The New York Times reports:

An explosive device was found on Monday in a mailbox at a home of George Soros, the billionaire philanthropist who is a favorite target of right-wing groups, in a suburb north of New York City, the authorities said.

Mr. Soros, who was born in Hungary, made his fortune running a hedge fund and is now a full-time philanthropist and political activist. He donates frequently to Democratic candidates and progressive causes and has given at least $18 billion to his Open Society Foundations to promote democracy and human rights around the world.

His activism has made him a villain to conservative groups and the target of anti-Semitic smears. Roseanne Barr called him a Nazi in an infamous tweetstorm, and just this month, Representative Matt Gaetz, Republican of Florida, falsely speculated that Mr. Soros had funded a caravan of migrants moving north toward Mexico. There is no evidence that Mr. Soros paid thousands of migrants to storm the border. Nor is there evidence that Democrats support the effort, as President Trump has said.

Mr. Soros became a major political donor in the United States during George W. Bush’s presidency. He spent millions backing John Kerry’s unsuccessful bid to deny Mr. Bush a second term, was an early backer of Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign and contributed more than $25 million to Hillary Clinton and other Democratic candidates and causes during the 2016 election cycle.

Though Mr. Soros’s name has become a trigger for a subset of Republicans and conservatives, he has said that his main goal as a political activist was to see a return to bipartisanship.

He has said it was the extremism of the Republican Party that had prompted him to become a major Democratic donor, but also said he is opposed to the extreme left. [Continue reading…]