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New Rules and Select Committee Create Opportunity for a More Effective Congress

Chris Nehls
/
January 14, 2019

Last week, the congressional reform community scored some major wins: new rules in the House of Representatives to support ethics and transparency, and the creation of a Select Committee with real potential to promote further reforms.

New Rules Lay the Foundation for New Results

The set of rules that the House of Representatives adopts each Congress often sets the tone for the next two years of legislating. Judging from the rules the House adopted in the first few days of this session, the 116th Congress is positioning itself to aggressively address challenges to its legislative capacity.

Current House rules tilt control of the chamber in ways that make it much harder for members to find bipartisan consensus on key problems that voters sent them to Washington to tackle. The select committee will examine ways that changes to how committees operate and how bills proceed to final passage can empower individual members to inject their expertise in the process and negotiate across the aisle. The Congressional Institute and Bipartisan Policy Center Action (a grantee of our sister organization, Democracy Fund Voice) have explored extensively what such changes could look like.

New Committee Promises Change and Accountability

The House overwhelmingly approved the creation of a Select Committee on the Modernization of Congress in a remarkable bipartisan vote of 418-12. This committee, to be chaired by Rep. Derek Kilmer of Washington, will suggest changes to House rules and procedures to encourage more bipartisan cooperation on bills and allow members to have more of an impact on the legislative process. It will also look into how Congress can adopt better workplace technology to become more innovative and examine challenges to recruiting and retaining a diverse and highly talented workforce. Membership on the committee will be split evenly between Democrats and Republicans.

Building Congressional Staff Capacity

Although changes to procedural rules may open new avenues for bipartisan legislation, the effects of these reforms will be limited as long as the working conditions, capacity, and resources of congressional staff remain stagnant. Fortunately, the broad mandate of the Select Committee allows it to address these foundational issues as well. As Democracy Fund grantees have highlighted, the level of support the institution provides its most essential personnel has reached crisis status. In a 2017 Congressional Management Foundation (CMF) survey, only 6 percent of congressional senior staff said they were “very satisfied” with the technological infrastructure of the Congress in supporting members’ duties and only 15 percent were very satisfied with the level of knowledge, skills, and abilities of fellow staff.

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Our grantees like the Congressional Management Foundation (CMF), the Legislative Branch Working Group, and Demand Progress have demonstrated how low pay, inadequate professional development opportunities, and high turnover can lead harried staff to rely increasingly on the perspectives of lobbyists and advocacy groups to inform legislation. Demand Progress, Lincoln Network, and TechCongress have noted that Congress suffers from a lack of staff with scientific and technical expertise—which might amount to just a handful of employees—to make sense of highly complex policy areas touching on nearly every aspect of American society. OpenGov Foundation and Lincoln Network, meanwhile, have explored how the information technology and digital communications systems serving congressional offices are inadequate for the world’s most powerful legislative body.

As the Select Committee begins its work, its members can rely on Democracy Fund grantees for impartial expert information on the state of congressional legislative capacity and ideas for modernizing the institution. Lincoln Network and Demand Progress, for example, have teamed up with a bipartisan coalition of civil society organizations, think-tanks, and academic experts to launch Future Congress, a resource hub to help improve the institution’s understanding of science and technology.

Fostering a Congress That Looks More Like America

The rules package also created a new Office of Diversity and Inclusion, which will develop and implement a plan to address Congress’ long-standing challenge of recruiting and retaining a diverse workforce, especially among senior staff. As Democracy Fund grantee the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies recently demonstrated, less than 14 percent of top-level congressional staff are people of color. This lack of diversity presents an urgent legislative capacity issue, as Congress lacks staff perspectives that reflect the demographic composition of the nation.

The Office of Diversity and Inclusion can look to the Staff Up Congress initiative, a project of the Joint Center and the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials, for best practices in developing a pipeline of diverse candidates and hiring and promoting in an inclusive manner. The Joint Center is holding the freshman class of the 116th Congress accountable by tracking new hires of staff of color to senior positions.

The Select Committee and the Office of Diversity and Inclusion are just two aspects of a broader package of reforms that will strengthen ethical and transparent conduct of House members. The rules package also establishes a whistleblower office for congressional staff, strengthens institutional support for ethics investigations of members, and forces members to pay out of their own pocket for employment discrimination lawsuits.

Change in Washington requires patience and preparation to be ready to seize opportunities for reform when they arise. The rules reform package validates our strategy of long-term investment in organizations that provide a vision of what a modern Congress should be. In partnership with congressional stakeholders, those organizations are poised to begin a historic undertaking in the new Congress, strengthening its ability to fulfill its constitutional obligations and restoring public trust in the institution.

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Not Just Another Election Year: Reflections on Defending Democracy in 2018

Joe Goldman
/
December 20, 2018

In July, I published an open letter to tell you about the numerous ways our organization stood up in this time of crisis. Since then, Democracy Fund and our grantees have continued to garner important successes in bolstering the guardrails of our democracy.

