing, entity-tracing methodology)
• public-records-research-specialist (IRS filings, FEC filings)
• democratic-health-monitoring (donor-disclosure architecture as democratic-health indicator)

Severity Assessment

Immediate harm: Low — no documented individual harm; conduct is lawful under current federal campaign finance law.

Democratic erosion: Moderate — the sustained routing of nine-figure sums from unidentified donors into federal Senate elections is a documented factor in the accountability gap between voters and the funders of the advertising directed at them. This is not a characterization unique to critics: SLF’s own filings, and its transparency about its transfers from One Nation, illustrate that the disclosure boundary is inside the 501(c)(4), not at the super PAC.

Authoritarian marker: None specific. The relevant marker is the more general one of reduced information availability to voters about who is funding electoral messaging directed at them.

Accountability Status

Current status: Active — operating as a 501(c)(4) in good standing with the IRS; funding SLF for the 2026 midterm cycle.

Legal exposure:

One Nation has not been the subject of an IRS enforcement action, a federal grand jury investigation, or a state regulatory finding. Its operations, as publicly documented, conform to the current federal statutory and regulatory regime governing 501(c)(4) organizations. The relevant policy debates concern the framework itself, not documented individual violations by this organization.

Ongoing points of legal debate applicable to 501(c)(4)s of One Nation’s profile — none of which have produced adverse rulings against One Nation specifically — include:

• Whether the volume and share of spending devoted to political intervention (including transfers to an aligned super PAC) is consistent with the “primary purpose” test under Treasury regulations
• Whether disclosure of “major donors” on Schedule B (currently withheld from public inspection under Treasury Department policy) should be restored to public availability
• Whether the FEC’s definition of “express advocacy” adequately captures ads that praise or criticize named candidates during an election year

Congressional oversight:

• Senate Finance / House Ways and Means — jurisdiction over 501(c)(4) classification and the “primary purpose” test
• House Administration / Senate Rules and Administration — jurisdiction over federal campaign finance disclosure
• Senate Judiciary / House Judiciary — jurisdiction over the Citizens United framework and any statutory response

Public accountability:

• CREW (Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington) — ongoing tracking of One Nation’s Form 990 filings and SLF transfers
• Issue One — quarterly analysis of 501(c)(4) transfers to aligned super PACs
• OpenSecrets (Center for Responsive Politics) — FEC filing analysis and cross-referencing
• SourceWatch (Center for Media and Democracy) — organizational profile
• FactCheck.org — sourced summaries of SLF and One Nation activity

Sourcing note: most of the characterization of One Nation as a dark-money vehicle originates from organizations that are themselves participants in the disclosure-reform debate (CREW, Issue One, SourceWatch tend to argue for stronger disclosure; InfluenceWatch is operated by the conservative Capital Research Center). The underlying figures (IRS Form 990 revenue and contribution amounts; FEC contribution records) come from primary filings and are not in dispute.

Truth and Reconciliation Considerations

Investigation priorities

1. Identify the individual and corporate donors behind the $33 million and $13.5 million single gifts in 2020, and the analogous large-dollar contributions in the 2021–2026 cycles.
2. Document the internal decision-making by which One Nation selects Senate races and candidates for its issue-ad campaigns, including any coordination with the Senate Leadership Fund principals with whom it shares an address and leadership.
3. Reconstruct the flow of funds from original contributors → One Nation → Senate Leadership Fund → independent expenditure — mapping which original donors bore the ultimate cost of each specific ad campaign.
4. Examine whether the 2015 takeover of Alliance for America’s Future by Rove-affiliated operatives, and the substitution of that entity for the pending Crossroads GPS application, was itself communicated to or reviewed by the IRS as a material change in organizational purpose.
5. Assess whether One Nation’s use of “issue advocacy” language during election periods meets the Buckley v. Valeo (424 U.S. 1 (1976)) express-advocacy standard as applied by contemporary FEC practice.

