Alex Rodriguez's charity raised $403K in 2006 but donated only $5K
Alex Rodriguez raised more than $400K for charity in 2006 but reportedly donated only $5K of it. (Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images)
A Boston Globe review of more than 150 Internal Revenue Service filings by 50 nonprofits launched by professional athletes found that New York Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez had raised $403,862 through his A-Rod Family Foundation in 2006 but donated only $5,090 of it to charitable causes.
According to the report published in February, Rodriguez operated the foundation and donated $5,000 to Jay-Z’s Shawn Carter Scholarship Fund and $90 to a Little League Baseball club in Miami. But documents show that only one percent of the funds raised were actually given away. A year later, in 2007, the IRS officially stripped the A-Rod Family Foundation of its tax exempt status after it failed to submit the proper paperwork.
Rodriguez said prior to launching the charity that he wanted to reverse bad publicity he received after being outed as a member of an underground poker club, and thus he founded a celebrity poker tournament with hip-hop mogul Jay-Z in an effort to raise money for charity:
“I got in some trouble for poker last year, so why not turn it around and raise some money for the children?” Rodriguez said in an interview with MLB.com at the time.
