A wide range of private foundations support progressive causes. Some, like the Ford Foundation, have billions of dollars in assets and are well known. But many of the most reliable progressive funders are smaller foundations that keep a low profile and can be hard for fundraisers to identify and approach.
All of the foundations listed here have a history of supporting progressive organizations. Many of these funders don't clearly position themselves as left of center, while others are more explicit in their commitments.
This list was created with our media partner Inside Philanthropy, which houses a trove of research designed to assist fundraisers—including articles and profiles of most of the foundations listed.
You can use the tool below to search Inside Philanthropy's research guides for the funders on this list and other givers. Accessing these resources requires a subscription to Inside Philanthropy. Blue Tent members can receive a 25% discount on this subscription by using the code BLUETENT.
Agua Fund
The Agua Fund promotes civic engagement, voter participation and voter rights in Washington D.C. and the surrounding areas, as well as nationally. In particular, it funds efforts to engage conservation-focused voters and protect the rights of Native Americans and marginalized groups.
Akonadi Foundation
This funder is focused on racial justice in Oakland, California. Its current focus is ending the criminalization of Black youth and youth of color.
Alphawood Foundation
Newsweb founder Fred Eychaner gives through this foundation, which is known for LGBTQ advocacy, especially in the Chicago area. Many of its grantees work across multiple human rights priorities.
Amalgamated Foundation
Incorporated in 2017 as an independent public charity, the Amalgamated Charitable Foundation spun off from Amalgamated Bank. It’s a progressive grantmaker as well as a social justice-oriented fiscal sponsor, DAF sponsor and impact investor.
Andrus Family Fund
This grantmaker is technically a fund under the Surdna Foundation, but it manages its own giving. Grants aim to empower young people, with a focus on those impacted by the foster care and juvenile justice systems.
Annie E. Casey Foundation
Annie E. Casey’s longstanding commitment to children’s well-being has seen it embrace some progressive funding, including research and policy-oriented grants to reform how young people experience the justice system.
Appalachian Community Fund
Progressive since its inception, this community funder provides much-needed backing to grassroots groups addressing systemic injustice in Central Appalachia, which includes parts of Tennessee, Kentucky, Virginia and West Virginia.
Arca Foundation
Founded by Nancy Susan Reynolds, the Arca Foundation supports organizations working on the front lines of social change to achieve economic, social and racial justice, a clean environment, peace and security.
Arch Community Fund
Founded by siblings Alan, Leslie and Dean Preston in 2017 to combat “hateful ideologies of white nationalism,” this grantmaker backs a variety of progressive organizing work, including for racial and environmental justice.
Arcus Foundation
Arcus pursues justice for LGBTQ people, with a focus on youth of color, transgender populations, and work by and for affected communities. Its work also encompasses conservation for great apes and gibbons across 18 countries in Africa and Asia.
Argosy Foundation
John Abele, the co-founder of Boston Scientific, founded Argosy in 1997 to pursue the broad goal of “making society a better place to live.” Its support covers a variety of bases, and reproductive health and environmental justice are among the more progressive.
ARIA Foundation
ARIA is the grantmaking vehicle of investor and environmentalist Adam Albright, a former executive at the Natural Resources Defense Council. In addition to the environment, ARIA frequently backs LGBTQ rights groups.
Arkay Foundation
The Arkay Foundation supports efforts to promote civic engagement, government transparency, voting rights and other pillars of the democratic process in the United States. It also engages environmental organizations to confront the influence of money in politics.
Art for Justice Fund
Art for Justice is a philanthropic partnership between Agnes Gund, the Ford Foundation and Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors. It got its start when Gund sold Roy Lichtenstein's “Masterpiece,” and has since dedicated millions to artists and advocates toward changing the justice system.
As You Sow
This shareholder advocacy organization also operates as a grantmaker in California, supporting work to reduce toxins and support environmental justice and education.
Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice
Astraea funds grants for lesbians and queer women, trans and gender non-conforming people, intersex people, and people of color. The foundation also supports rights organizations that advance racial, economic, and gender-related justice.
Baltimore Community Foundation
Some of BCF’s grantmaking and initiatives confront the region’s stubborn racial disparities, including a 2020 Baltimore Progress Fund with “an explicitly reparatory justice lens,” focused on shifting power.