Nowhere was this more on display in 2018 than during the midterm election. Millions of Americans from across the political spectrum engaged in the electoral process as volunteers, candidates, and voters for the first time. Record-breaking turnout resulted in a Congress that is more reflective of America than ever before. This surge of enthusiasm for our democracy was inspiring and reenergized my dedication to Democracy Fund’s core mission.

Dozens of Democracy Fund grantees played important roles in supporting this groundswell. I am honored that we helped enable their success. I’d like to take this opportunity to share just a few of their stories.

Ensuring the integrity of our electoral process and systems

Razor-thin margins and recounts in numerous races this November brought significant public scrutiny to election officials and highlighted the importance of well-resourced election administration. This year alone, our grantees’ work resulted in the modernization of nine states’ voter registration systems and pressured at least five states to comply with the National Voter Registration Act.

On the important issue of election security, grantees such as the Defending Digital Democracy Project equipped hundreds of jurisdictions across the nation with best practices and resources to meaningfully respond to cyber threats. I’m particularly proud of the contribution of Democracy Fund Voice staff and grantees in ensuring the congressional appropriation of $380 million for election security that was awarded in grants to all 50 states and multiple territories.

Defending voter access

When voter access was put in jeopardy, our grantees fought to protect the rights of voters in some of the most-watched states in the midterm elections. Demos helped protect the language access rights of Spanish speakers in Florida. The Campaign Legal Center sued to defend the voting rights of Native Americans in North Dakota and played a key role in efforts to combat the controversial measures implemented in Georgia by then-Secretary of State Brian Kemp. Common Cause provided thousands of volunteers to support election protection and strategies to alert the public if voters had problems at the polls. The Texas Civil Rights Project won expanded early voting access for Texas State University students and kept nine polling locations in Harris County open for an extra hour after they opened late on election day.

Engaging and informing voters

Robust and fair elections systems are a crucial starting place for successful elections, but so too is an engaged and informed public. Millions of voters used tools built by Democracy Fund grantees to register to vote, identify their polling locations, and access other important information about the election. Democracy Works’ API powers the voter registration and voter outreach efforts of Facebook, Google, and Twitter, among others – over 3.5 million people received help registering to vote in 2018. Meanwhile, Democracy Fund partnered with Nonprofit Vote and dozens of others to implement the most successful National Voter Registration Day ever, with more than 800,000 Americans registering to vote on September 25th alone.

Throughout the election season, grantees in our Public Square portfolio played an important role in keeping the public informed about election systems, the candidates, and campaigns. Hundreds of local newsrooms supported by Democracy Fund helped prepare and educate voters for the decisions before them. Our North Carolina Local News Lab helped spark an exciting collaboration between Duke University, Politifact, the University of North Carolina, and McClatchy newspapers to publish over a dozen fact-checking articles on local and state races, including a series on the North Carolina constitutional amendments. The Center for Public Integrity undertook a fascinating effort to track the influence of money in races across the country. And ProPublica’s Electionland has quickly become one of the most important journalistic collaborations to track and report on election administration in the country. Their reporting on misinformation and political ads on social media platforms such as Facebook were particularly noteworthy.

In these ways—and so many more—Democracy Fund’s grantees and partners helped shape what may well be a watershed election in our history.

Preparing to govern

With the midterms behind us, Congress is set to receive a significant influx of new members. Many grantees in our Governance program are helping them get off on the right foot through orientations, trainings, and other resources. A record number of women and people of color will hold seats in the 116th Congress, and Democracy Fund has provided additional funding this year to the Women’s Congressional Policy Institute to help these members thrive. The Staff Up Congress initiative, meanwhile, is facilitating the recruitment and placement of members of underrepresented groups for senior congressional staff positions.

With such a large number of first-time legislators set to join the institution, it is all the more important that members of Congress have the resources necessary to manage effective legislative offices. That’s why I’m particularly pleased that so many of the priorities of Democracy Fund Voice and its grantees passed through the FY2019 Legislative Branch Appropriations Bill. This includes new resources for the Congressional Research Service and GAO, funding for cybersecurity and tech improvements, and the first significant new funding for member office capacity in Congress in a decade.

Holding government accountable

Our government accountability and investigative journalism grantees have consistently had a hand in some of the key political issues of the year, informing the public and applying pressure where ethical and legal breaches among government actors have been suspected.

  • Our grantees filed more than 3,000 FOIA requests and dozens of FOIA lawsuits, including Lawfare’s successful effort to secure the release of more than 100 FBI emails that contradicted the White House narrative that Director James Comey had lost Bureau support before his firing.
  • ProPublica’s heart-wrenching reporting on the family separation crisis played a key role in rallying public opposition to the administration’s policies. And the Project On Government Oversight and OpenTheGovernment uncovered documents showing that DHS officials signed off on policies that would lead to family separation and then told Congress there was no such policy.
  • Protect Democracy Project is looking ahead to a moment of democratic renewal, laying out an extensive list of reforms to strengthen Congress’ role as the first branch and to rein in executive branch abuses.

