[3] The trust makes grants and program-related investments in Minnesota, North Dakota, and western Wisconsin in communities where there are Bremer banks.

The Trustee position is not merit-based; rather, it is passed down from parents to children, with no job interview or search for qualified candidates.

[9] Not unlike other private charities created by their founders, trustees are often individuals who are either family members or close business confidants.

A successful transaction would enable an incredibly significant increase in OBT’s philanthropy and allow us to expand our work in Minnesota, North Dakota, Wisconsin, and Montana.”[13] Financial analysts estimated that BFC could be worth in excess of $2.2 billion.

"[16] The 165-page complaint contends that, among other things, the disloyal scheme included actions such as hiring an investment banker to solicit offers for the bank and sharing confidential information without approval.

[19] The issue was effectively resolved in 2022 (and affirmed in 2023) when a judge ruled that a now-former trustee of the trust, Brian Lipschultz, could not get back onto the board after it was found that he was using the trust's employees "to staff his own side business" as well as to perform his own personal business, as the St. Paul Pioneer Press reported; an Appeals Court affirmed in January 2023 that Lipschultz would not be allowed back on the board.

A further examination of IRS tax records by NCRP showed this ousting was only the latest in a series of troubling decisions, inducing the watchdog group to call for an investigation by the Minnesota Attorney General."

Another response came from Paul Olson, who wrote an Op-Ed in the Star Tribune, in which he observed that "At Bremer, the criticisms include excessive trustee compensation of more than half a million dollars annually (after a 1,000-percent increase over 9 years); concentrating the roles of CEO, chairman and treasurer with the trustees; and firing the foundation’s executive director to justify the increased salaries."

Olson continued his Op-Ed by drawing parallels between the Blandin Foundation's 1977 scandal: "Frankly, it’s out of the same playbook of self-interest dressed up as charity.

Olson further notes the similarity between the trustee's salaries and those of the presidents of Minnesota's higher education systems, allowing him to sharply contrast the qualifications and workload required for the respective positions: "But the academic leaders got their appointments on the basis of a national search, not from their fathers.

Olson concludes his Op-Ed with the imperative that "... Bremer trustees should tear up the pre-1969 tax-dodging, self-perpetuating private-bank, nepotism-driven trust arrangement and get on with philanthropy in the best Minnesota tradition."

Those plans are developed by professional compensation consultants and reflect the guidelines set by the Trust's founder, Otto Bremer.