Barr Foundation
Barr is one of the largest private foundations in the state of Massachusetts. Its work focuses on education, climate change, and arts and culture. Its education and arts investments are focused on Boston.
Peggy and Jack Baskin Foundation
Founded in 2008, this foundation backs gender and racial equity in California’s Monterey and Santa Cruz counties, and occasionally in the Bay Area. Intersectional feminism is its main grantmaking lens.
Bauman Foundation
Led by Patricia Bauman, a veteran Democratic donor and the daughter of its founder, the D.C.-based Bauman Foundation supports democracy work, alongside other progressive causes.
Ben and Jerry’s Foundation
The Ben & Jerry’s Foundation is devoted to supporting grassroots organizing for activism and social change.
Blue Shield of California Foundation
Affiliated with the insurer, this funder backs a liberal slate of grantees pursuing health equity and opposing domestic violence in the Golden State. They include progressive mainstays like Tides and lots of regional community funders.
Bohemian Foundation
Founded by Pat Stryker, the Bohemian Foundation promotes civic engagement, economic opportunity, and government accountability in Colorado and beyond.
Boston Foundation
The century-old Boston Foundation operates numerous funds with equity and justice missions, including the New Commonwealth Racial Equity and Social Justice Fund, the LGBTQ-focused Equality Fund, the Asian Community Fund and the Latino Legacy Fund.
Bread & Roses Community Fund
This community funder has channeled resources to movement groups in the Philadelphia region since the 1970s. It hosts a variety of funds for different progressive priorities.
Brooklyn Community Foundation
BCF is new for a community foundation, dating back to its conversion from a private bank foundation in 2009. It funds through a well-articulated racial justice lens and supports BIPOC-led advocacy, including for immigrant rights.
Brush Foundation
Reproductive health and rights is the focus of this legacy foundation, which supports local and national organizations working in Ohio.
Bullitt Foundation
The Bullitt Foundation has been a prominent defender of the ecosystems of the Pacific Northwest since its founding in 1952. The environmental funder plans to sunset its grantmaking in 2024.
Bush Foundation
The Bush Foundation supports a variety of work in Minnesota, North Dakota, and South Dakota, including community improvement, capacity building, human services, arts and culture, education, environment, health, and media and communication.
Butler Family Fund
This family foundation’s current priorities are homelessness and criminal justice reform, and it’s not afraid to fund frontline organizing in addition to think tanks and other advocates.
California Community Foundation
This community funder works in Los Angeles County, and the liberal leanings of many donors there have led it on a progressive path in areas like immigration and civic engagement.
California Endowment
The California Endowment has a major grantmaking footprint in Los Angeles and throughout the Golden State, as one of the region’s largest funders of healthcare initiatives and organizations.
California Wellness Foundation
This prominent regional health conversion foundation focuses its efforts on the health and well-being of low-income individuals and young people. The foundation funds around wide-ranging public health issues including violence, teen pregnancy and poverty.
Carnegie Corporation of New York
The Carnegie Corporation is one of the oldest foundations in the United States, and funds across a range of areas including education, democracy and international security.
Castellano Family Foundation
Founded by a California couple after they won the lottery, this grantmaker supports organizations working to improve the lives of Latinos in California’s Santa Clara County, particularly Latinas and youth.
Ceres Trust
Named after the ancient Roman goddess of agriculture, this funder backs green organizations and environmental justice, especially in Hawai’i, the upper Midwest and California’s San Joaquin Valley.
Chang K. Park Foundation
This foundation channels the wealth of the CEO of Universal Remote Control, Inc. Grantees include Demos and the Common Cause Education Fund.
Chan Zuckerberg Initiative
As the philanthropic vehicle of one of the world’s wealthiest couples, CZI has charted a moderately progressive course on issues like justice reform, poverty, and housing affordability.
Chicago Community Trust
The Trust’s latest strategic plan centers on closing the wealth gap between households of different races in the region. It also operates funds based around racial identity, LGBTQ identity and disability.
Chinook Fund
Chinook pools money from Colorado progressives and makes grants to community organizations in the state. It also engages in donor organizing work.