Meanwhile, when the Attorney General was forced to resign, we helped lead the philanthropic sector in defending the rule of law by rallying 45 signatories to our statement demanding that the Mueller investigation be allowed to reach its conclusion unimpeded.

Elsewhere in our portfolio, grantees have continued the slow and steady work of informing and engaging the public through trustworthy local journalism, building an effective and constructive Congress, and rebuilding a strong civic fabric by reaffirming our commitment to core American values.

Across the nation, I see dedicated Americans standing up for the type of democracy they want and working daily to build it. The determination our sector has shown has given me renewed faith in our democracy’s future and has increased my resolve to face the challenges ahead. In my open letter in July, I noted that our approach would be far more aggressive in combating the unprecedented threats that our democracy faces. In the new year, Democracy Fund looks forward to continuing to invest in efforts to create a more effective Congress, modern and secure elections, and a robust public square.

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Constructive Oversight in the Newly Elected Congress

Lara Flint
/
November 27, 2018

Earlier this month, the Project On Government Oversight sponsored the first-ever Oversight Summit, convening experts from nonprofits, think tanks, Congress, and the executive branch to share best practices and strategies for improving oversight of and by the federal government. The Summit featured organizations across the political spectrum working to support meaningful oversight, transparency, and accountability efforts—including Democracy Fund grantees like the R Street Institute, the Levin Center, the Partnership for Public Service, and many others.


At Democracy Fund, we ground our work in a framework of principles we developed to describe the attributes of a healthy democracy. Under that framework, constitutional checks and balances and respect for the rule of law are critical to protecting Americans against abuses of power by their government. Co-equal branches of government and our federal system both serve as checks, and civil society plays a critical role in holding those in power accountable to the Constitution, the law, and the people they represent.As expected, a topic that arose repeatedly was the incoming 116th Congress and its oversight powers and priorities. As is often the case under one-party rule, Congress has not leaned into its role as a check on the executive branch over the past two years. Despite a range of issues crying out for meaningful oversight, Congress largely did not engage, instead giving in to the hyper-partisanship that pervades our political system (though with some exceptions). Congress’ lack of institutional resources has further hamstrung its ability to fulfill its constitutional role to conduct oversight. With a president whose rhetoric and actions fundamentally threaten democratic norms, however, the stakes are high, and the need for effective oversight can no longer be ignored. While the 116th Congress has a full agenda, the incoming House leadership has promised oversight of the executive branch will be a top priority.

Our framework also emphasizes that political leaders bear an uncommon burden to act with integrity. Their words and actions should reflect democratic values, the Constitution, and the dignity of every individual.

As Democracy Fund’s Betsy Wright Hawkings outlined at the beginning of the 115th Congress, “For those who care about values-based leadership, rules matter—starting with the rule of law. And that is what oversight is—enforcement of the rules.” These principles apply regardless of who holds power.

So how should the new Congress exercise its oversight responsibilities? Some have debated whether the House should aggressively pursue investigations. I think that is the wrong question.

There is no shortage of oversight to be done—the hurricane recovery effort in Puerto Rico; separating children from their parents at the border; government officials using their positions to enrich themselves rather than serve the public good; or foreign attempts to influence our elections. All of this oversight is sorely needed.

Instead, the question is whether the House will ground that oversight in a methodical effort to make our government work better for the American people, or whether Democrats will approach its investigations as an opportunity for partisan retribution. Will the new House majority reach across the aisle—even if they expect to be rebuffed? Or will they go it alone from the beginning? Will they reflexively issue subpoenas, or deploy them as a last resort?

Strong oversight efforts can be aggressive and constructive. As former congressional oversight staffer Kris Kolesnik said during the Oversight Summit, “all oversight begins and ends by putting politics at the door.” The administration should absolutely be asked tough questions by members of Congress—but those members must also remember why they are asking these questions in the first place: to uncover and fix wrongdoing and make our government better, not to score political points.

This will take hard work, and unfortunately we know that Congress is under-resourced to fulfill its constitutional responsibilities under Article I—another theme raised frequently during the Summit. That is why Democracy Fund has invested in organizations that provide bipartisan oversight training to congressional staff; help ensure that government actions are transparent to the American people; and conduct their own investigations of government wrongdoing.The importance of this was underscored by Senator Carl Levin, a keynote speaker at the Summit and veteran of countless bipartisan oversight investigations during his decades in Congress. At the Summit Senator Levin awarded the first ever Carl Levin Award for Effective Oversight to South Carolina State Rep. Weston Newton, the Republican chairman of the Legislative Oversight Committee, who has worked across the aisle to make government work better in South Carolina. Rep. Newton explained how oversight should transcend party affiliation: “Whether an agency is doing its job properly or not should not be something that either party has the franchise on asking the questions [about]…nor should the party in power be afraid to ask the questions and expose the shortcomings of those agencies.”

