Former Real Housewives Of New York star Bethenny Frankel says she’s raised AU$13 million worth of donations (US$10 million) for humanitarian relief in Ukraine through her non profit BStrong. As well as the millions of dollars raised in donations, BStrong’s also committed to sending over AUD$20 million (USD$15 million) in aid.
That means a whopping AUD$33.9 million (USD$25 million) in total. Far out.
BSTRONG UPDATE: we have committed 15m in aid & have raised over TEN MILLION DOLLARS in $ donations for the refugee relocation program. This is MAJOR. @GEMmissions bethenny.con/bstrong
— Bethenny Frankel (@Bethenny) March 4, 2022
In an Insta Story, she explained how exactly the redistribution of resources would work.
“We are partnering with different apparel companies, food companies, lodging companies to be announced later, to place these people in lodging,” Bethenny Frankel said, as per the NY Post.
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The BStrong team have a base camp set up near the Ukrainian border in Poland.
“It will be the first of many base camps where we will welcome refugees, connect with them, give them very basic needs, and our crisis boxes are en route,” she told Fox News.
“It’s [USD]$10 million in aid coming, but we will meet what’s mostly mothers and children and relocate them. So, get them on a train or plane and relocate them to friends or family — someplace that’s a safe haven — and give them really basic survival needs for now.”
According to The Cut, this is the first time BStrong has worked through a conflict. Usually the non profit’s work focuses on natural disasters, like the devastation caused by Hurricane Irma in Texas and Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico.
Bethenny Frankel also sent aid all the way Down Under back in the horrific bushfires of 2020.
“We have a warehouse filled with $16 million dollars of aid, all the time, so we don’t need to go out and find it every time there’s a crisis, we can just go straight away,” Bethenny told The Cut.
“So we always have survival kits, our warehouse is like a giant Costco of donated aid, which is always ready to go.”
She also said that BStrong was approaching the conflict in Ukraine the same way they’d approach a natural disaster.
“We get there, we meet our volunteers, we know what they’re going to need. We know people are being displaced, that people will be homeless and desperate,” she explained.
“I created a survival kit system years ago, because we had all this aid, but we just needed it to be organised in a way that was efficient.”
Bethenny Frankel isn’t the only celeb raising funds for Ukraine at the mo. Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis revealed that they’ve raised over AUD$21 million (USD$15.9 million) for Ukraine via GoFundMe.
Mila Kunis was born in Ukraine. Her family moved America when she was seven years old.
“While my family came to the United States in 1991, I was born in Chernivtsi, Ukraine in 1983. Ukrainians are proud and brave people who deserve our help in their time of need,” she wrote in the GoFundMe.
Mila also said that she and Ashton would be matching donations up to AUD$4 million (USD$3 million).
“This unjust attack on Ukraine and humanity at large is devastating and the Ukrainian people need our support.”
