Privacy Policy
Privacy Policy for Family Policy Alliance, Family Policy Alliance Foundation (including Christians Engaged), and Family Policy PAC
Effective October 31, 2025
This is the Privacy Policy for Family Policy Alliance, Family Policy Alliance Foundation (also known by its trade name, Family Policy Foundation; and which includes Christians Engaged, a ministry of Family Policy Alliance Foundation), and Family Policy PAC (collectively, the Family Policy Organizations). As Christian ministries committed to transparency, integrity, and accountability and which believe that your privacy is important, we want you to know how we handle your personal information, including its collection, storage, and use by us, with whom we periodically or occasionally share it, and for what purpose. We also want you to know your rights and choices regarding your personal information. Finally, we believe you should know how we collect anonymous data (non-personal information) related to your use of our websites and other internet-based services we provide, how we use “cookies,” and how social media companies collect information about visitors to our websites which is used to send ads by us to you on the social media company’s site, such as the use of the Meta pixel to send ads to you on Facebook.
Several states have recently enacted comprehensive privacy laws that contain new terms, definitions, and legal requirements for some organizations that collect and retain information about individuals. As with other new laws, some of the terms, definitions, and requirements in these laws are vague and will need to be clarified and supplemented over time by state agencies and courts. Further, these new privacy laws focus primarily on for-profit businesses, and whether they apply to any or all of the nonprofit Family Policy Organizations is not always clear from their provisions.
While most of the provisions in this Privacy Policy will be applied by us regardless of your state of residency or whether we are legally subject to your state’s privacy laws, when a section of this policy is being applied only to residents of a particular state we will so indicate in that section.
This policy explains how we handle personal information about you when you voluntarily provide such information to us; it comes to us through a third party; or by inferring personal information about you based on information we have collected from you and/or information provided by a third-party source. Additionally, the policy describes the types of anonymous data we obtain from your use of our websites and other internet-based services that we provide, and how we use cookies. As affiliated sister ministries, we share the information we collect with each other as further explained in Section 5.A below.
If you have any questions about this policy, please don’t hesitate to contact us through one of the methods described in Section 15 below. Also, in Section 6 we explain how you can change your preferences regarding our communications with you; access, correct, update, delete, and obtain a copy of your personal information; and opt out of certain uses by us of your personal information.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. Organizations and Activities To Which This Policy Applies
2. The Categories and Types of Information We May Collect and Retain About You
A. Personal Information That We May Collect and Retain
B. Credit/Debit Card and Bank Account Personal Information
C. We Do Not Collect Sensitive Information About You
D. Anonymous Data
3. How We Obtain Information About You
A. Personal Information You Voluntarily Give Us
B. Personal Information Provided to Us by Third-Party Services, Allied State Organizations, Other Organizations, and Individuals
C. Personal Information Provided on Social Media Platforms
D. Personal Information We Create or Generate From Inferences
E. Anonymous Data
F. Cookies
4. The Purposes for Which We Use Personal Information About You
5. To Whom We Share Your Personal Information
A. The Family Policy Organizations
B. Our Trusted Service Providers
C. Our Allies
D. Our Strategic Ministry Partners
E. Social Media Companies
F. Others for Legal Reasons
6. The Rights and Choices You Have Over Your Personal Information
A. Communication Preferences
B. Confirming, Accessing, Correcting, Updating, Deleting, and Obtaining a Copy of Your Personal Information
C. Opting Out of “Targeted Advertising” and a “Sale” of Personal Information
D. Verification, Timing of Our Response, and Fees
E. Your Right to Appeal
F. Browser and Platform Controls
G. Text Messaging
H. No Discriminatory Treatment; Policy Accessible to People With Disabilities
7. Data Collection by Meta and Other Social Media Companies
8. The Length of Time We Retain Your Personal Information
9. Our Security Measures Protecting Your Personal Information
10. Children’s Personal Information
11. Your Friend’s Email Address
12. Links to Third-Party Websites
13. Personal Information Provided Outside the United States
14. How to Contact Us
1. Organizations and Activities To Which This Policy Applies
This policy applies to Family Policy Alliance, Family Policy Alliance Foundation (also known by its trade name, Family Policy Foundation, and including Christians Engaged, a ministry of Family Policy Alliance Foundation), and Family Policy PAC. These organizations are collectively referred to in the policy as the “Family Policy Organizations,” “our,” “we,” or “us.” The policy governs personal information obtained from your use of the following websites: (a) our shared website at familypolicyalliance.com, the SoConCon website at soconcon.com, the SoCon Report website at soconreport.com, and the Christians Engaged websites at christiansengaged.org, thececonference.org, and ce1630.org; (b) any other website (i) for which we have registered a domain name that directs to that site, (ii) we operate, and (iii) that links to this policy; and (c) any website or web page co-branded by us and one or more other organizations which directly or indirectly links to this policy and to the extent indicated on the website or web page. It also governs personal information obtained from the other activities and sources identified in Section 3 below. We intend our websites and other activities to be directed only towards individuals who reside in the United States, and we strive to comply with all applicable privacy and data protection laws in the U.S.
This policy does not apply to (i) Meta/Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Rumble, Twitter/X, and other social networking and image/video-sharing websites on which we have a page or presence, (ii) websites and applications including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Edifi on which we post podcasts or they are distributed, (iii) other websites, such as The Stream, that occasionally post our videos and podcasts, (iv) blogs or forums hosted by third parties on which we may post, and (v) personal ministry websites of our employees such as bunnipounds.com. This policy also does not apply to the State Allies listed on our website, the strategic ministry partners of Christians Engaged, or other organizations, including National Allies and single-issue organizations, with which we may form an alliance concerning a particular issue or activity. If you would like to learn how they treat data that you provide to them or which they otherwise obtain about you, please contact them directly.
