Amway founder Richard DeVos and his family have donated more than $2 million to various anti-gay causes over the years, including but not limited to Florida4Marriage, Focus On The Family and efforts to eliminate gay marriage in Michigan. Aside from a squeamish arrangement with the New York Mets, DeVos is probably best known to CSTB readers as the owner of the Orlando Magic, and it was in that role Wednesday that DeVos donated $400,000 to #OneOrlando, a non-profit established to assist the victims of Sunday’s Pulse nightclub massacre, as well as their families. From the New York Daily News’ Tobias Salinger :
“There is nothing more important than our community,” the Magic announced in a tweet from the team’s official account. “We are #OrlandoUnited.”Yet the family of Amway founder Richard DeVos, whose income Forbes magazine estimated at $4.9 billion, has financed campaigns to ban same-sex marriage in the past and steered millions of dollars to right-wing organizations, records showed.
“If you know about Orlando Magic owner Dick DeVos’ bankrolling of anti-LGBT causes, the hypocrisy will rankle you,” Dave Zirin, the sports editor of the liberal magazine The Nation, wrote on Twitter Wednesday.
Magic spokesman Joel Glass declined to discuss the DeVos’ family’s political donations.
“Our thoughts and prayers are with the families and the victims of this horrific tragedy,” Glass said.