The right and wrong lessons for funders to learn from the midterm elections

Hey everyone. I’m still ecstatic from the Bluenami we just ushered in last week, when Democrats gained control of both the House as well as the Senate, which effectively curtains Republicans' power during Trump's last two years in office. We are finally seeing a light at the end of this long, cruel, corrupt tunnel, and it is bright and hopeful. Besides the House and Senate, there are so many victories and historic firsts, it’s hard to count them all.

Gratitude to all the organizations, movements, and leaders who worked to mobilize voters, support progressive candidates, fight voting suppression and election interference, and educate and activate people on various issues and initiatives, as well as all the amazing funders who funded them. Your work helped save democracy.

While there’s much to celebrate, there are a few lessons our sector needs to pay attention to, especially funders, since funders often learn the WRONG LESSONS after major sociopolitical events.

For instance, right before the midterms, organizations working on voter engagement were dealing with funding shortfalls, especially efforts to engage voters of color. As this article reports, "organizations that registered and persuaded millions of voters to participate in the 2018 and 2022 midterms are drastically underfunded. They have raised nearly 40% less than they had at this point in those cycles."

And furthermore:

“The shortfalls have led organizations focused on engaging and mobilizing key voting groups to scale back operations and staffing over the last year. That has included programs aimed at registering and mobilizing lower-propensity voters, voters of color, and rural and younger voters.”

A lesson many funders are probably taking from that may be “See?! We cut back on funding, and the Blue Wave still happened! That means these organizations didn’t need our funds if they managed to pull that off anyway!”

Please do not learn that shitty lesson and certainly don’t celebrate your cowardice and lack of vision if your foundation did cut back funding for this work before these vital elections. While there have been many wins, we could have been even more effective. As a colleague (@downtownangrybrown on Instagram) says,

“My organization has been fostering community, ties, fighting identity-based hate, and working at the grassroots to counter the politics of division we have seen astro-turfed in our county since 2016. We have been amazingly effective on a shoestring. Imagine how much GOOD we could do with a robust budget like what our opponents are working with.”

We could have had even more progressives elected, such as Florida’s Angie Nixon, who barely lost despite the complete lack of support and funding from mainstream Democratic leaders. We could have passed more initiatives, such as the billionaire’s tax in California.

And we could have prevented some truly awful things. In particular, how trans people were villainized and used as pawns, even by Democrats, that resulted in several anti-trans initiatives passing across the country. In my state, Washington State, which is relatively progressive, voters passed the horrifying Initiative 638, which bans transgender girls from participating in female school sports, and subjects all girls to invasive physical examination to prove they are cisgender.

Here are a few lessons I collected after talking to leaders who are out in the front doing the work:

Do not rest on your laurels, get ready for 2028: After a significant success, people often become complacent. The right-wing is not going to go away; they will continue to undermine and sabotage and whip up fear and anger leading up to the presidential election. A serious area of concern that we may be overlooking, for example, are state election boards, which monitor voting processes and certify results. The far-right, knowing they cannot win fairly, has been and will continue trying to take over these boards. As this article points out, “State and local election officials have come under attack and constant scrutiny by President Trump and his allies as they seek to manipulate time-tested procedures for partisan gain [...] Election deniers and [right-wing] partisan activists have successfully infiltrated local election boards and offices.” None of us can be complacent.  

Invest to build on the successes of the midterms: A propensity of funders is to reduce funding when things get dire. But equally annoying and counterproductive is their propensity to leave when things are good too. Now that we have some new leaders, invest to make sure they’re successful. And fund efforts and leaders who came close to success. Gara LaMarche in a LinkedIn post recommends that funders “shore up the key nonprofits and community organizations in Texas to help the new state administration undo the damage of years of MAGA rule and put in place programs and policies that advance economic security, health, human rights and environmental protection” as well as invest in Florida to capitalize on how close Democrats came to winning there and dealing a fatal blow to MAGA.

Fund at the state and lower levels: While Democrats have secured the House and Senate, Trump is still president, which means it’ll be challenging trying to get federal policies passed. But we can still achieve a lot at the state, county, and city level. As Estevan Muñoz-Howard, Senior Director with social-justice focused philanthropic advisory Ktisis Capital, says, “Given the power of the veto and how this constrains federal policy opportunities, funders have to turn their attention to building and wielding power at the local level. States are where we have the greatest opportunities to protect communities, strengthen democracy, and deliver for voters who are clearly hungry for change.”

Fund significantly and fund early: Activists who were working to stop Initiative 638 told me about the lack of funding to educate people. Colleagues in California said the same thing about the billionaire’s tax. There was so much deliberate misinformation about these issues and not enough funds to counter it. And sometimes, funding came too late, when the misinformation has already taken hold and momentum is lost. Funders, give out money RIGHT NOW in anticipation of the 2028 election and the next several years.

Fund Southern states and rural areas: Southern states and rural had several incredible wins this midterm, including Scott Colom, who will likely be the first Black Senator from Mississippi in over 150 years. These wins are despite the severe funding gap experienced by southern states and rural areas. As this report points out, “As of 2021, per capita grant giving in New York was $313, nearly five times the amount in the Deep South.” Funders must invest more in these areas to mitigate gerrymandering and voting suppression, and to strengthen the vital pro-democracy networks. They have been working so effectively despite decades of philanthropic neglect; imagine what they could do with sufficient and long-term funding.

Be bold and progressive, and fund bold and progressive: It’s been disheartening to see so many funders moving to the center the past few years, capitulating on various progressive issues. The success of progressive candidates like Abdul El-Sayed who are openly pro-Palestine and who won’t cave to pressure to be anti-trans, as well as progressive initiatives such as taxing the rich, should hopefully give these funders some courage to fund progressive efforts such as pushing for universal health care, undoing Citizens United, changing tax codes, and advancing the National Popular Vote Compact, which would effectively end the electoral college.

Restore funding for DEI work: In the report I cited above that discusses how funders pulled back support before the midterms, especially at efforts engaging voters of color, a reason mentioned was that some funders still fear being seen supporting DEI work. Well, now that we have secured the House and the Senate, can y’all get back to funding DEI? Including funding your own internal DEI work, so that some of you can understand things like how voters of color created the Blue wave and saved democracy. Black women, in particular, voted Democrat at a rate of 93%, despite enduring significant systemic injustice. DEI is vital for protecting democracy. Fund it!

Stop with the white moderate, anti-polarization bullshit. Likely future Speaker of the House, AIPAC-funded Hakeem Jeffries, went on air to talk about how voters ‘don’t want us to get even, they want us to get things done on their behalf.” Depressing that some people think holding those accountable for trying to destroy democracy, disappearing and murdering people in ICE concentration camps, and participating in the Epstein-led abuse of children is tantamount to “getting even.” Funders have been contributing to this sort of white-moderate brainwashing that MLK warned about. As I mentioned earlier in a post about the Civility Industrial Complex, a lot of funders have fallen into the right-wing trap of thinking “polarization” is the issue when it’s right-wing extremism that’s causing all the destruction we see. Snap out of it.

Let me know what other lessons we should be learning and not learning. There is still much for us to do to protect democracy, fight authoritarianism, restore rights that have been trampled by this administration, and advance a just world.

But also, take a deep breath. The future is looking much better! Especially if progressive-leaning funders learn the right lessons and act on them.

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