Even with these challenges, by all reports the incoming House majority is poised to breathe new life into Congress’ role as a check on the executive branch. Done right, this is a critical component of our democratic system, it will protect against abuse of power, and it will make our government work better.

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Building a Team to Invest in Democracy

Lauren Strayer
/
November 26, 2018

Following the 2016 election, Democracy Fund heard from many philanthropists seeking advice on what they can do to respond to the threats facing our political system. For some, the last two years have brought a newly pervasive sense that our democracy is under threat and that our political system is far more fragile than most of us assumed. We feel the same way, and we are humbled that interested donors and their advisors are turning to us and to our peers for guidance.

Through our efforts to support these new partners, we discovered that Democracy Fund can play a helpful role in providing advice and connections to philanthropists who are learning about the field. To that end, I am delighted to share that we are building a new team at Democracy Fund to help us be a better resource to philanthropists, advisors, and our peers. The team will be led by a newly created position, the Director of Partnerships.

This swell in philanthropic interest comes at a pivotal time. Despite a clear and pressing need, the level of philanthropic support for this field remains critically low. Whether you look at voting, journalism, or civic education, many of the most capable and innovative organizations in the space have struggled through multiple cycles of feast and famine and need more resources to meet the challenges at hand.

To make progress on issues that are important to the American people and to ensure the health of our democracy for future generations, the United States needs deep investment by philanthropists and advocates. Policy reforms ranging from the future of affordable housing to climate change depend on a political system that is responsive to the public. A more equitable society requires eliminating barriers to voting and reducing the influence of money on politics. And improving the ability of individuals and communities to thrive rests on a functioning government, fair enforcement of the rule of law, and stability in our politics. Despite the reality that progress hinges on a healthy democracy, the field receives less than two percent of overall philanthropic giving.

Building a healthier democracy together

Working with our peer funders, we hope the Democracy Fund Partnerships team can be a resource to donors and to the field. Our goal is to make the expert capacity of our staff and our collaborative approach available to interested philanthropists. We believe that enlisting greater philanthropic energy, ideas, and resources to the fields in which we work is one of the most effective ways for us to meet the scale of the challenge.

Our new team will educate and engage philanthropists who are new to democracy with the goal of helping them to enter the field. Led by the Director of Partnerships, the team will help donors and their advisors make strategic decisions to invest in our country’s democracy. It will take some time and experimentation to build this program, but there are a few things you should expect to see:

  • Resources: Democracy Fund will work with our peers to develop resources that help new donors to better understand the space, including investment guides highlighting the most innovative and high-impact strategies and organizations in the field. The Foundation Center’s data tool for the democracy field is an excellent example of the kind of resource we have helped create in the past that can help philanthropists understand the existing landscape.
  • Educational Events: Over the past 18 months, Democracy Fund has partnered with the Giving Pledge to educate members of that network about opportunities to strengthen democracy in the United States. We expect to organize more briefings and workshops like those we organized with Giving Pledge to inform new donors.
  • Joint Funds: Democracy Fund participates in and has created several collaborative funds that enable donors to easily contribute to vetted, highly effective grantees working to protect the health of our government, elections, and free press. Our Public Square program, for example, works with other journalism funders through NewsMatch, the North Carolina Local News Lab Fund, and the Community Listening and Engagement Fund. We aim to work with our peers to develop other similar funds that make it easier for new donors to enter the space.

Our Commitment to the Field

Our new efforts to build philanthropic partnerships will not slow our existing efforts to deploy our resources to support the field. Since Democracy Fund began, we have committed more than $100 million in grants and built a team of more than 45 people with deep expertise on issues ranging from journalism and elections to Congress and government accountability. Thanks to the generosity and leadership of Pierre Omidyar we intend to continue to invest at a similar level in the coming years.

At the same time, our commitment to our existing grantees will not limit our advice to new donors – we hope to help philanthropists find their own path into the field, whether or not it mirrors the path that we have chosen.

We are grateful for the mentorship and ongoing partnership of many foundations who have supported this field for decades, including the Knight Foundation, Carnegie Corporation, Ford Foundation, Open Society Foundations, and Rockefeller Brothers Fund. At such a deeply important moment for our country, we are excited to begin this important work and will continue to share our progress as the team grows and the program develops.

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Op-Ed: How Philanthropy Can Do More to Stand Up for America’s Democracy

Joe Goldman
/
November 25, 2018

When the chief justice of the Supreme Court finds it necessary to reprimand the president of the United States for undermining the independence of the federal judiciary, it can be difficult to objectively know if that signifies a constitutional crisis.

Compared with Watergate, we are living through a slow-motion Saturday Night Massacre as the president and his allies test the limits of our democracy every week and sometimes every day. Instead of igniting from one clearly crossed red line, a constitutional crisis is creeping up on us.

