U.S. foundations focus their attention on saving democracy
NEW YORK — Democracy, as President Joe Biden declared in his inaugural speech, survived a barrage of misinformation and an insurrection at the U.S. Capitol to achieve a peaceful transfer of power.
Yet the threats to democracy remain alarming in the view of most experts. And many major U.S. nonprofits and philanthropies, which provided funding to help safeguard the 2020 elections, plan to keep the money flowing.
Philanthropic groups helped recruit roughly 500,000 potential poll workers last year, paid for election officials’ protective equipment and helped dispel disinformation about where and when people could vote. One nonprofit, the Center for Tech and Civic Life, an advocacy group, provided funding at 2,500 polling places for recruitment and training in the midst of the viral pandemic and the additional equipment and supplies that were needed to process record-high mail-in ballots.
“It is impossible to overstate the significance of the philanthropic response to the difficulties of this election,” the Biden campaign said in an election post-mortem.
For all their success in helping ensure what Christopher Krebs, who tracked the voting as head of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, called the most secure U.S. election ever, advocates see the need to keep putting their financial muscle behind the cause.
“In Georgia, there have been a slew of voter suppression laws introduced — that’s happening right now,” said Lisa Versaci, director of NEO Philanthropy’s State Infrastructure Fund, which financed $55 million in programs to foster election engagement and protect voting in historically underrepresented communities. “Don’t be fooled. This isn’t going away. It’s going to be occurring in the states, and we’re going to counter it. It doesn’t end.”
The financial support that gushed from philanthropic groups in 2020 had been building for years. Over the past decade, foundations donated nearly $10 billion in the United States to try to boost civic participation, secure election reforms and educate the public, according to the philanthropy research organization Candid. The Ford Foundation, the largest donor in the sector, contributed $635 million in the past four years — 33% more than it had donated in the entire previous decade.
Funding for protecting American democracy began to pick up after the 2013 Supreme Court ruling that invalidated a section of the Voting Rights Act and allowed states to make changes to the voting process without federal approval. Then, in the run-up to the 2020 elections, financial support accelerated as concerns about social injustice, potential voter suppression and public disinformation erupted into public view.
Maria Torres-Springer, the Ford Foundation’s vice president of U.S. programs, noted that the organization has long supported groups that it felt were sometimes excluded from participating in democracy, especially women, people of color and members of the LGBTQ community. For 2020, the foundation doubled its democracy-related grants from 2019 levels to $200 million.
“The events of the last year really compelled us to double-down on the funding for those groups,” she said. The pandemic and murder of George Floyd compelled them as an institution to say they need to do more to fortify social justice organizations, she said.
Philanthropic groups that donated to 2020 election security say they were heartened by what looks to them like a successful outcome. Ultimately, despite intense pressure to overturn election results, state election officials and judges of both parties upheld election results across the country in light of no widespread evidence of irregularities or fraud.
“The system held,” Ms. Versaci said. “That was a huge relief. And I feel like that didn’t come because of some magic bullet. There was a lot of work on many, many different levels because this was a real threat.”
In different times, the result might have been cause to exult. But the violent insurrection, led by proTrump rioters insisting that Mr. Biden’s victory had been rigged, showcased the fragility of democracy and the spread of dangerous disinformation.
Tammy Greer, an assistant professor of political science at Clark Atlanta University, said she felt the riot illustrated a disturbing lack of understanding about a process that is fundamental to U.S. presidential elections.
This year, Ms. TorresSpringer said, the Ford Foundation plans to continue funding both large, established groups that protect democratic structures like voting rights and newer organizations that are building coalitions in individual communities.
There also appears to be a growing trend toward bipartisan cooperation among philanthropists. In October, more than 100 philanthropists across the political spectrum signed a letter stating that “repairing the fabric of our democracy will require extraordinary stewardship by leaders across society.” Another letter after the violent riot at the U.S. Capitol drew nearly 300 signatories asking elected leaders to “repair our tattered social fabric and help our democracy live up to its ideals.”
“Democracy is a muscle,” Ms. Greer said. “You have to work at it every single day in order for it to be strong.”