‘Anonymity Isn’t Possible’

To the Editor:

In January, the Trump administration announced an inquiry into the diversity, equity, and inclusion practices and programs of foundations with more than $500 million in assets. Last week, in response, the Chronicle of Philanthropy published a list of the 346 large foundations that could be targets.

Most of those grant makers have remained silent. Some, as reported in an accompanying Chronicle article, have said they would continue to honor their long-held institutional values, including racial justice and equity. But they are a minority.

Others in the field have criticized the Chronicle’s coverage, opining that publishing the names and asset sizes of large foundations puts them at risk. To those making that charge, I would say that anonymity isn’t possible — this is widely available public information — and bogus secrecy won’t protect them anyway.

We need to do better. Either lying low or criticizing a news outlet in a public spat ignores the real danger to all of us and will invite an even worse response from the Trump administration. Most importantly, the idea that this investigation is mainly about large foundations with DEI programs is sadly mistaken.

Whatever one’s views are about DEI programs, alarm bells should be sounding at all foundations and nonprofits — political and apolitical, conservative, progressive and in between. This is about all of us.

When the government intrudes on the operations of a foundation, there’s no guarantee that all private enterprises, regardless of their stands on DEI, will be spared. The government could interfere in multiples ways, dictating values, censoring opinions, and intruding on the behavior, operations, contracts — even an institution’s right to exist — if they run afoul of the ruling party line.

If Trump’s version of the “deep state” can successfully threaten and ultimately degrade DEI programs at endowed foundations, why shouldn’t it shut down university programs that counter antisemitism or build bridges across religious divides.

This isn’t really about DEI. It’s about setting a precedent for investigating university research on, say, Russia, or Hungary, or North Korea, or even France. Why not cancel medical institutions’ research on vaccines? What about private enterprises that do business with Canada, Mexico, Ukraine, or perhaps the United Kingdom?

Fighting the Autocrats

This is not hysteria — it’s history, straight from the timeless playbook of autocrats. Fortunately, we have the tools to fight back, including through the long-held legal prohibition against government intrusion into private contracts, speech and religion. It’s no accident that the first such test of those rights, which led to the legal precedent, involved a private nonprofit institution.

As a schoolgirl in Hanover, N.H., I was an extra in school re-enactments of that 1819 Supreme Court case, Dartmouth College vs. Woodward, which prohibited government interference in private institutions. I have long since accepted the bitter reality that I wasn’t cast in either of the juicy roles — that of Daniel Webster, whose lines included, “It is, Sir, as I have said, a small college. … And yet, there are those who love it!” or of Chief Justice John Marshall, who was moved nearly to tears by Webster’s eloquence.

But I did get a good dose of the attitude that the philanthropic field should embrace now in the face of this unconstitutional intrusion: Get lost! Vamoose! You’re up in my grill! This is private property and privileged speech. It is at the heart of the right to reject government interference in private institutions.

We must be neither misled nor divided by the cloak of party politics or name calling. These principles are both conservative and liberal. As Jim Canales, president of the Barr Foundation, told the Chronicle, “We respect … and acknowledge that everyone operates independently. Each funder has its own mission, its own set of values, its own governance structures, and its own reasons for making the decisions that it makes.” That goes for all private businesses, institutions, and organizations. Period.

This is a moment for all such institutions, including foundations, to stand up and be counted together. Whatever our personal views, we must call out and resist this unprecedented and intolerable intrusion by the government into our fundamental rights as Americans. Trump’s deep state intruders will simply be emboldened unchecked if we take no action and insist on silence.

Clara Miller
President Emerita, Heron Foundation
Founder and Former President and CEO, Nonprofit Finance Fund