Grants Database

Democracy Fund collaborates with our grantees, donors, and other partners to strengthen and expand the movement for an inclusive, multiracial democracy. We are proud to have supported more than 400 organizations doing this work.

Program Areas
Select...
Elections and Voting
General and Field Building
Governance
Just and Inclusive Society
President's Office
Public Square
Strategies
Select...
Civil & Human Rights Online
Constructive Politics
Digital Democracy
Ecosystem News
Empowering Congress
Engaged Journalism
Equitable Civic Infrastructure
General
Investigative Journalism
Journalism & Power Building
News & Information Ecosystems
Oversight and Accountability
Power Building in Marginalized Communities
Press Freedom
Preventing Authoritarian Abuse of Power
Previous Strategy
Pro-Voter Reform
Representative Institutions
Representative Leadership
Resilient Elections
Rights and Dignity
Roadmap for American Democracy
State and Local Accountability
Trust in Elections
Voter-Centric Election Administration
Voting Power
Organization Name (A-Z) Grant Amount Type Program Area Year
  • Issue One
  • $25,000.00
  • Project
  • Elections and Voting
  • 2014

To provide a restricted grant for Issue One to hire a consultant to strengthen the organization’s internal grant making processes and procedures.For more on Issue One’s background and program areas, please refer to R-201410-01360.

Project:

Restricted grant for consultation

Foundation Center Topic:

Campaigns, Elections, and Voting/Campaign Finance

Grant Length:

Dec 2014 to May 2016

Strategy:

Previous Strategy
  • Issue One
  • $400,000.00
  • General Operating Support
  • Elections and Voting
  • 2017

To provide general support to Issue One as they continue to broaden the coalition of leaders, supporters and ideas in an effort to find meaningful opportunities to educate the public on problems and solutions to the influence of money on politics. 

Project:

General Operating Support

Foundation Center Topic:

Campaigns, Elections, and Voting/Campaign Finance

Grant Length:

Apr 2017 to Mar 2019

Strategy:

Previous Strategy
  • Issue One
  • $400,000.00
  • General Operating Support
  • Elections and Voting
  • 2014

To provide general support to Issue One (formerly Fund for the Republic).

Project:

General Operating Support

Foundation Center Topic:

Campaigns, Elections, and Voting/Campaign Finance

Grant Length:

Dec 2014 to Dec 2016

Strategy:

Previous Strategy
  • John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, Inc.
  • $250,000.00
  • Project
  • Public Square
  • 2015

This grant will provide additional award money for the Knight Foundation’s News Challenge. The Knight News Challenge accelerates media innovation by funding breakthrough ideas in news and information. Winners receive a share of $3 million in funding – and support from Knight’s network of influential peers and advisors to help advance their ideas. Innovators from all industries and countries are invited to participate.

Project:

Knight News Challenge

Foundation Center Topic:

Media/Media Access and Policy, Campaigns, Elections, and Voting/Election Administration

Grant Length:

Jun 2015 to Sep 2017

Strategy:

Engaged Journalism
  • Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies Inc.
  • $300,000.00
  • Project
  • Governance
  • 2017

Democracy Fund will support The Joint Center’s efforts to identify, screen, and counsel African-American candidates for jobs in the U.S. Congress.  

Project:

The Joint Center Black Talent Initiative

Foundation Center Topic:

Government/Legislative Branch Performance, Government/Executive Branch Performance

Grant Length:

Jul 2017 to Jun 2019

Strategy:

Constructive Politics
  • Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies Inc.
  • $1,175,000.00
  • General Operating Support
  • Governance
  • 2019

This grant will provide General Operating Support to the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies. 

Project:

General Operating Support

Foundation Center Topic:

Civic Participation/Civic Education and Leadership, Government/Legislative Branch Performance

Grant Length:

Nov 2019 to Sep 2024

Strategy:

Constructive Politics
  • Journalism & Women Symposium
  • $100,000.00
  • General Operating Support
  • Public Square
  • 2020

The Journalism and Women Symposium (JAWS) is expanding their regional programming and diversifying their membership to support their mission to empower and grow the number of women in journalism.

Project:

General Operating Support

Foundation Center Topic:

Media/Journalism, Media/Journalism Education and Training

Grant Length:

Jul 2020 to Jun 2022

Strategy:

Engaged Journalism
  • Journalism & Women Symposium
  • $120,000.00
  • General Operating Support
  • Public Square
  • 2018

The first $80,000 installment is to support Grantee’s general charitable, educational, and/or scientific purposes as described in Grantee’s charter documents.
The second $40,000 installment is to empower the Grantee to increase and improve its organizational diversity, equity, and inclusion practices through various activities, including but not limited to collecting demographical and attitudinal data, a series of DEI-centered talks throughout Grantee’s regional chapters, and continued partnership with outside experts on diversity, equity, and inclusion.

Project:

General Operating Support

Foundation Center Topic:

Media/Journalism Education and Training, Media/Journalism

Grant Length:

Oct 2018 to Sep 2020

Strategy:

Engaged Journalism
  • Journalism & Women Symposium
  • $150,000.00
  • General Operating Support
  • Public Square
  • 2022

The Journalism and Women Symposium (JAWS) is expanding their regional programming and diversifying their membership to support their mission to empower and grow the number of women in journalism.

Project:

General Operating Support

Foundation Center Topic:

Media/Journalism, Media/Journalism Education and Training

Grant Length:

Jul 2022 to Dec 2023

Strategy:

Journalism & Power Building
  • JustFund.Us
  • $1,824,000.00
  • Project
  • Elections and Voting
  • 2023

JustFund is a revolutionary nonprofit grantmaking solution that provides philanthropy with a new way to give through a B2B SaaS (business-to-business software-as-a-service) platform with growing B2C (business-to-consumer) offerings. JustFund eliminates bottlenecks and barriers to giving and centers equity in a traditionally inequitable process.