As philanthropic leaders, we find it especially challenging to know what our role should be at a time like this. We represent nonpartisan institutions concerned about issues as disparate as civic engagement, civil rights, the environment, the arts, and more. That work can only truly thrive when our democracy is healthy, and so while we remain committed to our individual missions, we must also stand up and support people and organizations working to protect constitutional norms…

Read more from Joe Goldman at The Chronicle of Philanthropy.

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Learning from History to Plan for What’s Next

Joe Goldman
/
November 7, 2018

​American democracy is in crisis. At a time of deepening polarization and social strife, many of our elected officials – most notably our chief executive – routinely disregard, and indeed actively undermine, the very norms and institutions that buttress our democratic system. At every turn, the foundational values of American democracy are under attack.

Fortunately, the threats facing our democracy are not unique and there is much to learn from other countries and from our own history – both about democratic backsliding and about strategies to reverse its course. Understanding the experiences of other democracies can help us grapple with challenges we are experiencing today, and plan for those that may lie ahead.

Democracy Fund invited Rachel Kleinfeld and David Solimini of the Carnegie Endowment for World Peace to write What Comes Next? Lessons for the Recovery of Liberal Democracy to tackle just this question. Through their research, Rachel and David dig into several case studies and offer insightful recommendations on what might be done in the United States to recover from the path of institutional decline.

Rachel and David’s analysis challenges us to revisit many of the assumptions Democracy Fund has made in assessing our democracy’s vulnerabilities and deploying strategies to protect it. Our staff has grappled these insights in ways that have enriched our thinking and the approach to our work. Among others:

  • We are affirmed in our work focused on ensuring the independence of a robust, healthy media that can hold those in power to account. The watchdog function of the media cannot be underestimated.
  • We take to the warning against placing too much hope in the political parties and legislature to defend themselves against abuses of power by a strong executive. We must explore ways to find, pressure, and incentivize, alternative champions of democracy.
  • While the paper corroborates our fears on the risk of the American’s system reliance on informal norms, we were encouraged to read how federalism should be considered an important tool in combatting the worst overreaches of an embattled federal government.

Democracy Fund regularly publishes research relating to our established program areas, and we occasionally commission work that is intended to push our thinking in new directions. We, like others, have much to learn. We are all well-advised to engage deeply with new, big ideas that challenge our assumptions. The research is a platform for rigorous scholarship that can help us identify new strategies to build a healthier democracy.

Read the Full Report Here

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Local Officials Working to Make Your Vote Secure

Adam Ambrogi
/
November 6, 2018

As the nation gears up for what could be one of the most historic mid-term elections, it’s important to separate the misconceptions from realities when assessing the safety and security of our elections. A new cohort of nonprofits have emerged to focus on promoting election security and election access for the voting process. Election officials at the local and state level, as well as national officials, have worked incredibly hard since 2016 to identify and respond to foreign probing and cybersecurity breaches—and we believe that despite increased risks, our elections are safer than they have ever been.

The U.S. election system is not run by a single body or office—rather they are administered by approximately 10,000 local jurisdictions nationwide – which makes it difficult to coordinate an attack on the election process or rig the system. Even within the same state, different jurisdictions use different technologies to administer their ballots, making a successful attack even more difficult. There are problems that need ongoing attention; and it is certainly true that foreign interference is a real threat—but federal, state, and local authorities remain vigilant as they protect our democracy.

To secure an election, local election officials test machines in the lead up to the election to detect problems early and ensure things run smoothly on Election Day. In addition, all 50 states and 1,000 local election offices share information with U.S. Department of Homeland Security to prepare for potential cyber threats. Additionally, Congress has worked to provide state and local government with funds to aid them in securing this election.

To keep voting machines secure, they are held under lock and key with additional protections in place to ensure that nobody without proper credentials can access the devices undetected—typically with multiple layers of physical security such as fencing, key card access, locks, and seals, as well as observational video surveillance. Together, these serve as a check and balance to prevent tampering with the machines and to catch any errors in the count.

Similarly, it is very unlikely that anyone could ever change a vote tally. Ballots are cast at tens of thousands of polling places across the country. Changing an election result would require advance knowledge of likely results, numerous perpetrators working together to go completely undetected by communities, election officials, and law enforcement, including the FBI.

It’s also important to keep in mind that 80% of Americans vote on paper, and almost all states require a post-election review to validate the results. If a discrepancy exists, reviews and recounts are ordered, and the paper records are used for the official record. Even if an individual machine were compromised, the official result would be based on the paper record. And most states are considering a move to a post election audit that’s based on the difference between the the candidates, sometimes known as a “risk-limiting audit.” Furthermore, local election officials are the best resource in any election cycle. You can learn about how they secure the election systems, machines, and other equipment on their social media accounts. If there are problems getting attention from your poll worker or the head of your polling place, there is an effective national hotline, 1866-Our-Vote

Finally, instances of people voting multiple times or voting if ineligible are an incredibly rare occurrence, and this does not occur at a scale that has ever been shown to impact or change an election result. The registration rolls and voters reporting their identity both serve as a check, and the massive criminal penalties for voter fraud operate as a major deterrent. The likelihood that a scheme of voter impersonation would change a particular race is incredibly small.

