In honor of Giving Tuesday, I wanted to share a few organizations that could use your support this holiday season and beyond. I decided to focus on seven organizations that I personally support; but there are a million amazing organizations working in a variety of sectors, so if you have a favorite cause or organization – feel free to mention them in the comments below! These days, I’m personally very much focused on organizations working to protect and reform our democratic systems (and they’re mostly non-partisan!), as well as organizations seeking to help asylum seekers impacted by the Trump administration’s disastrous immigration policies. Maybe you’re already familiar with these organizations, but if not I’m thrilled to help introduce you to a few organizations doing amazing work around the country. Every little bit helps!
POLITICAL NON-PROFITS
Run for Something has the fantastic mission of supporting young, progressive candidates running for state and local office. Run for Something aims to lower the barriers to entry for these candidates by helping them with seed money, organization building, and the training they need to be successful. They want to permanently improve and expand the definition of “politician†– making it something honorable again, and not just something for rich old white dudes or slimeballs – and bring it back to public service. They just launched in January 2017 and have already recruited more than 45,000 candidates across all 50 states. Yes to more young people in public office!
Fair Fight (founded by Stacey Abrams) promotes fair elections in key states around the country, encourages voter participation in elections, and educates voters about elections and their voting rights. Fair Fight brings awareness to the public on election reform, advocates for election reform at all levels, and engages in targeted voter registration and other voter outreach programs and communications. Fair Fight is particularly focused on countering voter suppression – particularly young voters and voters of color – and they’re doing some really important work in many 2020 swing states.
She Should Run is a nonpartisan nonprofit promoting leadership and encouraging women from all walks of life to run for office by providing training and other assistance for female candidates. Women are underrepresented at all levels in the 500,000+ elected offices across the United States. She Should Run is committed to getting at least 250,000 women to run for local, state, and federal offices by 2030!
Resistbot is a free service that helps you contact your elected officials or local newspaper via email, text message, fax, or postal letter – it makes engaging with our elected officials SO EASY! Because the goal of Resistbot is to deliver your correspondence to elected officials, their activities technically fall under the IRS definition of lobbying – and they need our donations to keep the service running!
Represent Us is a grassroots organization bringing together conservatives, progressives, and everyone in between to pass powerful anti-corruption laws that stop political bribery, end secret money, and fix our broken elections by passing anti-corruption measures at the state and local level. So important!
IMMIGRATION/REFUGEE ASSISTANCE
Al Otro Lado provides legal and medical assistance to asylum seekers, migrants, and deportees, including cross-border support for families separated under the family separation policy and families currently impacted by the Remain in Mexico policy program. Your donations to Al Otro Lado go directly to serving indigent deportees, migrants, and refugees in Tijuana and Los Angeles!
Aldea – The People’s Justice Center provides pro-bono or discounted legal services for members of the immigrant community, including unaccompanied minors and minor immigrant children. They’re active throughout the United States, but focus largely on families and children detained at the Berks Detention Center. You can also donate via Facebook.
In addition to Al Otro Lado and Aldea PJC, you can also donate to Las Americas, an immigrant advocacy organization based in El Paso, or donate to support families impacted by the ICE raids in Mississippi earlier this year right here.