Project:

Building Power Cohort

Foundation Center Topic:

Other

Grant Length:

Dec 2023 to Nov 2025

Strategy:

Voting Power
  • Justice Work
  • $10,000.00
  • Project
  • President's Office
  • 2022

Justice Work is a think tank/action lab that incubates path-breaking and creative initiatives to advance social justice. They center marginalized voices to challenge conventional priorities and strategies. They develop long-term partnerships with front-line organizations and academic institutions to strengthen social justice movements and break down siloed spaces.

Project:

Investing in Staff Wellbeing

Foundation Center Topic:

Grant Length:

Oct 2022 to Sep 2023

Strategy:

General
  • Justice Work
  • $200,000.00
  • Project
  • Just and Inclusive Society
  • 2021

22nd Century Initiative is a project of Justice Work, a fiscally sponsored project of the National Center for Civic Innovation. The Initiative addresses the expansion and mainstreaming of white nationalism and other far right movements in the U.S. by developing strategies, networks, research, and actions that protect the integrity of our democracy.

Project:

22nd Century Initiative

Foundation Center Topic:

Other

Grant Length:

Oct 2021 to Sep 2022

Strategy:

General
  • Kairos Fellowship Inc.
  • $1,050,000.00
  • General Operating Support
  • Public Square
  • 2023

Kairos works toward an inclusive, multi-racial democracy by changing how pro-justice organizations see, use, and imagine the future of the internet. Kairos recognizes that understanding the internet as a place, and reshaping governance of the internet as a public square, are essential to strengthening democracy and building a healthier digital media ecosystem.

Project:

General Operating Support

Foundation Center Topic:

Media/Media Access and Policy

Grant Length:

Nov 2023 to Sep 2026

Strategy:

Civil & Human Rights Online
  • Kairos Fellowship Inc.
  • $215,000.00
  • Project
  • Public Square
  • 2022

Kairos Fellowship, a fiscally sponsored project of Allied Media Projects Inc., trains fellows in digital-first campaigning who are placed at state and national power-building organizations.

Project:

Kairos Fellowship

Foundation Center Topic:

Media/Media Access and Policy

Grant Length:

Oct 2022 to Sep 2023

Strategy:

Equitable Civic Infrastructure
  • Kanu Hawaii
  • $85,000.00
  • Project
  • Elections and Voting
  • 2019

To provide Kanu, a Hawaii based volunteer organization, with capacity to engage volunteers to raise awareness about nonpartisan civic engagement and empowerment in the state. Kanu will work with other organizations and nonprofits to promote greater Hawaiian participation in voting and public engagement.

Project:

Volunteerism and Civic Engagement-Hawaii

Foundation Center Topic:

Campaigns, Elections, and Voting/Voter Education, Registration, and Turnout, Civic Participation/Civic Education and Leadership

Grant Length:

Dec 2019 to Nov 2020

Strategy:

Pro-Voter Reform
  • Kartemquin Educational Films
  • $20,000.00
  • Project
  • Governance
  • 2018

To support production and outreach for the documentary Represent, which followed a bipartisan group of female candidates during their 2018 election bids to different positions across the country.

Project:

Support for Represent Documentary

Foundation Center Topic:

Civic Participation/Public Participation, Civic Participation/Civic Education and Leadership

Grant Length:

Dec 2018 to Nov 2019

Strategy:

Constructive Politics
  • Keep Our Republic Charitable Fund
  • $300,000.00
  • General Operating Support
  • Elections and Voting
  • 2023

Keep Our Republic is a non-partisan civic education organization dedicated to protecting a republic of laws and strengthening the checks and balances of our democratic electoral system. We aim to discover, highlight, and help prevent an array of extraordinary threats to American democracy, strengthen democratic guardrails, and educate the public before it is too late.

Project:

General Operating Support

Foundation Center Topic:

Civic Participation/Civic Education and Leadership

Grant Length:

Oct 2023 to Mar 2025

Strategy:

Resilient Elections
  • Kennesaw State University Research and Service Foundation, Inc.
  • $200,000.00
  • Project
  • Public Square
  • 2017

This grant will support the Georgia News Lab. The News Lab’s mission is threefold: To make the vital work of investigative reporting affordable for news organizations, to increase diversity in newsrooms, and to help news outlets better serve their communities by increasing the flow of trustworthy public interest journalism.

Project:

Georgia News Lab

Foundation Center Topic:

Media/Journalism Education and Training

Grant Length:

Oct 2017 to Jun 2020

Strategy:

Engaged Journalism
  • Keseb
  • $300,000.00
  • Project
  • General and Field Building
  • 2023

Keseb, a fiscally sponsored project of the Fund for Constitutional Government, is a nonpartisan, pro-democracy nonprofit organization building transnational alliances between democracy activists and entrepreneurs to fight authoritarian ideology, demagogic political leaders, and xenophobic movements.

Project:

Support for Keseb

Foundation Center Topic:

Civic Participation/Civic Education and Leadership, Other

Grant Length:

Nov 2023 to Oct 2025

Strategy:

General
  • KW Foundation
  • $100,000.00
  • Project
  • Elections and Voting
  • 2024

Influence Change, a program of KW Foundation, a fiscally sponsored project of Social Impact Fund, serves as a hub to convene, educate, and empower artists and influencers using their platforms to increase civic participation.

Project:

Influence Change

Foundation Center Topic:

Campaigns, Elections, and Voting, Civic Participation, Campaigns, Elections, and Voting/Voter Education, Registration, and Turnout

Grant Length:

Sep 2024 to Aug 2025

Strategy:

General
Democracy Fund
1200 17th Street NW Suite 300,
Washington, DC 20036