2. The Categories and Types of Information We May Collect and Retain About You
A. Personal Information That We May Collect and Retain
We may collect and retain different types of personal information about you for the purposes described in Section 4 below. By “personal information” we mean any data or information that we can reasonably link to an individual whom we can readily identify, directly or indirectly. Personal information does not include publicly available information. We limit our collection of personal information to data that is adequate, relevant, and reasonably necessary in relation to the purposes for which it is collected and processed as set forth in Section 4 below.
The personal information we collect and retain generally falls within the following categories. It may, but does not necessarily, include the examples given for each category as well as other types of information that would customarily be considered to be within the scope of the particular category.
Contact Information. For individuals, their first, middle, and last names; for an organization, its name; for individuals and organizations their postal address, street address, phone number, and email address.
Demographic Information. Age, age range, sex, ethnicity/race, religious affiliation, church affiliation, wealth, hobbies, lifestyle attributes, and ideological affinity.
Donation Information. For individuals, their first and last names, and if the donation was through a donor-advised fund, the name of that fund; for organizations, its name; for individuals and organizations their billing address, phone number, type of phone line, email address, payment information for donations by credit/debit card and ACH (debiting a bank account), the donation amount, the organization to which the donation was made, the specific appeal resulting in the donation, how the donation was submitted (online, postal mail, etc.), donation frequency, donation history, the type of an appreciated asset donated to us and related information, and information regarding planned bequests. We use a secure third-party payment processor to process credit/debit card and ACH donations. For how we collect your credit/debit card and ACH information and the specific information that we and our payment processor retain, see Section 2.B below.
Transactional Information. The particular product, class, course, program, material, or event registration purchased, the amount of the purchase, the purchaser’s name, address, email address, and phone number, and credit/debit card payment information. As noted above, we use a secure third-party payment processor to process payments by credit/debit cards. See Section 2.B below for how we collect your credit/debit card information and the specific information that we and our payment processor retain.
Conference and Event Information. Admission to Family Policy Alliance Foundation’s (FPAF) Statesmen Academy is based on an application submitted to FPAF, which is then reviewed and invitations to attend are extended to selected applicants. Some Contact Information and Demographic Information, along with occupation, spouse’s name, current and prior offices held, leadership positions, religious, volunteer, and public service involvement, official website addresses, social media handles, references, and the applicant’s responses to open-ended questions, are obtained from Statesmen Academy applicants. Contact Information and Transactional Information, along with the purchaser’s organization or elected office, title, and Twitter handle, are obtained from FPAF’s Social Conservative Policy Conference (“SoConCon”) registrants. Contact Information and Transactional Information are obtained from registrants of the Christians Engaged Conference and the Christians Engaged Washington D.C. trip. For persons who submit a Student Scholarship application for the Washington, D.C. trip, the student’s school, graduation date, major, and Other Information provided on that application may be collected. For other events and conferences, Contact Information, Demographic Information, and Transactional Information may be collected. A record of each person’s attendance at events held by a Family Policy Organization and the person’s post-event written comments about the event are also retained. Dietary preferences and restrictions may be collected for certain events and conferences, but such information is not retained.
Online Program Information. Admission to Family Policy Alliance Foundation’s (FPAF) online School Board Academy program is based on an application submitted to FPAF, which is then reviewed and invitations to attend are extended to selected applicants. Some Contact Information and Demographic Information, along with the applicant’s status as a school board member or candidate, their school board district, city, and state, the year first elected (or the year running for election if a candidate), and the applicant’s responses to open-ended questions, are collected from School Board Academy applicants. For registrants of FPAF’s online Social Conservative Academy program, only Contact Information and Transactional Information are collected. A record of each person’s attendance at these online programs and their post-program written comments about the program are also retained. Contact Information, the name of the church or non-profit ministry, and the title of the person signing the application for the organization is collected for Christians Engaged’s Strategic Ministry Partnership Program.
Voting Information. Your state and federal legislative districts, or your county of residence or zip code, to enable us to identify them. We may also determine and collect the identity of some of your state and federal elected officials, whether you are registered to vote, your political party registration (if any), political contributions you have made (if any), and your propensity to vote.
Communication Preferences. Your preferences regarding the receipt from us of emails, postal mail, phone calls, text messages, and tweets.
Cultural, Societal, and Governmental Interests. The cultural, societal, and governmental issues in which you are interested. We also keep a record of our online advocacy alerts, surveys, polls, petitions, open letters, and other “Take Action” items to which you respond.
Account Information. Account registration usernames. We do not have access to your passwords.
Other Information. Other information you choose to voluntarily provide to us in person, by phone, online, or postal mail. For example, you might provide us with the name of your spouse or other family members, or the date of your wedding anniversary.
While not a separate category, we occasionally collect and retain inferred information, that being information that we or a third-party provider have inferred about you based on your known personal information. Please see Section 3.D below for more details on information that we or our third-party providers create or generate from inferences.
B. Credit/Debit Card and Bank Account Personal Information
We do not collect and retain credit and debit card numbers and CVV/CVC codes, or ACH bank account and routing numbers, except as follows. Credit and debit card numbers, expiration dates, CVV/CVC codes, and ACH bank account and routing numbers on physical materials that accompany a donation are kept by us for 90 days solely for the purpose of responding to questions that may arise about the donation, after which the physical material is shredded and we thereafter have access only to the last four digits of the card number and its expiration date, or the last four digits of the bank account number. For donations and payments made online using a credit or debit card, your card information is electronically transmitted directly to our secure payment processor. We only have access to and retain the following information: the type of card (Visa, Mastercard, etc.), the last four digits of the card number, and its expiration date. If you make a recurring donation (e.g., monthly or yearly) using a credit or debit card, our payment processor retains the full card information for processing your recurring donation. For donations made online using ACH (which debits your bank account), your bank account and routing numbers are electronically transmitted directly to our payment processor, and we only have access to and retain the last four digits of your bank account number. If you make a recurring donation (e.g., monthly or yearly) using ACH, our payment processor retains the full bank account and routing numbers for processing your recurring donation. Our payment processor adheres to standard industry security practices, including Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) protection and conformity with payment card industry (PCI) standards.
