Soros' nonprofits received $1.4 billion in 2022
1577 nonprofits were given 1991 grants worldwide
Last week George Soros’ Open Society Foundations updated their online grants database to include grants from 2022.
The database gives details of 17,590 grants that total $6.1 billion from 2016 through 2022.
Open Society Foundations (OSF) grants are also listed in IRS 990 nonprofit reports to the government, but no attempt was made to compare the online database against the IRS filings at this time.
The IRS 990s give additional information about nonprofit recipients such as address, boards of directors, and key employees.
Extracting this OSF grant information to local Excel files enables future research of progressive organizations.
Kansas connections?
The only known direct OSF grant to a Kansas recipient was a $50,000 grant to the Kansas Appleseed Center for Law and Justice in Lawrence in 2018.
However, OSF gives large grants to donor-advised funds, such as the Arabella Advisors’ “dark money funds” (e.g., New Venture Fund or Sixteen Thirty Fund), Tides (Tides Center, Tides Foundation and Tides Advocacy), and other progressive nonprofits (e.g., Center for Popular Democracy, Way to Win Action Fund, State Engagement Fund, State Voices).
Some of these groups gave grants to Kansas nonprofits in 2022 and other years, which will be the subject of future articles.
By the numbers
The number of grants in 2022 was the lowest of any year back to and including 2016, while the total amount of grants was the largest ever.
This means the median size of each grant in 2022 was also the largest ever. The median grant amount grew from $150K in 2021 to $200K in 2022.
Amount Awarded: The amount awarded is the total amount approved at the time the grant was awarded, which may be dispersed over multiple years. In some cases, it may differ from the total amount paid to the grantee, such as when the grant is contingent or rescinded or payment has been returned due to unexpended funds. Open Society Foundations, About Our Awarded Grants.
Regions
There are seven broad geographic regions where we work. The region associated with a grant reflects the geographic area served by the grant and not necessarily where the grantee is based. Open Society Foundations, About Our Awarded Grants.
At least 490 of the OSF grants totaling $320 million were given to nonprofits in the United States. It’s unclear how much of the 352 global grants that totaled $826 million also flowed to the US.
Themes
We use nine themes to categorize the work we do. When a grant is made, one or more of these themes is assigned as appropriate. Open Society Foundations, About Our Awarded Grants.
Many of the 2022 “Democratic Practice” grants in the U.S. focused on progressive organizing and different aspects of progressive get-out-the-vote efforts, including
America Votes, $1 million
Courier Newsroom, $2.5 million (not listed under “journalism”)
Fair Fight Action, $2.5 million (Stacey Abrams)
Latino Victory Project, $1 million
Protect the Vote 2022, $1 million
State Engagement Fund, $2.15 million
Voter Registration Project, $2 million
Voto Latino Action Fund, $1.4 million
Way to Win Action Fund, $9 million
The $100,000 grant to Union Theological Seminary with no specified theme is curious since it was “to support field organizing and communications capacity for faith leaders and people of color-led social justice movements to counter the threat of White Christian Nationalism in the United States.” This was the only time the word “Christian” appeared in the 2022 OSF data. [While not related to this grant, Kansas Interfaith Action in Kansas held a panel about “Countering the Threat of White Christian Nationalism” in Sept. 2023 at six locations.]
Lists
Explore the OSF grants and recipients yourself. What do you find?
List of 1991 OSF grants from 2022
The 1991 grants totaling $1,432,081,445 are listed alphabetically by recipient (grantee). One line per grant.
List of 1577 OSF grant recipients from 2022
Many recipients received more than one OSF grant. List is sorted from largest to smallest grant total amount. One line per recipient with aggregate total of grants.
Related
Leftist Billionaire George Soros and Son Maximize Donations to Joe Biden’s Reelections Campaign, Breitbart, Amy Furr, Dec. 2, 2023.
How Dark-Money Megadonor George Soros Hides Behind ‘Democracy’ PACs To Sabotage It, The Federalist, Seamus Bruner, Nov. 15, 2023.
State Voices received over $3 million in funding from Soros’ nonprofits from 2016-2020.
Why has DC-based Protect Democracy purchased 68 updates of the Kansas voter registration file from 2002-2022 for its VoteShield project? Protect Democracy received $650K from Soros’ nonprofits in 2018-2021, and sister organization United to Protect Democracy received over $1 million in 2017-2020.