Chorus Foundation
Progressive heir Farhad Ebrahimi founded Chorus to help power a transition from an extractive, exploitative economy to a regenerative and just one. The foundation aims to spend down by 2024.
Christopher Reynolds Foundation
Established by singer Libby Holman Reynolds in 1952 following the death of her son, this grantmaker currently prioritizes climate change resilience and ecosystem health.
Cleveland Community Foundation
This community funder operates a fund focused on Black-led and Black-serving social change organizations, toward the dismantling of racist systems.
Common Counsel Foundation
This Oakland, CA-based organization is home to several family foundations and funds, all of which back progressive organizing and equity work.
Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta
Progressive initiatives at this community foundation include a civic engagement fund and a fund to promote neighborhood-level organizing.
Community Foundation for Greater Buffalo
This regional player has identified several community goals to pursue, including racial and environmental equity.
Community Foundation for Southeast Michigan
Many of this community funder’s initiatives have a progressive bent, including projects to spur justice reform, ensure an accurate U.S. Census count and address the needs of the area’s immigrants and refugees.
Conant Family Foundation
Conant backs racial justice, environmental justice and abortion access in the Chicago area. Family members are interested in participatory processes and shifting power to community organizers of color.
Crankstart Foundation
Founded by investor Michael Moritz and wife Harriet, Crankstart has supported some progressive organizations like the ACLU. Crankstart got behind Black-led movement organizing in the fall of 2020 via the Democracy Frontlines Fund.
Daphne Foundation
This foundation channels the wealth of Disney heir Abigail Disney. Its grantmaking favors community-based racial justice organizing.
David Bohnett Foundation
The eponymous founder of this Los Angeles-based institution is an early internet entrepreneur. Today, the foundation backs progressive causes like LGBTQ rights and gun violence prevention.
David Rockefeller Fund
One of many left-leaning organizations in the Rockefeller philanthropic universe, the David Rockefeller Fund supports climate change policy and criminal justice work, as well as the arts.
Deaconess Foundation
Deaconess supports the well-being of children and youth in the greater St. Louis region. Many of its current grantees are local community organizing groups and advocates with social justice missions.
Democracy Fund
The Democracy Fund is one of several funding vehicles that channel the fortune of eBay founder Pierre Omidyar. As the name suggests, its focus is on civic engagement, democracy protection and accountable government.
Denver Foundation
The oldest community foundation in Colorado has identified racial and economic equity as priorities. It supports the former, in part, through its Black Resilience in Colorado (BRIC) Fund.
Draper Richards Kaplan Foundation
A venture philanthropy shop, the DRK Foundation backs a portfolio of organizations in the U.S. and abroad. Many have explicit social justice, sustainability or pro-democracy missions.
East Bay Community Foundation
Based in Oakland, California, this community foundation is a friend to local donors and nonprofits looking to tackle structural barriers to opportunity and advance racial equity.
Echoing Green Foundation
Through its leadership development approach, Echoing Green has supported individuals and organizations working in areas like human rights, climate change and racial justice.
Elton John AIDS Foundation
The musical icon’s foundation is a key grantmaker in the global HIV/AIDS space, funding healthcare access and fighting stigma against LGBTQ people.
Embrey Family Foundation
Based in Dallas, Embrey supports Texas nonprofits along with systemic change work across the country. Priorities include women’s empowerment and gender equity, human and animal rights, and arts and human rights education.
Emerson Collective
A nonprofit LLC rather than a traditional foundation, Laurene Powell Jobs’ funding vehicle is an important, albeit secretive, progressive grantmaker. Its priorities include immigration, media and journalism, racial justice, criminal justice and civic engagement.
Enfranchisement Foundation
This small grantmaker was founded by Sunita Leeds, who has held leadership roles in the Democracy Alliance, Planned Parenthood and the Democratic Party itself.
Fledgling Fund
This grantmaker long supported documentary film and other media projects that shone a light on vulnerable populations. It is currently transitioning toward other priorities, which include COVID-19 relief.
Ford Foundation
Ford is an iconic social justice philanthropy and a bellwether for the sector. Its wide-ranging campaign against inequality has it funding in most progressive 501(c)(3) spaces we can think of, and leading in many.