C. We Do Not Collect Sensitive Information About You
Some state privacy laws require organizations that collect and retain “sensitive information” about consumers (sometimes referred to as “sensitive data”) to meet additional requirements regarding such information. Depending on the particular state, “sensitive information” typically, but not necessarily, includes (1) racial or ethnic origin, religious beliefs, a mental or physical heath diagnosis, sex life, sexuality, sexual orientation, citizenship status, or immigration status; (2) genetic or biometric data that is processed for the purpose of uniquely identifying an individual; (3) data collected from a “known child” (that being a minor, usually under 13 years of age, where the organization has actual knowledge of, or willfully disregards, the child’s age); and (4) precise geolocation data. “Sensitive information” might also include government-issued identifiers that are not required by law to be made available to the public (for example, social security and drivers’ license numbers); private communications except for those in which we are an intended recipient; and security and access codes and passwords.
We do not collect such information about you. Occasionally, during a one-on-one meeting or a phone call with a constituent, or in a letter or email from them, we are asked to pray for that constituent or a family member regarding a health condition. To enable our team to pray for the person, a team member may make an informal note of the prayer request, but we do not formally record and retain details about the person’s mental or physical diagnosis.
We also may occasionally learn from you of your religious affiliation or church affiliation and retain a note of it in our records, although we do not routinely collect such information. While Sensitive Information sometimes is defined to include “religious beliefs,” religious affiliation and church affiliation are not “religious beliefs” (and consequently are not Sensitive Information) since a person can have religious beliefs that are inconsistent with, and even directly opposed to, the beliefs of their religious affiliation or church affiliation, or without having a religious or church affiliation. Like all personal information we have about you other than information we’re required or permitted to keep in compliance with applicable law, you have the right to have your religious affiliation or church affiliation deleted from our records by submitting to us a Personal Information Request form requesting that it be deleted as explained in Section 6.B below.
D. Anonymous Data
Anonymous data – that is, information that cannot reasonably be linked to an individual whom we can readily identify – that we may collect consists of a user’s IP address, browser type, device type/model/manufacturer, Internet service provider, domain names, access dates and times, length of website visits, our web pages the user visits, the website address if a user comes to a Family Policy Organization site from a link in a third-party website, and other data described in Section 3.E below.
3. How We Obtain Information About You
We obtain personal information about you when you voluntarily provide it to us by engaging directly with us in certain activities; when it’s provided to us by others such as our trusted service providers, other organizations, or those who know you; and when you indirectly provide it to us by responding to a post by us on a social media platform. We also may use such information to create additional personal information about you based on inferences. Anonymous (non-personal) data is collected by us automatically when you use our websites and other internet-based services that we provide.
A. Personal Information You Voluntarily Give Us
When you engage directly with us through any of the following activities, we may collect and retain the types of personal information described in Section 2 for the category(ies) listed under the activity. For some of these activities, we collect only some but not all of the types of information. For example, for surveys and polls from which we collect Contact Information and Demographic Information, we do not collect middle names, postal addresses except state of residence and zip codes (which we do collect), phone numbers, or ethnicity/race.
Subscribing to our Emails. We collect Contact Information.
Registering for our In-Person Conferences and Events. We may collect Contact Information, Demographic Information, Transactional Information, Conference and Event Information, and Other Information.
Registering for Online Programs and Classes. We may collect Contact Information, Demographic Information, Transactional Information, and Online Program Information.
Registering for Other Online Events. We may collect Contact Information.
Registering to Receive Materials via Email or Text Message. We may collect Contact Information.
Purchasing Merchandise. We may collect Contact Information and Transactional Information.
Making Donations. We collect Donation Information.
Taking Action in our Action Center. We collect Contact Information and track the specific advocacy alert or issue to which you responded.
Participating in our Surveys, Polls, Petitions, and Open Letters. For surveys and polls, we collect Contact Information and may collect Demographic Information along with answers and comments that a respondent submits to us. For petitions and open letters, we collect Contact Information.
Downloading Materials From our Websites. We collect Contact Information.
Volunteering Online. When you volunteer online with Christians Engaged, we collect Contact Information, Demographic Information, Voting Information, and Other Information including a description of your prior civic involvement. We also may collect your spouse’s name.
Contacting Us Online. If you contact us through our online contact webform or via email, we collect Contact Information if you indicate that you would like to receive emails from us, and we may collect Demographic Information, Cultural, Societal, and Governmental Interests, Communication Preferences, and Other Information.
Calling Us or Sending Us a Letter. For our existing constituents, we collect new and updated Contact Information and may collect Demographic Information, Cultural, Societal, and Governmental Interests, and Communication Preferences as well as Other Information you voluntarily provide to us. If the phone call or letter is from a person who is not an existing constituent, we do not collect any information about them unless they included a donation or asked to be added to our email and/or mailing lists in which event we may collect Contact Information, Demographic Information, and Donation Information.
Personal Meetings. You may provide us with information about yourself during a meeting with you which we may retain, typically Contact Information and Demographic Information, and occasionally Cultural, Societal, and Governmental Interests, Communication Preferences, Voting Information, and Other Information.
Responding to our Ad on Social Media. You may provide us with Contact Information when you click on one of our ads on social media such as Facebook, causing a contact form to appear, and you then complete that form.
Other Sources. You may provide us with personal information through other sources. For example, at an event or conference you attend but for which you had not registered in advance, we may have a physical “sign-up sheet” on which attendees provide us with their name, address, email, and/or phone number. Or you might provide us at an event or conference with the name of your spouse, such as when signing up to attend a special afternoon or evening function open to spouses. Occasionally we are provided with personal information in a text message to our staff.
B. Personal Information Provided to Us by Third-Party Services, Allied State Organizations, Other Organizations, and Individuals
Third-party services, allied state organizations, collaboration with other organizations, and individuals can also result in our acquisition of personal information about you.
