Who is Patrisse Cullors' wife Janaya Khan? BLM co-founder transferred MILLIONS to buy mansion
Janaya Khan is a well-known Canadian activist who graduated from York University with a bachelor's degree in English language and literature. She is currently the program director for Color Of Change in Los Angeles, as well as a speaker for Keppler Speakers Bureau.Khan is a co-founder of Black Lives Matter Toronto and an international ambassador for the Black Lives Matter Network. After meeting Patrisse Cullors in June 2015, they both got married in the spring of 2016. Cullors is a co-founder of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement.
In 2016, Toronto Life named Khan as one of "Toronto's Most Influential". She is characterized as "a black, queer, gender-nonconforming activist (pronouns: they, them, theirs), staunch Afrofuturist and social-justice educator who presents an enlightening point of view on police brutality and systemic racism," according to a speakers' website.
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According to a source, Black Lives Matter shifted millions of money to a Canadian organisation headed by Khan which was used to purchase a $6.3 million Toronto estate for an arts centre. The news of the money transfer to the Canadian group has raised more questions about transparency and accountability within Black Lives Matter, coming just days after auditors recommended an investigation into the handling of BLM's $60 million war chest, and less than a year after Patrisse Cullors was forced to resign over her own real estate empire.
In July 2021, BLM Canada revealed that it had recently purchased a three-story Victorian home in Toronto's Baldwin Village neighbourhood near the downtown. Previously, the Communist Party's headquarters was housed in this majestic red brick building. The New York Post reported on Saturday that the money to buy the house originated from Black Lives Matter, and that it was transferred from the global network to M4BJ, a Toronto-based non-profit founded by Janaya Khan and other Canadian activists.
Cullors resigned as executive director of the Black Lives Matter Global Network in May 2021, when her $3.2 million real estate business came under examination. It's unclear if the funds were transferred from BLMGN to M4BJ before or after Patrisse Cullors stepped down, or why they went to M4BJ rather than BLM's Canadian subsidiary.
In the summer, Sandy Hudson, a co-founder of BLM Canada, told CBC News that the facility was critical to their work. "Having a space like this that has a level of permanence, that is large, that allows for different types of organizations to come together and create community." She continued, "It's going to be a really, really big shift for Black Canada and Black Toronto."
Charity auditors voiced concern last week over the management of Black Lives Matter's $60 million in donations after it was revealed that persons named to lead the organisation never showed up and no one could tell who was in charge of the funds. The charity's most recent tax filing, dated 2019, lists a location in Los Angeles that does not exist, and the two surviving BLM directors, identified by The Washington Examiner, were unable to assist with one even removing BLM references from his social media after the paper approached him. They have yet to file its necessary 2020 return, a Form 990, which might result in a fine from the IRS.However, the revelation of the center's funding comes at a difficult moment for BLM.
"In response to your request for a copy of Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation's 2020 Form 990, we wish to inform you that at this time we do not maintain a permanent office," an unnamed BLM representative informed the daily via email.