We, the undersigned organizations, stand in solidarity with all people, civil society groups, and movements in the US and around the world who are affected by the recent executive order put in force by the US Presidential administration suspending US foreign aid for a three-month period and terminating all Diversity Equity Inclusion (DEI) programs under existing grants and contracts.

These orders have a dramatic impact on the most at risk populations across the globe: women and LGBTI communities, victims of gross rights abuses, human rights and environmental defenders, victims of climate change, migrants, and many others. Independent journalism and media, anti-corruption, good governance, rule of law efforts are also being affected.

Although it is feasible that some of the suspended grants may continue in the future, the impact of this decision is already seismic. Civic space as a key pillar of democratic resilience, already under attack in many countries, will shrink further. There are already reports of layoffs and programs shutting down the work of civil society in the US and other regions indefinitely.  

The termination of DEI programs will not only touch groups working on these issues directly but also those aiming to integrate DEI values and build just societies within their organizations and programs.

Given the sheer scale of funding the US Government has been providing – 63 billion USD in 2024 spent globally – we expect ripple effects from this decision that will reshape whole fields and movements. The fundraising environment for many organizations will become impossible to handle.

We appreciate that it is practically impossible to offset the loss of such a large amount of funding to so many organizations worldwide. We believe, however, that there are concrete steps that the philanthropic community could embrace and act upon, joining in solidarity and with resources to support responses and mitigate the impact of these orders.

Our suggestions include:

• Monitor and study closely the impact of the executive orders globally, including through supporting civil society for this work. Such monitoring should be both short-term as well as after the US Government has reviewed its grant with the aim of understanding which areas and movements are most at risk and negatively impacted.
• Through donor coordination, design targeted and strategic programming, with emergency funding attached to it, in order to mitigate the negative impact of this decision, with direct unrestricted grants, pool funds and networks of re-granters.
• Set up an emergency litigation fund that would include operating of lawyers' networks to coordinate worldwide (potential class action) legal actions against the US Government for reneging.
• Engage in emergency advocacy with governments as well as wealthy individuals globally to expand the amount of funding available to most impacted communities.
• Allow for more flexibility and reprogramming in ongoing grants to organizations for unrestricted spending, as opposed to strict project spending in order to mitigate the financial risks.

Thank you for your consideration.

Araminta 
International Partnership for Human Rights (IPHR) 
Hungarian Helsinki Committee
Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights, Poland
European Center for Non-for-Profit Law (ECNL)
Democracy Development Foundation, Armenia
Civil Society Foundation, Georgia
Media Diversity Institute, UK
Civil Liberties Union for Europe, Germany
Italian Civil Liberties Coalition (CILD), Italy
Estonian Human Rights Centre
Hungarian Civil Liberties Union
Solidarna Foundation, Croatia
Human Rights Monitoring Institute, Lithuania
Bulgarian Helsinki Committee
Centre for Peace Studies, Crotia
Civil Rights Defenders, Sweden
Irish Council for Civil Liberties

Photo: Takver- Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 International license