SACRAMENTO -- — Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Thursday revealed for the first time the names of donors to a secretive nonprofit group that has funded his trips by private jet to countries around the world.
Schwarzenegger's benefactors, who will be eligible to receive tax breaks for their contributions to the California State Protocol Foundation, are a cross-section of the powerful: wealthy philanthropists, financiers, corporate moguls, Silicon Valley executives and Napa Valley and Sonoma County vintners.
The governor's aides and the foundation say the arrangement takes a financial burden off taxpayers while allowing Schwarzenegger to serve as an ambassador for the state. Watchdog groups contend it has the potential to allow moneyed donors to wield undue influence without public scrutiny.
The foundation is set up under the same rules as the United Way and Red Cross. State law does not require disclosure of its donors unless the contributions are made at a politician's behest.
Schwarzenegger solicited the $435,000 in gifts for the protocol foundation at a Nov. 7 fundraiser in San Francisco.
In the past, Schwarzenegger's office and the foundation have refused to provide the names of contributors or their links to Schwarzenegger and state government. Their donations paid for his and aides' journeys to Israel, China, Japan, Canada and Europe on trips, described by the governor's office as trade missions, costing hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The group also paid for part of Schwarzenegger's state delegation to China in October for the Special Olympics, an event founded by his mother-in-law.
Under state law, Schwarzenegger, a Republican, must report the donations to the state's Fair Political Practices Commission. Schwarzenegger spokesman Aaron McLear said the governor had never personally raised money for the foundation before.
"That's an outside entity to us," McLear said. "They deal with how they want to disclose -- or not disclose -- their donors."
Some who gave at the fundraiser, held at the DeYoung Museum in San Francisco, have close ties to Schwarzenegger. Lissa Morgenthaler-Jones, a retired money manager from Woodside, Calif., and the daughter of venture capitalist David Morgenthaler, led a campaign to change the U.S. Constitution so Schwarzenegger could run for president even though he was born in Austria.
She gave $10,000, and her mother, Lindsay Morgenthaler of Ohio, gave $5,000.
