Nonprofit Resources of the Week – 4/19/25

Stay informed of the week’s notable events and shared resources with this curated list of Nonprofit Resources of the Week.

Notable Nonprofit Posts, Articles, & Other Resources:

Trump Officials Weigh Earth Day Move Against Green Groups (Jennifer A Dlouhy and Akshat Rathi, Bloomberg)

After Harvard, Liberal Donors and Groups Fear New Scrutiny From Trump (Theodore Schleifer and Lisa Friedman, NY Times)

Nonprofits Under Fire: How the IRS Can – and Cannot – Revoke Federal Tax-Exempt Status (Jeffrey S. Tenenbaum, Tenenbaum Law Group)

Threats to Civil Society and the Independence of the Charitable Sector (Council on Foundations, Independent Sector, National Council of Nonprofits, and United Philanthropy Forum on Threats to Civil Society and the Independence of the Charitable Sector)

DOGE wanted to assign staff to the nonprofit Vera Institute of Justice because it got federal funds (Thalia Beaty, AP)

The Academy versus the Executive – Litigation roundup (Joseph Mead, Nonprofit Law Prof Blog)

Meet the Moment: A Call to Action for Philanthropy in 2025 (and Beyond) (Presented by the Trust-Based Philanthropy Project, in collaboration with Grantmakers for Effective Organizations and the National Center for Family Philanthropy)

The Weight We Carry (Uma Viswanathan, Substack) [Ed. A discussion of philanthropy and its need for courage and active participation in the threatened communities it serves.]

DOGE takes over federal grants website, wresting control of billions (Dan Diamond, Hannah Natanson and Carolyn Y. Johnson, Washington Post)

A Tariff ‘Tidal Wave’: Higher Costs, Donor Pullback, More Budget Pain (Ben Gose, Chronicle of Philanthropy)

Significant Events:

“Tensions are rising across American academia as the Trump administration froze over $2 billion in multi-year grants and contracts at Harvard University after its leaders refused to make key policy changes the White House also is demanding of other elite US colleges. … Harvard refused to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion programs, ban masks at campus protests, enact merit-based hiring and admissions reforms, and reduce the power of faculty and administrators the Republican administration has called “more committed to activism than scholarship.”” CNN
“Trump’s ploy is almost insultingly simple. He has seized the power to arrest any person and whisk them to Bukele’s notorious Terrorism Confinement Center, where they will be held indefinitely without trial. Once they are in Bukele’s custody, Trump can deny them the protections of American law. His administration has admitted that one such prisoner, Kilmar Abrego Garcia, was sent to El Salvador in error, but insists that it has no recourse. Trump, who has threatened the territorial integrity of multiple hemispheric neighbors, now claims that requesting the return of a prisoner he paid El Salvador to take would violate that country’s sovereignty.” The Atlantic
“Yet turmoil in bond markets last week revealed the extent to which President Trump has shaken faith in that basic proposition, challenging the previously unimpeachable solidity of U.S. government debt. … “The whole world has decided that the U.S. government has no idea what it’s doing,” said Mark Blyth, a political economist at Brown University …. An erosion of faith in the governance of the world’s largest economy appears at least in part responsible for the sharp sell-off in the bond market in recent days.” NY Times

Equity and Justice Related Articles & Resources:

California defies Trump order to certify that all school districts have eliminated DEI (Howard Blume, LA Times, Yahoo! News)

Taxes, Race, and Justice: Confronting “Quiet Violence” Against Black Americans (Anne Price, NPQ) [Ed. There are two more articles in this 3-part series co-produced by The Maven Collaborative and NPQ. Appreciate your great work, Anne!]

Broad Coalition of Mainstream Jewish Organizations Release Statement Rejecting False Choice Between Jewish Safety & Democracy (Jewish Council for Public Affairs)