While Congress needs to do more work to solve this problem-and fund a solution, they’ve started the process. Earlier this year, they appropriated $380 million dollars to the states, to be used to promote greater security of elections. All of the states and territories requested this money, received it, and many states are now using the money to improve security and voting systems. Overall, our elections are as secure as they’ve ever been—certainly compared to 2016. There are diligent public servants on hand to address security concerns that do arise in the 2018 midterms so that each state can understand the challenges and feel equipped to prepare for the 2020 presidential election. While I am optimistic, the need to better secure our elections and provide voters has never been greater, and Congress must provide a regular stream of funding to the states to deal with the rising threats—as the states and localities cannot match the magnitude of threats alone.

To find your polling place, learn about the candidates, or find other information about your local election from nonpartisan organizations like the Voting Information Project and Vote411.org—and find out more about your state’s recount process here. You can also talk with family and friends about the election. And to learn more about our work, check out the website www.democracyfund.org, including new research on the public’s view of election administration and reform, found here, and state-level news about elections on www.electionline.org.

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Supporting Listening, Learning, and Community Connection for a Stronger Democracy

Laura A. Maristany
/
November 5, 2018

From rising discrimination against religious and ethnic minorities to the resurgence of fascist and white supremacist ideologies, both the EU and the United States are grappling with how to respond to the rise of hate¬¬ and fear-based politics. Magnified by foreign and special interest propaganda and misinformation, these dangerous and highly divisive movements could significantly challenge the health and future of democracy around the world. This month, I joined the German Marshall Fund Memorial fellowship program to learn more about how European democracies are responding to these threats, and to share how Democracy Fund is standing up to defend democracy here in the U.S.

After visiting with political, philanthropic, and community leaders in five countries, I was especially inspired by the work being done to foster conversation and connection between communities in both Athens, Greece and Sofia, Bulgaria. In Athens, the civil sector has created common spaces for communities to engage with each other through the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center, and local government initiatives are working to integrate migrant communities. In Bulgaria, the Sofia Platform is helping communities reconnect by developing a new model for civic education, including an updated syllabus and new tools and trainings for teachers.

At Democracy Fund, we believe that healthy democracy is rooted in the recognition of the dignity of every individual and in the equal protection of their rights under the law. All people have intrinsic value and bigotry in any form undermines democracy. Grantees of our Just and Inclusive Society project are working to defend the rights and voices of targeted communities through communications and legal strategies. Democracy Fund has also funded new research on The Rise of the Alt-Right and is investing in projects that empower faith leaders to help bridge some of our nation’s most painful divides.

We also believe that constructive dialogue within and between political parties is essential to governing a complex society like ours. Americans must find ways to reestablish trust in our political leaders and institutions, and also with each other. In previous blog posts, we’ve shared how elevating constructive voices, celebrating civility, and ensuring Congress looks more like America are important keys to achieving this goal—but it’s not enough. As Speaker of the House Paul Ryan recently explained, “How do you make inclusive, aspirational politics … strategically valuable? How do you make it so this is the winning thing, this is how you win elections?”

To dig into this question, Democracy Fund is partnering with universities, think tanks, and nonprofit organizations to convene leaders from across the political spectrum and in communities across the country to listen, learn, and connect with each other. Through in-depth conversations about American identity and political philosophy, these projects aim to develop new ideas, strategies, and actionable steps towards a more inclusive America.

In a series of bipartisan events, The Project on Political Reform at the University of Chicago is convening political scientists and practitioners to discuss the scope and nature of governmental and political dysfunction. Participants work together to help identify pragmatic solutions and common-sense strategies for improving political accountability, campaign laws and practices, structural incentives influencing candidate and office-holder behavior, and relationships between governing institutions. The American Project on the Future of Conservatism at Pepperdine University is a multi-year program that brings together conservative leaders and scholars to assess where the conservative movement stands today and to imagine its healthy future. Contributors at recent events have published essays and media pieces and a collaborative principles document entitled A Way Forward, which offers innovative insights on conservatism in an age of rising populism.

The Inclusive Republic Series, an Aspen Socrates Program, provides a forum for emerging leaders and civically engaged citizens from a wide range of backgrounds and sectors to discuss American identity through examination of some of our nation’s founding documents and with expert-moderated dialogue. The Prospects for Liberal Democracy Series at the CATO Institute aims to mitigate the growing threat of populism through discussions about the future of liberal democracy in the United States among a diverse group of activists, academics, and political leaders. By promoting civil discourse in communities across the country, these convenings are working to change the nature of our national dialogue.