Foundation for the Carolinas
A powerhouse regional community foundation, Foundation for the Carolinas plays host to a number of moderately progressive initiatives to boost equity in housing, education and in the region’s economy more broadly.
Foundation for a Just Society
This organization was founded in 2011 by a group of women led by Audrey Cappell, daughter of hedge fund billionaire James Simons. Its grants support structural change efforts for women, girls and LGBTQI people in the United States and abroad.
Fund for Southern Communities
A public foundation, this grantmaker raises money for small community groups working for social change in the states of Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina.
Future Justice Fund
Through this Bay Area-based fund, Instagram co-founder Mike Krieger and wife Kaitlyn support criminal justice reform and income security, which encompasses advocacy for direct cash transfers and reducing “consumer and worker predation.”
Garfield Foundation
Garfield has supported causes like environmental sustainability and racial equity, particularly by funding capacity around networking and collaboration.
General Service Foundation
A thoroughly progressive legacy funder, the General Service Foundation pursues an intentional program of holistic movement funding for racial and gender justice.
George Gund Foundation
This major regional funder is dedicated to social progress and human welfare, with a heavy focus on Northeast Ohio, but also giving nationally. Giving areas include the arts, economic development, community revitalization, education, the environment and human services.
Gill Foundation
The Denver-based Gill Foundation has awarded millions of dollars annually in grants for LGBTQI advocacy, both on the national level and in founder Tim Gill's home state of Colorado.
Lisa and Douglas Goldman Fund
Based in San Francisco, this family foundation funds nationally in several areas, including democracy and civil liberties, sustainable industry, and reproductive health and rights.
Grantham Foundation for the Protection of the Environment
Named after its founder, British investor Jeremy Grantham, this foundation typically backs larger environmentalist groups and climate change research.
Groundswell Fund
The Groundswell Fund supports grassroots groups fighting for the reproductive rights of women of color, low-income white women, and transgender people in the United States.
Group Health Foundation
This Washington state grantmaker’s 501(c)(3) funding is quite progressive, favoring priorities like anti-racism work, civic participation, organizing and narrative change.
Evelyn & Walter Haas Jr. Fund
Haas funds organizations working in the areas of immigration, LGBTQ rights, education, nonprofit leadership development and community partnerships.
Nick and Leslie Hanauer Foundation
Investor Nick Hanauer has become known for criticizing extreme wealth inequality. This foundation reflects those beliefs with gifts to liberal policy think tanks, progressive funding intermediaries and even some labor groups.
Edward W. Hazen Foundation
The Edward W. Hazen Foundation’s grants focus on how structural oppression and social inequality impact young people. The foundation is now in the process of spending down.
Headwaters Foundation for Justice
A community foundation, HFJ backs progressive organizing groups working in the state of Minnesota. BIPOC-led organizations are prioritized.
Heising-Simons Foundation
Heising-Simons is a great funder for climate and clean energy organizations to know, as well as human rights nonprofits, particularly those fighting the criminalization of poor Black, Indigenous, and other people of color.
Hellman Foundation
This funder supports Bay Area organizations working in education and youth development, health access, and basic needs. Music and dance also receive support today, alongside organizations like Planned Parenthood Northern California and the Center for Investigative Reporting.
William and Flora Hewlett Foundation
Though it doesn’t exhibit a particularly progressive brand, Hewlett is a big-time climate funder with a global development program that emphasizes women’s rights and a U.S. democracy program that’s just ramping up.
Hidden Leaf Foundation
Hidden Leaf is a small funder that seeks to expand “inner awareness” among social change organizations by backing organizational development for progressive movement groups.
Hill-Snowdon Foundation
The Hill-Snowdon Foundation funds economic justice and community strengthening initiatives in Washington D.C. and across the United States, with an emphasis on racial justice movement building.
Horizons Foundation
The first community foundation “of, by and for LGBTQ people,” Horizons channels funding to LGBTQ communities in the Bay Area.
Hull Family Foundation
Chicago-based investor Blair Hull founded this small grantmaker, which has supported progressive democracy work through outfits like NEO Philanthropy and Tides, as well as reproductive health and rights.
Hyams Family Foundation
This accessible funder focuses its grantmaking on Massachusetts’ Boston and Chelsea communities. It has adopted an approach centering racial justice.
