“We are continuing our work unabated. We will not be intimidated into silence.” That was Laleh Ispahani, managing director for the U.S. at the Open Society Foundations, answering a question about the Trump administration’s attacks on the Soros family. She was speaking about a new $300 million pledge, announced Wednesday, for work in the United States over the next five years.
The foundation, started by George Soros, says the money will go toward defending democratic rights and advancing economic security. Grants will go to organizations at the national, state and local levels.
Two pillars
The plan has two parts. The first backs groups defending civil liberties and the rule of law: efforts to shield civil society from attack, strategic litigation against government overreach, and work to expose corruption. The second pairs civil rights with economic opportunity. That means jobs that pay a living wage, affordable child care and elder care, and protection from newer forms of discrimination such as algorithmic bias.
Alex Soros, the foundation’s chair, framed the two as inseparable. “Guaranteed rights and freedoms are just as critical as broad economic prosperity and are the strongest defense we have against a closed society,” he said in a statement.
Ispahani gave an example. “You can’t address the racial wealth gap without tackling core, working class economic issues like living wages, affordable child care and housing,” she said. Civil rights and economic policy, in her telling, are usually handled separately. The foundation wants to treat them as one fight. It will look for state-level policies that protect vulnerable groups and could be copied elsewhere, along with policies that build a fair economy for working-class families.
Twenty million dollars of the total is already committed for this year. It is earmarked for strategic litigation, defense of the nonprofit sector, and efforts to track government corruption.
Under pressure
The timing is not accidental. The Trump administration has singled out the Soros family, accusing it of backing violence and fostering division. Those attacks belong to a wider campaign Trump and his allies launched in 2025 to influence nonprofits and their funders through executive orders, withheld funding and threats of investigation. Allies in Congress have asked the IRS and the Justice Department to look into nonprofits they accuse of supporting domestic terrorism, illegal immigration or climate programs. In December, then-Attorney General Pam Bondi ordered law enforcement to investigate nonprofits that support antifa.
Asked whether the Justice Department was looking into Open Society, a department spokesperson said it does not comment on investigations.
The foundation also issued its own statement objecting to reports that the administration is directing investigations into its operations without evidence.
A first for the new leadership
The Associated Press reported that this is the first new program working solely in the U.S. that the foundation has approved under Alex Soros, one of George Soros’s sons, who has overseen a yearslong restructuring and major layoffs. The previous U.S. democracy strategy put at least $220 million into a multiracial, multifaith pro-democracy alliance, including five-year grants to community groups led by people of color and women.
Open Society is not alone. The MacArthur Foundation pledged $100 million across last year and this year for voting rights and civil rights. McKnight approved another $20 million from its endowment for 2026. Kristin Anne Goss, a Duke professor who studies the sector, found that the biggest foundations raised the share of their giving to democracy work between 2013 and 2020. Measuring results is hard, she said, because funders are trying to move things “deep and long standing.”
Sources
- $300 Million to Advance Economic Security and Defend Freedoms in U.S.
- George Soros’ foundations pledge $300M for US democracy amid attacks on nonprofits – WTOP News