Third-Party Services. The companies we use to manage our constituent information and relationship management databases, send out advocacy alerts, other “Take Action” alerts, and text messages on our behalf, and process our postal mailings may provide us with personal information about you, typically Contact Information such as an updated postal address or a cell phone number. We also contract with third-party providers to identify persons who have the financial ability and the interest to support us financially. Additionally, third-party providers with whom we contract may provide us with Demographic Information as well as information about your Cultural, Societal, and Governmental Interests and Voting Information.
Allied State Organizations. Family Policy Alliance (FPA) and Family Policy Alliance Foundation (FPAF) host an alliance of state organizations across the country. While these state organizations are separate corporate entities and operate independently of us, we occasionally acquire personal information about you from them. Several years ago, a few such organizations decided to no longer operate independently and joined FPA and FPAF, resulting in FPA and FPAF acquiring information about their constituents. Another situation involved a couple of these state organizations closing down and their constituent information was provided to FPA and FPAF. We might also receive information about you from collaborating with one or more of these organizations on a project, program, or event.
Other Organizations. We occasionally collaborate on a project, program, or event with other organizations (usually but not always nonprofits) that are not part of the alliance, and in the course of such collaboration we may receive personal information about you. For example, if we collaborate with an organization to host an event and individuals can register with either organization to attend the event, we might receive from the other organization the registration information that you submitted to that organization. Or if we collaborate with an organization to provide products or resources that can be downloaded by a user from our respective websites, we might receive information about you that you submitted online to the other organization to download the joint product or resource from its website.
Churches and non-profit ministries with whom you have a relationship may provide us with your Contact Information as part of their application to participate in Christians Engaged’s Strategic Ministry Partnership program or when requesting a speaker from Christians Engaged for their organization.
Individuals. Persons who interact with us may provide us with personal information about you. For example, a constituent who knows you and believes you might be interested in our involvement on the same issue they’re interested in, or in financially supporting us, may provide us with some or all of your Contact Information.
C. Personal Information Provided on Social Media Platforms
As described under Section 3.A, if you fill out a contact form on social media that appears after you click on our ad, we collect some Contact Information about you. Other than that situation, we do not collect personal information about you from social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and X (formerly known as Twitter). The social media platforms and the companies that operate them, however, may collect information about you when you visit, “follow,” “like,” or take other action (such as viewing a video or indicating that you’re going to, or interested in, an event) on our “page” or account on those platforms. The information they collect about you is in their possession, under their control, and not personal information as to us, and your interactions with those platforms and their features are governed by the privacy policies of the companies that operate them, not this policy. As explained below in Sections 6.C and 7, these social media companies may display an advertisement from us to you through advertising modules on their platforms, and in doing so they sometimes use information they collected about you to determine our ad’s intended recipients on their platform (such as all users who “follow” our page on their platform) and direct our advertisement to them.
D. Personal Information We Create or Generate From Inferences
We and our third-party providers may use the personal information we have collected about you to compile, combine, and infer additional personal information related to you. The information that may be inferred about you usually falls within the following categories (non-exclusive examples are given in parentheses for each category): Demographic Information (age range, wealth), Cultural, Societal, and Governmental Interests (pro-life issues, parental rights), and Voting Information (your propensity to vote).
E. Anonymous Data
Like almost all organizations that use the Internet, we automatically collect and retain certain types of anonymous information as described below, using the following technologies.
Log Files. We use log files which are textual data files that record and store certain activities and data when a user visits one of our websites. The data includes the IP address of the user’s computer and their internet service provider, the type of browser and/or device the user is using, the URLs of the website(s) the user visited before visiting our site (often called “referring” URLs or web pages), date/time stamps, numeric identifiers for the user’s mobile device, and the number of clicks. This data enables us to analyze trends, administer the sites, evaluate what content persuades users to check out our sites, perform aggregated site traffic analysis and other statistical analyses, and maintain data security of our sites, such as by recording a user’s IP address which enables us to prevent malicious Internet users from masquerading as other users, and detecting and preventing cyberattacks and unauthorized robot activities.
Clear Gifs a/k/a Web Beacons. Additionally, we (or our third-party service providers) use clear gifs that help us understand how users of our websites interact with them, including informing us what content on our sites is the most interesting to our users. They are similar to cookies except they reside on our sites, not on the user’s computer. In sum, clear gifs track a user’s movements across a website, informing us of the pages visited, links clicked on, videos watched, and other actions a user takes on our sites. This data enables us to tailor our content to our users’ interests and provide more content on those particular issues.
Clear gifs are also used in our HTML-based emails for the purpose of letting us know which emails were opened by the recipients. This enables us to determine the effectiveness of our issue-oriented and advocacy emails as well as our fundraising/appeal campaigns.
F. Cookies
In addition to collecting personal information and anonymous data, we sometimes use cookies. A cookie is a tiny data file containing a randomly assigned, alphanumeric number that is automatically created on a computer’s browser when a user “loads” (accesses) our websites. Its purpose is to simplify the process of logging into certain areas of our sites and to quickly and automatically provide the user with the personalized content they are seeking. Cookies do not damage the user’s computer nor can they read other files on it. While the default setting on most browsers is to accept cookies, a user can usually change the settings in their browser to block all cookies or block or accept cookies for certain sites they have listed in their browser’s cookie settings. If a user blocks cookies for a site, the user might not be able to access that site or some of its features may be diminished or not function properly.
We use both “session cookies” and “persistent cookies” to improve a user’s experience when visiting our websites. Session cookies remain on a user’s computer only during the user’s site visit; they expire when the user closes their browser. In short, web pages have no memory, so session cookies provide that functionality. They are used to ensure that the user’s browser is recognized when the user moves from page to page within a site and any information the user has entered is remembered. As a result, the user is able to move swiftly from web page to web page on the same site.