Irving Harris Foundation
Rooted in Jewish traditions of giving back, this legacy foundation’s work includes reproductive health and justice as well as some movement work around health equity.
James Irvine Foundation
The James Irvine Foundation is a state-based funder that promotes economic opportunity for low-income Californians through two strategies it pursues in concert: workforce development and workers’ rights.
Jennifer and Jonathan Allan Soros Foundation
Jonathan Soros is the son of progressive mega-donor George Soros. Jonathan and wife Jennifer give to advance the social justice ecosystem via grants to policy think tanks, election protection efforts and progressive intermediaries.
Jessie Ball duPont Fund
Jessie Ball duPont gave generously to various causes, including liberal arts colleges, during her lifetime. The duPont Fund continues her work via grants to small liberal arts colleges for capital campaigns, student retention efforts, and green projects.
Jessie Smith Noyes Foundation
This New York-based legacy funder has long supported social justice movements and progressive causes. It has recently sought to “move beyond funding silos” to resource grassroots movements in an intersectional way.
John M. Lloyd Foundation
This funder got its start in the 1990s, tackling the AIDS epidemic. In 2014, it pivoted to work on the justice system in Los Angeles, where it backs movement building, policy and rapid response.
Johnson Family Foundation
Not to be confused with larger grantmakers that share the Johnson name, this is a small foundation that supports LGBTQ advocacy, environmental work and other social justice grantees. Colorado and Vermont are a focus.
Jonathan Logan Family Foundation
This Oakland, CA-based funder supports investigative journalism, the arts and documentary film in order to advance social justice.
Joyce Foundation
Through grantmaking centered on the Great Lakes region, Joyce funds a range of work toward the goal of reforming public policies and systems to improve people’s lives. It’s one key funder of efforts to curtail gun violence.
JPB Foundation
Barbara Picower’s philanthropy is a quiet but high-dollar social justice funder, supporting progressive nonprofits seeking economic justice, a better democracy and an end to poverty. It’s also a frequent environmental grantmaker.
Kataly Foundation
Kataly is an up-and-coming progressive grantmaker founded by Regan Pritzker, whose parents Nicholas and Susan Pritzker give through the movement-oriented Libra Foundation. Racial, economic and environmental justice are key early priorities for Kataly.
Marilyn and Jeffrey Katzenberg Foundation
A former CEO of DreamWorks, Jeffrey Katzenberg is a prominent Democratic donor whose charitable contributions favor left-leaning human rights organizations as well as arts and human service groups in Los Angeles.
W.K. Kellogg Foundation
A well-known progressive legacy funder, Kellogg centers its grantmaking on thriving children and families and seeks to fund racial equity throughout its work. Health equity and workers’ rights are big priorities.
Kendeda Fund
The low-key Kendeda Fund draws on the fortune of Diana Blank, whose former spouse Arthur Blank co-founded Home Depot. It funds a mix of conservation, climate change and sustainable living projects, with an emphasis on building broad support.
Klarman Family Foundation
The philanthropic vehicle of billionaire hedge funder Seth Klarman and wife Beth, this foundation awards grants to Jewish and Israeli charities, enrichment opportunities in Boston and medical and science research. Democracy issues are also a focus.
John S. and James L. Knight Foundation
Knight is a crucial philanthropic funder of media and journalism, waging a heroic effort to keep local news and investigative outlets afloat against economic headwinds. It’s also a substantial arts and place-based funder.
Kresge Foundation
Long one of the largest private foundations in the United States, Kresge supports a range of nationwide community development and human services programs, with a degree of focus on southeast Michigan, where it’s based.
Jacob and Valeria Langeloth Foundation
The Langeloth Foundation supports organizations that take a public health approach to ending the cycle of violence at the community level, and bankrolls justice reform efforts. It lately dedicated a large portion of its resources to democracy work.
Laughing Gull Foundation
Based in Durham, North Carolina, Laughing Gull backs LGBTQ equality efforts, climate and environment grantees and justice reform, specifically higher education in prison.
Lefkofsky Family Foundation
The Lefkofsky Family Foundation was established by Groupon cofounder Eric Lefkofsky and his wife, Liz. Within its human rights program area, it has supported a wide variety of big-name organizations like the ACLU, ADL, Everytown for Gun Safety and Planned Parenthood.