To push back against the rise of hate and fear-based politics, we must find ways to rebuild trust and connection with our communities and with each other. By focusing on the ideals and values that unite us, rather than divide us, these grantees give us hope for the future. We’re grateful for their commitment to helping build a more inclusive America and a stronger democracy. I look forward to sharing what we’re learning as these and other projects continue.

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A Bold Funder Collaboration Focuses on Supporting Journalism that Strengthens Democracy

Josh Stearns
/
November 1, 2018

Something remarkable starts today. Across the country 155 newsrooms are banding together for a year-end campaign to stand up for journalism that strengthens democracy. Today is the first day of NewsMatch, a national call to action to support trustworthy local news and critical investigative reporting. For the next two months a group of funders will double donations to nonprofit newsrooms across the country. At a moment when news deserts are spreading and journalism is under attack, nonprofit newsrooms are expanding and refuse to back down. They are united in their commitment to serve the public, Now more than ever, they need the public’s support.

From November 1 to December 31 individual donations of $1,000 or less will be matched, dollar for dollar, up to $25,000 per newsroom. At NewsMatch.org you can search for participating newsrooms that report on issues you care about or cover your community, and you can donate to them all in one place.

Now in its third year, NewsMatch is a unique partnership between local and national foundations and companies that aims to raise millions of dollars for quality news, build the long term capacity of the nonprofit news sector, and raise awareness of the important role of journalism in our democracy. Local and national funders interested in supporting public interest journalism can still get involved (reach out to me at jstearns@democracyfund.org to discuss how NewsMatch can meet your goals)

Originally created by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation in 2016, NewsMatch has more than doubled in dollars, donors, and participants in three years as it has become a platform for foundations and corporations to pool their funds and expand their impact. “NewsMatch is more than just a campaign. It is a movement that accelerates a new lane of journalism,” writes Karen Rundlet, a Journalism Director at Knight Foundation, “NewsMatch is stronger with multiple sources of financial support.”

New Funders Join NewsMatch to Support Quality News

In 2018 NewsMatch is growing significantly with new funders and newsrooms, representing the increased importance of nonprofit news to keeping our citizens informed, holding our leaders accountable, and covering the issues facing our communities and our nation.

One of the new funders joining NewsMatch in 2018 is the Jonathan Logan Family Foundation. Jonathan Logan, a longtime supporter of investigative reporting in the United States, invests in journalism that creates positive change. “NewsMatch is a perfect fit for us,” Logan said, “we look for opportunities where our support will make a significant difference.” The Jonathan Logan Family Foundation’s gift will both support the national campaign and provide an extra match opportunity to specific local newsrooms. “We are able to support dozens of worthy newsrooms by being part of the main NewsMatch fund, and at the same time offer additional support and incentives to more than a dozen newsrooms in the Deep South and post-Hurricane Maria Puerto Rico, regions of particular importance to us,” Logan said.

Facebook has also significantly increased its support this year, after partnering with NewsMatch in 2017 to raise awareness about the campaign. In August the Facebook Journalism Project announced it was contributing $1 million to the NewsMatch fund. “We are thrilled to do our part to help support these publishers that are providing critical news for communities across the U.S. and helping fill gaps in public information,” said Jason White, Facebook’s director of news partnerships. “This is Facebook’s second year supporting NewsMatch, and over this time, we’ve seen an increase in the importance of nonprofit newsrooms to the local news ecosystem.” Facebook is the first corporation to join the campaign.

In parallel with NewsMatch, at least 20 other foundations and donors have set up local matching efforts with individual newsrooms during the last months of the year. These donors include the University of Texas at El Paso which is providing $65,000 in matching dollars to Borderzine, The Zellerbach Family Foundation and The Ralph M. Parsons Foundation which are supporting Fostering Media Connections, the Asta MacDonald Memorial Match supporting WDET Detroit Public Radio, South Dakota philanthropists Dan and Arlene Kirby who are providing $25,000 in matching dollars to South Dakota News Watch, a match from the PRI-PRX Board, a group of major donors in Michigan who will be matching donations to East Lansing Info, and Hugh and Jackie Bikle, the Calhoun & Christiano Family Fund, and the Randy and Rebecca Wolf Family Fund who together are supporting BenitoLink.com with a $25,000 match.

Foundations Expand Their Support with More Dollars for More Newsrooms

In addition to these new supporters a number of foundations returned to support NewsMatch for a second year, and expanded their support in 2018. The Gates Family Foundation, which supported one newsroom in 2017, is offering an additional $1,500 match to eight Colorado newsrooms in 2018 as part of the Colorado Media Project, which aims to strengthen and accelerate sustainable, civic-minded journalism in Colorado. Melissa Milios Davis, vice president for strategic communications at the Gates Family Foundation, sees NewsMatch as a way to encourage Colorado outlets “to come together to brainstorm ways to increase individual donations at each outlet, while also amplifying the vital role that community support plays in sustaining high-quality local news in Colorado.”