Persistent (or “tracking”) cookies remain on a user’s computer after the user leaves our websites. They also increase the functionality and user-friendliness of our sites. Persistent cookies are primarily used to automatically fill in a user’s Contact Information when the user accesses a form on one of our sites. For example, if a user receives an Alert email from Family Policy Alliance asking the user to take action on pending legislation and the user clicks the Take Action button in the email -- thereby taking the user to our web page containing the message to send to their legislator – the user’s name and perhaps their postal address may already appear in the message form due to a persistent cookie.
Cookies are further used to support client session connections to our websites and to ascertain how often a user has visited a particular web page that enables us to better personalize our site’s content for the user.
4. The Purposes For Which We Use Personal Information About You
We use the personal information we collect and infer about you to fulfill your expectations, provide you with a God-honoring, positive experience with us, and improve the ways in which we serve you and pursue our respective missions. Specifically, your personal information is used by us for the following purposes. This list does not include the purposes for which we use anonymous data and cookies as such data and cookies cannot be reasonably linked by us to an individual whom we can readily identify and therefore do not constitute personal information. However, the purposes for which we use anonymous data and cookies are described above in Sections 3.E and 3.F.
5. To Whom We Share Your Personal Information
A. The Family Policy Organizations
The Family Policy Organizations share a single constituent relationship management (CRM) system in which most of your information that we retain is stored. Each Family Policy Organization is able to access your information in that system. However, pursuant to an agreement between Family Policy Alliance, Family Policy Alliance Foundation, and Family Policy PAC, Family Policy Alliance and Family Policy PAC will not, without your permission, use your information if it was collected by Christians Engaged before or after it merged into Family Policy Alliance Foundation and was not independently collected by Family Policy Alliance and/or Family Policy PAC.
B. Our Trusted Service Providers
Some of your personal information is shared between us and our trusted service providers. We share this information with those providers for several purposes, including maintaining your information electronically in a cloud-based system for organizational efficiency, data security, ease of access, and future use; sending you emails, postal mail, and text messages; contacting you telephonically; presenting surveys and polls for you to participate in if you so desire; focusing our communications to you based on such factors as your demographic data, interests, and electoral jurisdictions; responding to your requests for information or assistance; processing, acknowledging, and tracking your donations to our organizations; registering you for our in-person conferences and events and our online programs and events; providing you with the products and materials that you purchase from us; identifying persons who have the financial ability and the interest to support us financially; providing other specific services; and performing statistical analyses. As discussed in Section 6 below, you have certain rights and control over some of these activities, such as the right to opt out of certain communications.
Our trusted service providers customarily include providers of the following types of systems and services:
We also occasionally contract with a company(ies) to send text messages, voicemails and phone calls to our constituents.
Our trusted service providers maintain the highest standards of data security. They do not share, store, or process your personally identifiable information for any secondary purpose.
C. Our Allies
While the Family Policy Organizations do not sell, rent, or lease to others the personal information we collect and retain about you, we occasionally share some of your information with our allies as described below. Depending on how the information is shared, you may have the right to opt out of our sharing it as discussed in Section 6.C below. We do not share your Donation Information with any allies.
State-Based Family Policy Allies. As noted in Section 3.B, Family Policy Alliance and Family Policy Alliance Foundation host an alliance of state-based organizations across the country that focus on social conservative issues in their respective states. (These organizations are listed on the “Allies” page at familypolicyalliance.com.) At times we will partner with one or more of these organizations on a specific project, and in connection with that project we occasionally share with them personal information that we have collected about you. The personal information we may share with them is typically Contact Information. Sharing your information with them allows us and our state-based allies to more efficiently and cost-effectively conduct the particular activity and expand its reach and impact.
National Allies. We also have long-standing relationships with national allies whose mission and policy positions on many social conservative issues align with ours. When we partner with a national ally on a policy issue or campaign, we occasionally co-brand a separate website or a web page with them on which we may collect personal information about you. If we collect such information, we may provide the national ally with its copy of your information. While to our understanding this situation does not constitute “sharing” your information under state privacy laws, the information we provide to them is typically Contact Information. Providing your information to them allows us and our national ally to more efficiently and cost-effectively conduct the activity or campaign and expand its reach and impact.
We also might collaborate with an organization about a specific issue on which we share the same viewpoint and have a common objective, even though we do not share the same viewpoint on most other issues in which that organization is involved. If we collect personal information in this type of collaboration, we do not provide it to the “single-issue” organization.
At times we might collaborate with a national ally and/or a state-based family policy ally along with a “single-issue” organization. In those situations, we will only provide personal information we collect about you with our national ally and/or the state-based family policy ally. The organization(s) to whom we provide a copy of your information will be identified in a statement linked at the bottom of the web page where your information is collected. Again, while to our understanding this situation does not constitute “sharing” your information under state privacy laws when we co-brand a separate website or a web page with them, the information we provide to them is typically Contact Information. You can see all of our active Collaboration Statements HERE.
D. Our Strategic Ministry Partners
A church or ministry that partners with Christians Engaged (CE) in its voter mobilization program is provided with a free, co-branded web page that asks users who take CE’s pledge to provide certain Contact Information. That information is collected by CE and a copy is periodically provided to the partnering church or ministry.
E. Social Media Companies
We may share your personal information, typically Contact Information, with social media companies to send advertisements on their platforms to you, and to people who are similar to our constituents (i.e., “lookalike” groups), for the purposes of fundraising and building support for our programs, events, and other activities. The personal information we share with these companies is “hashed” to protect your privacy. “Hashing” your information means scrambling it in a pre-defined manner that makes it very difficult if not impossible to recognize the original information. Meta (Facebook and Instagram), for example, describes its hashing process as a “cryptographic security method which turns the information … into randomized code” that cannot be reversed. The randomized code is then matched to other hashed information Meta already possesses for it to determine to whom it will send our ad on its platform. After the matching process is complete, Meta promptly deletes the randomized code.
You have the right to opt out of our sharing your personal information, which we have collected and is in our possession and under our control, with social media companies for the purpose of “targeted advertising” as discussed in Section 6.C below.