Levi Strauss Foundation
One of only a handful of corporate foundations with an unabashedly progressive agenda, Levi Strauss has gotten behind a variety of rights-focused movement organizing and has even backed the new labor movement.
Liberty Hill Foundation
Liberty Hill supports social justice work in Los Angeles, California. Funding interests include LGBTQ rights, racial justice, immigrant justice, the environment and an inclusive economy.
Libra Foundation
Founded by a branch of the Pritzker clan, Libra supports movement building and human rights work targeting systemic change, often backing efforts that involve policy reform, coalition building and legal strategies.
Long Island Community Foundation
A division of the New York Community Trust, this community funder hosts several collaborative funds focused on issues like civic engagement, racial equity and census equity in the state of New York.
Lumina Foundation
Known primarily for its workforce development funding, Lumina is currently engaged in efforts to foster a “learning landscape” that helps people of color overcome barriers to jobs and economic opportunity.
MacArthur Foundation
This iconic Chicago-based institution has been leaning left with work to address mass incarceration and seek climate solutions. Its longtime journalism commitments make it a solid funder in the broader democracy space as well.
Marguerite Casey Foundation
Marguerite Casey seeks to empower working people and families through grantmaking that builds networks of movement leaders and service providers from region to region.
Marisla Foundation
Marisla channels the fortune of Getty heiress Anne Earhart. Belying its origins, it’s best known for its environmental grantmaking. The foundation also actively engages in human services grantmaking in Los Angeles and Orange counties, with a focus on helping women.
Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation
This foundation supports economic opportunity, democracy and civic engagement, and related policies and institutions in the Southeast. Economic opportunity in Appalachia is one priority.
McIntosh Foundation
This environment-focused family foundation backs big greens like the NDRC and Greenpeace along with progressive advocacy groups like the Alliance for Justice.
McKnight Foundation
The Minnesota-based McKnight Foundation operates a “vibrant & equitable communities” grantmaking program that seeks to advance progressive change in its home state. It’s also a regional climate funder.
Andrew W. Mellon Foundation
This storied arts and humanities funder is tacking progressive under Elizabeth Alexander, a noted poet and former Ford Foundation employee. Its current priorities include keeping BIPOC-led arts nonprofits afloat and reimagining America’s monuments.
Mertz Gilmore Foundation
Mertz Gilmore’s climate giving current prioritizes the Southeast. It has also been giving to democracy groups since 2012 and remains a dedicated funder of community organizing and the arts in its home city of New York.
Eugene and Agnes E. Meyer Foundation
This regional funder works in the area surrounding Washington D.C., bringing a systems change lens to its support for movement organizations working for racial justice and equity.
Meyer Memorial Trust
Meyer supports a more equitable Oregon through funding for community development, education, the environment and housing. It operates special initiatives to support Black-led organizing and to address issues impacting immigrants and refugees in the state.
Minneapolis Foundation
This community foundation hosts funds focused on climate action and criminal justice reform, among other priorities. Its Fund for Safe Communities has backed BIPOC-led community groups working to reduce violence in the wake of George Floyd’s death.
Moriah Fund
Led by veteran philanthropist Mary Ann Stein during its first 35 years, the Moriah Fund is now led by her son Gideon Stein. Priorities include equity in education, social justice in Israel, women’s rights and reproductive health.
Morningstar Foundation
Founded by Michael and Susie Gelman, Morningstar supports civic participation, human rights, Jewish causes, reproductive rights and environmental work, mostly via well-established national nonprofits.
Charles Stewart Mott Foundation
Known for its longstanding work in and around its hometown of Flint, Michigan, Mott is also supportive of organizations working on civil society in developing countries, and of groups that foster a balance between economic and environmental imperatives.
Ms. Foundation for Women
An iconic funder in the feminist space, this foundation awards grants to a broad range of causes like ending gender-based violence, protecting women’s access to healthcare, and women’s sexual and reproductive rights. Grassroots movements are a priority.
Nathan Cummings Foundation
A multigenerational family foundation, Nathan Cummings pursues a program of racial and economic justice, corporate accountability and environmental justice, with an additional focus on multiethnic democracy in Israel.