The Wyncote Foundation in Pennsylvania is also increasing the number of newsrooms it is supporting through NewsMatch. “Wyncote Foundation is pleased to support the NewsMatch initiative again this year,” David Haas, Wyncote Board Vice Chair said. “NewsMatch allows us to support a range of strategies that strengthen non-partisan, fact-based journalism covering local and regional issues of concern to citizens in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, and that further civic dialogue and engagement within and across our communities.” Through these partnerships with NewsMatch, these place-based funders are making individual donations to local journalism go even further.

Solving Big Problems Together

All of these partners join Democracy Fund, the Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation, Knight Foundation and the MacArthur Foundation who continue to support NewsMatch, which is housed at the Miami Foundation. Collaboration is core to the success of this effort. The campaign is driven by the Institute for Nonprofit News and the News Revenue Hub, both of whom support the 155 participants during NewsMatch and year round. By creating shared trainings, templates and resources, these two organizations have helped to create an unprecedented, coordinated approach to end-of-year fundraising across the nonprofit news sector.

“Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation’s grant to NewsMatch supports the growth of nonprofit news across the country as well as locally in Oklahoma,” said program officer Tyler Tokarczyk. “The collaboration between national and local funders, and the participation of national and local news organizations makes NewsMatch a truly unique giving opportunity we are proud to contribute to again in 2018.” By combining partnerships in the field with partnerships across funders, NewsMatch is able to tackle big challenges none of us could do alone.

NewsMatch launches today and will begin matching individual donations to participating newsrooms, but foundations, companies and donors who want to join the effort are still welcome to contribute. The fund is housed at the Miami Foundation which handles all the administration and logistics for partner funders, making it easy for foundations and donors of any size to join NewsMatch. As the nonprofit news field has grown there is an urgent need to expand NewsMatch even further to support the journalism our nation needs. NewsMatch helped make 2017 a record-breaking year for giving to nonprofit news — this year we have to go even bigger with your support.

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Key to Trusted Elections: Understanding the Voter Experience

Natalie Adona
/
October 18, 2018

Democracy Fund’s healthy democracy framework identifies voting as the cornerstone of our democracy. The elections process ought to be free, fair, accessible and secure; give voters the information that they need to make informed choices; and must “provide voters with confidence in the integrity of election outcomes and assurance that they have a voice in our democracy.”

We know that the public’s trust and confidence in elections provides the basis for a healthy election system and a healthy democracy. However, prior to heightened concerns around elections cybersecurity, we were surprised to find that there are not many people studying this dimension of public opinion. In the spirit of learning and dialogue, we decided to examine data collected from 2008-2016 via the Cooperative Congressional Election Study to better understand the public’s views on our elections process.

In collaboration with Paul Gronke of Reed College, I am excited to share our findings in a new Democracy Fund report, “Understanding the Voter Experience: The Public’s View of Election Administration and Reform.” This report offers insight into the individual-level decision to vote or not, the public’s’ knowledge and application of voter registration requirements, the over all voter experience, and the public’s trust and confidence in U.S. elections.

The Good News

In Understanding the Voter Experience, we find that the public generally perceives that elections are run with integrity, understands most of what is required of them in order to vote, and have a good experience when voting. When compared to other institutions of in trust, election administration ranks well.

Other encouraging findings include that many people realize that they are responsible for registering and updating their registration; most respondents provide good or excellent job performance ratings for their poll workers and their state and local election officials; and majorities of the folks we surveyed are confident that their own votes and votes across the country are counted as intended.

Areas for Improvement

Our report also shows that the public can benefit from ongoing educational efforts—especially in states that have recently implemented modernization reforms or that have recently changed identification requirements. Significant numbers of our respondents were confused or unfamiliar with their state voter identification requirements pre-election, and our data indicate that they learn about these requirements post-election.

We also found a significant number of people did not know whether online voter registration is available in their state. In fact, nearly 50 percent of the respondents did not know whether their respective states offered online voter registration, and over 17 percent answered incorrectly as to whether their state offered it.

Our report also examines the public’s heavily reliance on the internet for basic election information, which is important because we find that a lack of information may keep people from voting, especially down-ballot races. The data shows that approximately 30-40 percent of respondents consistently felt they did not have enough information to vote on key races like state attorney general, secretary of state, and state senator races.

We hope that “Understanding the Voter Experience” will help election officials, lawmakers, advocates, and others better understand attitudes of the American people toward one of their most-cherished rights, and will encourage more probing of public attitudes about our election system. As you read the report, we welcome your questions and feedback. Please do not hesitate to email me at nadona@democracyfund.org.

Democracy Fund is a foundation working to build an inclusive, multiracial democracy that is open, just, resilient, and trustworthy.

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