F. Others for Legal Reasons
We retain the right to share your personal information with others for the following legally-related reasons:
The category(ies) of personal information we share with others for legally-related reasons would likely consist of Contact, Demographic, Donation, and Transactional Information, along with attendance information at conferences and events.
6. The Rights and Choices You Have Over Your Personal Information
Under some state privacy laws you have certain rights and choices regarding the personal information we collect about you. Some of these rights and choices differ from state to state. In light of that fact and the vagueness that currently exists in these laws, we have attempted to be overly inclusive in providing you with the following rights and choices in order to comply with or exceed all applicable legal requirements.
A. Communication Preferences
We usually communicate with you through email and sometimes through direct mail, telephone, and text messages. As we want to communicate with you according to your preferences, we offer you the following ways to inform us of your choices regarding our communications.
Emails. If you would like to unsubscribe from receiving Family Policy Alliance, Family Policy Alliance Foundation, and/or Christians Engaged emails, you can do so by clicking the “Unsubscribe” or similarly labeled link at the bottom of those emails. Please note that clicking “Unsubscribe” (or a similar link) on an email from one of our organizations will not unsubscribe you from the other Family Policy Organizations, but only from the organization which sent that email.
Text Messages. To unsubscribe from receiving automated text messages, please see Section 6.G below.
You may also inform us of your preferences regarding the receipt of emails, text messages, direct mail, and phone calls through one of the following methods:
B. Confirming, Accessing, Correcting, Updating, Deleting, and Obtaining a Copy of Your Personal Information
You have the following rights regarding the personal information we collect and retain about you:
If your personal information is available in a digital format, you also have the right to obtain a copy of your personal information that you previously provided to us in a portable and, to the extent technically feasible, readily usable format that would allow you to transmit the data to another “controller” (an individual or entity that determines the purpose and means of processing your personal information) without hindrance.
If you request that we delete all of your personal information, please be aware that your past transactions with us -- including donations, receipt of our materials, attendance at events, participation in courses, and other information -- will be irreversibly deleted. You will also be unsubscribed from all of our communications, and any recurring donations will be canceled. You may, of course, resubscribe to our communications and otherwise engage with us again in the future, but doing so will not restore your past history.
You may exercise any of these rights through one of the following methods:
Please note that as explained in Section 6.D below, we have the right to verify your identity before responding to the right(s) you have requested. We also may be permitted by applicable law to charge a reasonable fee to comply with your request if it is unfounded, repetitive, or excessive.
C. Opting Out of “Targeted Advertising” and a “Sale” of Personal Information
In addition to the rights listed above, you have the right in certain states to opt out of your personal information being used by us for “targeted advertising” and its “sale” by us. Some state privacy laws also afford their residents the right to opt out of “profiling.” We do not engage in “profiling.”
Targeted Advertising. While definitions vary across the states having privacy laws, “targeted advertising” is frequently defined as “displaying to a consumer an advertisement that is selected based on personal data obtained from that consumer’s activities over time and across nonaffiliated websites or online applications to predict the consumer ’s preferences or interests.” It customarily does not include ads based on personal information obtained or inferred by us from your activities on our own websites and our other online applications; “ads based on the context of a consumer’s current search query, visit to a website, or online application”; or ads we send to you in response to your request for information or feedback.
Unlike some organizations, we do not share your personal information with third parties which then send their own advertisements to you. However, we occasionally obtain information about you from third parties that includes inferences and predictions of your preferences and interests and may send you a communication based in part on that information, which you may find relevant and interesting. As “advertisement” and “ad” are typically not defined in state privacy laws, we are not able to determine with certainty which types of communications of this nature constitute an “advertisement” or “ad” under such laws, if any. Additionally, what does and does not constitute a “prediction” of “preferences or interests” can be subject to greatly varying interpretations, as can “ads based on the context of a consumer’s … visit to a website, or online application.” Nevertheless, we offer you the right to opt out of your personal information being used by us for targeted advertising and will do our best to fulfill your desire if you choose to exercise this right. Please note that your right under state privacy laws to opt out of targeted advertising does not include opting out of ads by us that do not constitute targeted advertising, including ads based on personal information obtained or inferred by us from your activities on our own websites or our other online applications. Consequently, if you opt out of targeted advertising you may still receive some ads from us.
Targeted Advertising: Social Media Platforms. If you exercise your right to opt out of your personal information being used by us for targeted advertising, we will exclude your personal information from the information we provide directly to the social media company for an ad by us that, in our judgment, constitutes targeted advertising. Please note that social media companies may provide you with interest-based ads from us that do not constitute “targeted advertising” as defined by state privacy laws, including information automatically collected by the social media company through the company’s pixel that is placed on our web pages (such as the Meta Pixel). Since we do not collect that information and cannot readily identify the person whose visit to our web page(s) generated that information, your ability to opt out of such information being used by the social media company for our ads is governed by that company’s privacy policy, not this policy. Section 7 explains such advertising, including the Meta Pixel, in more depth.
“Sale” of Your Information. As with targeted advertising, definitions of a “sale” of personal information vary from state-to-state, but generally a “sale” means the sharing, disclosing, transferring, or exchanging of your personal information by us to, or with, a third party for monetary or other valuable consideration. A “sale” customarily does not include us providing, disclosing, or sharing your personal information to, or with, a processor that processes it on our behalf; a third party for the purpose of providing you with a product or service that you requested; an affiliated organization; or a third party in connection with a merger or acquisition. Nor does a “sale” include the disclosure of personal information that you direct us to disclose; you intentionally disclose by using us to interact with a third party; or which you have intentionally made available to the general public through a mass media channel and did not restrict to a specific audience.
Based on our understanding of what constitutes a “sale” under state privacy laws, we do not engage in a “sale” of, or “sell,” your personal information except as described in the next paragraph.