Needmor Fund
Needmor is a small but dedicated funder of community organizing across the United States. It’s also interested in getting more donors involved in that work.
New Community Fund
A family foundation started by Fran and Charles Rodgers, this grantmaker supports national “progressive infrastructure” groups like the Brennan Center, Campaign for America’s Future, NARAL and Media Matters.
New York Community Trust
One of the largest community foundations in the nation, NYCT is an important regional funder of a wide variety of social and environmental justice causes. Roughly 5,000 grants go out each year.
New York Foundation
With over 100 years of grantmaking under its belt, the New York Foundation currently backs community organizing, civil and human rights, education, human services, legal services and criminal justice.
New York Women's Foundation
Established in the late 1980s to be run “by women, for women,” this grantmaker backs anti-violence work, safety, economic security, health, sexual rights, and reproductive justice to benefit women and girls in New York City.
Norman Foundation
This modest but well-established family foundation supports economic and environmental justice initiatives throughout the United States. Its movement building grants demonstrate an interest in racial justice organizing.
Northlight Foundation
Northlight is the foundation of businessman and environmentalist Daniel Tishman. In 2018, it adopted a strategic framework that centers environmental movement building, with some regional work in Alaska and the Arctic.
North Star Fund
The North Star Fund awards activist-led grants, rapid response money, and donor-advised grants in New York City. Issue areas include schools, housing conditions, healthcare, access to jobs, civil liberties, peace, freedom and human rights.
NoVo Foundation
The NoVo Foundation, founded by Peter and Jennifer Buffett, invests in organizations addressing violence against women and girls, seeking long-term policy change and advocating for economic justice.
Oak Foundation
An international grantmaker headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, Oak funds work on the environment, housing issues, women’s rights and preventing child sexual abuse, among other priorities.
Oak Hill Fund
Based in Virginia, Oak Hill is primarily a climate change and conservation grantmaker, but it also supports food security and women’s reproductive health and rights.
Omidyar Network
One of several funding vehicles the eponymous eBay founder utilizes, the Omidyar Network seeks systemic change through support for civic tech, worker power and a more pluralistic world.
Open Philanthropy Project
Open Philanthropy draws on the Facebook fortune of Dustin Moskovitz and Cari Tuna to back an effective altruist approach to challenges like justice reform and immigration policy, with additional global-level funding for development and risk alleviation.
Open Society Foundations
OSF has famously channeled the wealth of George Soros to advance a progressive agenda across the globe, with major domestic funding to advance democracy, racial justice and economic equity.
Ottinger Foundation
A modest foundation with an extensive board of directors made up of family members, Ottinger has supported climate and energy work, youth organizing and a progressive judiciary.
Overbrook Foundation
A progressive family foundation headquartered in New York, Overbrook’s two main funding areas are the environment—which includes a movement building component—and human rights, where current interests include reproductive and LGBTQ rights and the influence of money in politics.
David and Lucile Packard Foundation
This Bay Area foundation’s interests include climate and environmental conservation, reproductive health, and access to health and early learning for children. It’s an important ocean science funder.
Palette Fund
Primarily an LGBTQ funder, Palette has provided over $15 million to around 200 organizations since 2008. It’s also gotten behind progressive donor organizing groups like Resource Generation and the Threshold Foundation.
Panta Rhea Foundation
Panta Rhea is a small grantmaker founded by investor Hans Schoepflin and wife Lisl. It backs a broad spectrum of projects including the environment; youth, arts, and education; corporate and market campaigns; and alternative media.
Park Foundation
Located in Ithaca, New York, Park provides grants across several progressive program areas, including democracy and civil society, environment, media and animal welfare.
Passport Foundation
This is the 501(c)(3) giving vehicle of hedge fund manager John Burbank, whose philanthropic interests include the environment and left-leaning policy advocacy.
Public Welfare Foundation
This legacy foundation’s current efforts prioritize justice reform for adults and youth, and support alternatives to mass incarceration in a number of local and state jurisdictions across the country.
Quadrivium Foundation
Unlike his father Rupert, James Murdoch and wife Kathryn are dedicated liberal donors. Through Quadrivium, they back democracy groups, climate action, ocean conservation, “scientific understanding,” and efforts to grapple with the effects of tech on society.