Testimony value

Compelled testimony from Steven Law, Alexander Latcham, and Jennifer Fay — under use immunity per 18 U.S.C. § 6002 in the event of a future disclosure-reform investigation — could uniquely illuminate:

• Donor solicitation practice — how prospective donors are approached, and what representations are made about donor confidentiality and about the eventual use of contributed funds
• Coordination boundaries — how staff who serve One Nation and the Senate Leadership Fund from the same physical office maintain (or fail to maintain) the coordination boundary that federal law requires between a 501(c)(4) and an independent-expenditure super PAC
• Political-intervention share — how the organization internally measures whether it remains within the IRS’s “primary purpose” test
• Ad-content decision chain — who selects which senators to support or oppose, and against what internally documented criteria

Institutional reform

• Statutory reform: DISCLOSE Act family of proposals — require 501(c)(4) organizations that spend above a threshold on political intervention to disclose donors of $10,000 or more, closing the pass-through gap between the donor and the disclosed super PAC contribution
• Regulatory reform: Schedule B restoration — restore public availability of Form 990 Schedule B (major donor names) for 501(c)(4) organizations, reversing the 2020 Treasury change (T.D. 9898)
• FEC rulemaking — update the express-advocacy standard to reach ads that name federal candidates within a defined pre-election window (analogous to BCRA’s electioneering-communications rule struck down in Citizens United, replaced with a disclosure-only regime)
• IRS “primary purpose” enforcement — issue Treasury guidance quantifying the “primary purpose” test with a bright-line share of expenditures (e.g., under 40 percent political intervention) to end the current case-by-case ambiguity
• Structural separation — require that a 501(c)(4) and an aligned super PAC not share principals, staff, or office space, on the model of the FCC’s structural-separation rules for regulated industries

Cross-References

Skills: corporate-intelligence-investigator, public-records-research-specialist, democratic-health-monitoring, accountability-profile-verification

Related profiles: defending-the-republic-profile

Topics: dark money, 501(c)(4), campaign finance, Senate Leadership Fund, Steven Law, Karl Rove, Mitch McConnell, disclosure reform, issue advocacy

Factual correction requests: If you believe information in this profile is incorrect, please contact factcheck@patriot.university with your name (optional), the specific claim, and any supporting documentation. We review all submissions and correct verified errors promptly.

Investigative trail pointers (public records)

Education only — verify independently. Absence of hits is not proof.

Use public-records-research-specialist, corporate-intelligence-investigator, and public-corruption-ombudsman evidence tiers.

Sources

1. CREW (Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington), “Boosted by 8-figure donations, McConnell-aligned nonprofit raised $172 million in 2020,” 2021. https://www.citizensforethics.org/reports-investigations/crew-investigations/boosted-by-8-figure-donations-mcconnell-aligned-nonprofit-raised-172-million-in-2020/
2. OpenSecrets, “Karl Rove’s ‘new’ group isn’t new, and that could be the point,” May 2015. https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2015/05/roves-new-group-isnt-new-and-that-could-be-the-point/
3. OpenSecrets, “Senate GOP ‘dark money’ group passing millions to super PAC, avoiding disclosure,” October 2020. https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2020/10/senate-gop-dark-money/
4. OpenSecrets, “GOP Senate groups have five times more cash for Georgia runoffs,” December 2020. https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2020/12/georgia-runoffs-gop-senate-groups-5x/
5. Issue One, “Four main super PACs focused on control of Congress have raised nearly $120 million from allied dark money groups this election cycle,” 2026. https://issueone.org/press/four-main-super-pacs-focused-on-control-of-congress-have-raised-nearly-120-million-from-allied-dark-money-groups-this-election-cycle/
6. Issue One, “New Data Illuminates How Secret Money Fuels 2026 Midterms,” 2026. https://issueone.org/press/new-data-illuminates-how-secret-money-fuels-2026-midterms/
7. Issue One, “Top super PACs raise nearly $200 million and counting from secret donors ahead of the 2026 midterms,” 2026. https://issueone.org/articles/top-super-pacs-raise-nearly-200-million-and-counting-ahead-of-the-2026-midterms/
8. FactCheck.org, “Senate Leadership Fund,” March 2022. https://www.factcheck.org/2022/03/senate-leadership-fund-3/
9. FactCheck.org, “Senate Leadership Fund,” August 2026. https://www.factcheck.org/2026/08/senate-leadership-fund-5/
10. InfluenceWatch (Capital Research Center), “One Nation,” accessed 2026. https://www.influencewatch.org/non-profit/one-nation-2/
11. SourceWatch (Center for Media and Democracy), “One Nation.” https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/One_Nation
12. Wikipedia, “Senate Leadership Fund,” accessed 2026. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Senate_Leadership_Fund

Last Updated: 2026-09-01 Profile Status: Active Next Review: Quarterly (Form 990 and FEC filing cycles)