Occasionally, we share your personal information with our allies and Christians Engaged Strategic Ministry Partners as discussed in Sections 5.C and 5.D above. Depending on how the information is shared, you may have the right to opt out of our sharing it. If we co-brand a separate website or a web page with an ally or a Strategic Ministry Partner (SMP) on which we collect personal information about you, and we then transmit a copy of it to the ally or the SMP, there is no right to opt out of such sharing because when you entered your personal information you were made aware from the co-branding on the page that your information would be shared between us and the ally/SMP and we did not receive monetary or other valuable consideration for transmitting a copy of it to the other organization. If, however, we partner with a state-based or national ally on a specific project and we disclose to that ally, in return for monetary or other valuable consideration, personal information about you that we had previously collected, you have the right to opt out of such a disclosure by us.
Some state privacy laws require special notices if the organization “sells” sensitive information including biometric information. We do not sell sensitive information.
You may opt out of your personal information being used by us for “targeted advertising” and/or being provided by us to an ally in return for monetary or other valuable consideration through one of the following methods:
You have the right to designate another person in writing to serve as your authorized agent and act on your behalf in informing us of your decision to opt out. You may designate that person directly on the Request to Opt Out form or by informing us of their identity via email or postal mail. Either way, we must be provided with a copy of the written permission, signed by you, that authorizes the agent to submit the request.
Please note that as explained in the next section, we have the right to verify your identity and, if you designate an authorized agent, that agent’s identity, before responding to your request(s) in the Request to Opt Out form. We may also be permitted by applicable law to charge a reasonable fee to comply with your request if it is unfounded, repetitive, or excessive.
D. Verification, Timing of Our Response, and Fees
To help protect your privacy and maintain the security of our systems, before responding to a request made under Sections 6.B and 6.C above we will take steps to verify your identity. If we have offered our constituents password-protected accounts and you have such an account with us, we may require you to sign into your account. If we have not offered password-protected accounts or we have offered them but you have not created one, you do not need to set up an account. Instead, we will verify your identity by matching two pieces of the contact information (email, state, zip code, and phone number) you provide to us on the Personal Information Request or Request to Opt Out form with the information we have about you in our systems. If we don’t have two such pieces of information about you in our systems (for example, we only have an email address for you) or we are otherwise unable to verify your identity, we may ask you for additional information. Further, if you ask to access or delete your information or request a copy of it, we will send you an email to verify your identity before processing your request, and we reserve the right to require you to sign a declaration under penalty of perjury that you are the person whose personal information is the subject of the request.
If you have designated another person to serve as your authorized agent and they are in our systems, we will match their contact information with the information on them in our systems to verify their identity. If they are not in our systems, we may contact either or both of you to verify your agent’s identity and authorized permission.
If we’re ultimately unable to verify your (or your agent’s) identity, we will decline your request.
Once your (or your agent’s) identity has been verified, we will normally respond within 45 days after receiving the request. We have the right, however, to extend the time period for our response by an additional 45 days when reasonably necessary, provided we inform you within the initial 45 days of the reason for the extension. If we decline to take the action(s) requested in your request, we will inform you of that decision within the initial 45-day period. If you live in Nebraska or Texas, we will also provide instructions to you on how you can appeal our decision to your state Attorney General if you so desire.
Our response to your request will be free of charge up to twice annually unless your request is manifestly unfounded, excessive, or repetitive, in which event we may charge you a fee to cover our administrative costs of complying with your request or we may decline to act on it. Also, if you make more than two requests annually, we may have the right to charge you a fee depending on the state in which you reside. If we determine that a fee is warranted, we will notify you of the fee and explain the basis of our decision to charge it before we respond substantively to your request.
E. Your Right to Appeal
If we decline to take the action(s) sought by you in your request submitted under Section 6.B or 6.C, you have the right to appeal our decision within a reasonable period of time. Appeals should be submitted to us through one of the following methods:
Within 60 days after the date upon which we receive your appeal we will provide you with our response, including a written explanation of the reason(s) for our decision. If we have an email address for you, we will provide our response via email to that address.
If we deny your appeal and you live in Nebraska or Texas, you may contact your state’s Attorney General at the link below to submit a complaint:
Nebraska: https://ne.accessgov.com/ago/Forms/Page/ago/2efd1471-06a7-4cd1-9bd2-cc8fe4e37c02/eaa18f8a-30e7-48c7-b97b-eaabb1ab6ce8/1
Texas: https://www.texasattorneygeneral.gov/consumer-protection/file-consumer-complaint/consumer-privacy-rights
F. Browser and Platform Controls
As mentioned in Section 3.F, you have the ability to change the settings in your browser to block all cookies or block or accept cookies for certain websites listed in your browser’s cookie settings. If you block cookies for our site(s), you might not be able to access that site or some of its features may be diminished or not function as intended.
Some browsers include a “Do Not Track” (DNT) setting which signals a website you visit that you do not wish to be tracked by it during your time on it. However, while some uncertainty surrounds DNT settings, our websites are equipped to honor DNT settings as we understand them.
As explained in Section 6.A above, you can unsubscribe from our emails if you wish to avoid our use of clear gifs in our HTML-based emails that enable us to learn which emails were opened by their recipients. Additionally, many email clients contain a setting that allows you to prevent the automatic downloading of images, including web beacons, by blocking the automatic connection to our web servers which host those images.
G. Text Messaging
By providing us with your mobile phone number, you have opted in to receive text messages from us sent to that number. Our text messages to you may include public policy educational information, alerts to take action, financial appeals, notices of forthcoming courses, events, and activities, resources offered by us, and prayer and voting reminders, among others. Text messages may be sent through an automatic telephone dialing system. Please note that your carrier may prohibit or restrict certain mobile features and such features may be incompatible with your mobile device. We will never charge you for sending you a text message; however, standard message and/or data rates charged by your carrier may apply for any messages sent by us to you. If you have any questions about such charges, please contact your wireless provider.