Raikes Foundation
Jeff Raikes, a former Microsoft executive and CEO of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, uses this foundation to support educational equity, combat youth homelessness and build the philanthropic field.
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
A longstanding leader in public health philanthropy, Robert Wood Johnson’s recent turn toward the “upstream determinants” of health has it charting a more progressive, intersectional course and setting an example for other health funders.
Rockefeller Brothers Fund
A longtime backer of peacebuilding efforts, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund brings its ethos of an “interdependent world” to U.S. democracy work, sustainable development and economic justice.
Rockefeller Family Fund
Stemming from one branch of the storied family, this funder is a stalwart climate change grantmaker. Its other interests include civic participation and voter engagement as well as economic justice for women.
Rockefeller Foundation
Dating back to the last Gilded Age and the eponymous oilman, Rockefeller is now a solid liberal institution, tackling climate change, global development and economic equity in the United States.
Sandler Foundation
Progressives have this funder to thank for core institutions like the Center for American Progress, ProPublica and the Center for Responsible Lending. It remains a key think tank supporter and has moved into racial justice organizing via the Susan Sandler Fund.
San Francisco Foundation
The San Francisco Foundation is one of the largest community foundations in the nation and funds a broad range of equity-focused nonprofit organizations in the Greater Bay Area.
Schmidt Family Foundation
Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt and wife Wendy are moving in a progressive direction. The Schmidt Family Foundation has already backed efforts to build a more regenerative economy, and it's also embracing racial justice work.
Sea Change Foundation
Sea Change is the philanthropic vehicle of Nathaniel Simons (the son of hedge fund billionaire James Simons) and wife Laura Baxter-Simons. It gives away millions every year to promote clean energy and reduce carbon emissions, and also spends heavily on policy advocacy.
Simmons Foundation
This funder supports social justice organizations in the Greater Houston area and Harris County. Interests include health, education, civic and community power, and human services.
Solidago Foundation
This spend-down funder backs economic justice, climate equity and other progressive priorities, and sees the incubation of bold ideas as one of its roles.
Summit Foundation
This foundation channels the energy fortune of Roger and Victoria Sant. Urban sustainability is one focus area, along with equality for women and girls—particularly in Central America—as well as conservation of the Mesoamerican Reef.
Surdna Foundation
Building on a long history of giving, this national funder works at the intersection of economic and racial justice, environmental sustainability and the arts.
Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation
Flying mostly under the radar, this foundation is among the largest reproductive health and family planning funders on the planet, supporting efforts across the globe. It’s named after Warren Buffett’s late wife.
Swift Foundation
UPS heir John Swift founded this grantmaker in 1999. It’s an environment and conservation funder that predominately funds work led by or arising from Indigenous people and their local communities.
Unbound Philanthropy
Immigrant and migrant rights are Unbound Philanthropy’s core focus, and over the past two decades it has grown into a key backer of immigrant legal aid, grassroots activism, and projects involving culture change and immigrant integration.
Wallace Global Fund
“Inspired by the progressive vision” of New Deal-era vice president Henry A. Wallace, this funder backs corporate regulation, environmental protection, women’s rights and campaign finance reform.
Weingart Foundation
Funding primarily in its home region of Southern California, Weingart prioritizes three main areas: health, human services and education. Progressive service providers and human rights advocates often get funding.
Wellspring Philanthropic Fund
Wellspring is the brainchild of three secretive left-leaning billionaires and an important funder of voter engagement initiatives, progressive think tanks and movement organizations.
Woods Fund of Chicago
The Woods Fund arose from the 1993 restructuring of the Nebraska-based Woods Charitable Fund. Its current grantmaking focuses on community organizing, movement building and advocacy to combat systemic racism and poverty in Chicago.
Wyss Foundation
Billionaire Hansjorg Wyss focuses his philanthropic funding on environmental conservation, with various donations on the side to progressive policy outfits like the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities or left-leaning intermediaries like the New Venture Fund.
Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation
Notable for its transparent approach to strategic planning, this funder supports North Carolina causes in economic development, strengthening democracy, the environment, education, and social justice and equality.