You may opt out of receiving our text messages through one of several ways. Replying with the word “STOP” to our text message will stop all future text messages from Family Policy Alliance/Family Policy Alliance Foundation or Christians Engaged. However, if you are subscribed to text messages from Family Policy Alliance/Family Policy Alliance Foundation as well as from Christians Engaged, you will need to reply separately to messages from Family Policy Alliance/Family Policy Alliance Foundation and from Christians Engaged with the word “STOP” in order to stop all future text messages. Or you may inform us that you would like to opt out by using the Communication Preferences Web Form described in Section 6.A above, sending us an email at mail@familypolicyalliance.com, or mailing a letter to us addressed to Family Policy Alliance, 8675 Explorer Drive, Suite 112, Colorado Springs, CO 80920.
H. No Discriminatory Treatment; Policy Accessible to People With Disabilities
We will not collect and process personal information in violation of state and federal laws that prohibit unlawful discrimination against consumers, nor will we discriminate against you for exercising any of your rights contained in this policy or under any applicable state privacy law.
This policy has been designed to be accessible to people with disabilities. If you are unable to access it online, you may request a printed version of the policy free of charge by emailing us at mail@familypolicyalliance.com or mailing a letter to us addressed to Family Policy Alliance, 8675 Explorer Drive, Suite 112, Colorado Springs, CO 80920, and we will promptly provide you with a printed version.
7. Data Collection by Meta and Other Social Media Companies
We may display advertising to you through social media platforms, such as Facebook, Instagram, X (formerly known as Twitter), and others. The information used by social media companies to determine the intended recipients of an ad to be distributed on their platform comes from various sources. One source is personal information (usually contact-type information) provided directly by us to the social media company. In Section 5.E we explain sharing your personal information with such companies for the purpose of sending ads to you on their platforms.
Another source is information automatically collected by the social media company and retained by it when you visit or take action on (e.g., “follow”) an organization’s “page” or account on the social media company’s platform, as described in Section 3.C.
A third source is information automatically collected by the social media company using cookies, web beacons, and other technologies to receive information from our websites and use that information to target and deliver interest-based ads to you (and provide measurement services to us). One such technology is a pixel from Meta which is placed on our web pages. The Meta Pixel allows us to display ads to Facebook users who have shown some type of interest in the content on our web pages, including particular issues, materials, and programs. For example, if a Facebook user lands on one of our web pages about parental rights, the Meta Pixel allows us to subsequently display to that person through Facebook an ad on parental rights. Or if a Facebook user completes our School Board Academy application on our website, the Meta Pixel gives us the ability to later display to that person through Facebook an ad on an issue involving school boards.
The information collected by Meta through its pixel on our web pages is not provided by Meta to us. We have no control over that information, cannot download or upload it, and the person who visited our web page cannot be readily identified, directly or indirectly, by us. These interest-based ads are governed by Meta’s privacy policy, not by this policy. If you prefer not to receive interest-based ads on Facebook, you may be able to adjust your Facebook ad preferences. At the time this policy is being issued, adjusting your Facebook ad preferences is explained at this link: https://www.facebook.com/help/247395082112892. You can also learn more about interest-based advertising and your options regarding it at this link: https://youradchoices.com/.
8. The Length of Time We Retain Your Personal Information
Your personal information is retained by us for as long as it is needed, based on the reason(s) why we obtained it, unless we are required by applicable law to delete it earlier. When deciding how long to keep your information, we consider the following factors among others:
Once it is determined that we no longer need to retain your personal information, we will either delete it or de-identify it so that it cannot be linked to you. If your personal information was stored by us in the past in a form that renders it impractical to delete or de-identify it, then we will continue to securely store it and not further process it until if and when deletion or de-identification becomes possible.
9. Our Security Measures Protecting Your Personal Information
We take several measures to ensure that your personal information is secure, both online and offline. As explained in Section 2.B above, our payment processor that processes your donations and purchases made by you of our materials, courses, and events adheres to standard industry security practices, including Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) protection and conformity with payment card industry (PCI) standards. The cloud-based platforms and systems we use from our trusted service providers, such as our Constituent Relationship Management system, also utilize the most advanced data security protections in their respective industries.
Offline, we restrict access to your personal information on a need-to-know basis by our team members, who are subject to disciplinary action and termination for violating confidentiality. The contractors and agents whom we engage for certain services, such as handling our mass mailings, are also subject to confidentiality agreements they have entered into with us.
10. Children’s Personal Information
We do not knowingly solicit or collect personal information from children under the age of 13, nor do we provide our services and materials to such children. Accordingly, if we become aware that we have collected personal information provided by a child under the age of 13, we will immediately delete that information. If a parent or guardian of a child under the age of 13 learns that the child has provided personal information to us, we ask that they contact us and inform us of that situation so that we can remove the child’s personal information from our systems.
11. Your Friend’s Email Address
We may occasionally offer you the opportunity to send an article or other material on one of our websites to a friend. If you do so, we will use your friend’s email address to send them the information you asked us to send. Your friend’s email address will not be retained in our systems after your request has been completed unless he or she voluntarily subscribes to our emails and other services.
12. Links to Third-Party Websites
Our websites may contain links to third-party websites that contain information and resources provided by other organizations, vendors, and advertisers. While we provide such links, we are not responsible for the privacy policies and practices of those sites, organizations, vendors, and advertisers. If you use such links and leave our sites, we encourage you to read the privacy policies of each site that collects information about you.
13. Personal Information Provided Outside the United States
Our websites are hosted by servers located in the United States, and we intend our websites and other activities to be directed only towards individuals who reside in the United States. If you are located outside of the United States and you provide us with personal information, you consent to that information being transferred to the United States and governed under the laws of the United States and its individual states as may be applicable to your information.
14. How to Contact Us
If you have any questions about our Privacy Policy, please contact us as follows:
Email: mail@familypolicyalliance.com
Phone: 866-655-4545
Postal mail:Family Policy Alliance
8675 Explorer Drive, Suite 112
Colorado Springs, CO 80920
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