Foundations Are Failing Queer Communities
Dear foundations and grant makers,
It’s 2025, and LGBTQIA+ communities are still fighting for scraps from philanthropic tables that claim to serve equity. Foundations continue to underfund, undervalue, and overlook Queer-led work, even while flying Pride colors every June. We’re tired of waiting for trickle-down justice. We deserve more than symbolic gestures. We deserve structural change.
The Numbers Don’t Lie
Less than half a percent of all U.S. foundation funding goes to LGBTQIA+ causes. And when you break that down further? Even less reaches Trans-led, BIMPOC-led, and grassroots Queer organizations. Meanwhile, the philanthropic sector has poured billions into institutions with deep histories of exclusion, expecting us to be grateful for a seat at the kids’ table.
The reality? We are not being overlooked…we are being deprioritized.
Source: Funders for LGBTQ+ Issues, 2021 Tracking Report
The Problem Isn’t Just the Funding, It’s the Framing
Foundations say they want equity, but they’re still afraid of activism. They want Queer joy without Queer justice. They fund identity but not advocacy. They seek stories of resilience without funding the conditions that would make resilience unnecessary.
You can’t celebrate our existence and refuse to fund our resistance.
When Queer organizations name the root causes of harm—whether that’s white supremacy, anti-Blackness, transphobia, or capitalism itself—foundations get nervous. Too radical, too political, too much. But our lives are political. Our safety is radical. And our vision for the future? It’s bigger than a rainbow sticker on a grant report.
Foundations Must Do Better
If you say you care about LGBTQIA+ communities, your funding should reflect:
Trust in Queer-led leadership and community solutions
Unrestricted, multi-year grants that allow us to build, not just survive
Funding for advocacy, not just service delivery
Investment in Trans and BIMPOC-led organizations, not just the big players
Learning from, not extracting from, Queer movements
This is not about representation. It’s about redistribution.
The Call Is Coming From Inside the House
Let’s be clear: some Queer nonprofits are complicit, too. When white-led, cis-led LGBTQIA+ orgs absorb the majority of funds and tokenize BIMPOC and Trans-led partners, they replicate the same systems of exclusion that philanthropy claims to dismantle. Solidarity means sharing resources, not hoarding them.
And this sort of structural change isn’t just for LGBTQIA+ nonprofits; these changes should be enacted across all underserved communities.
Philanthropy has an opportunity to get this right. But it requires more than open calls and equity statements. It demands bold, sustained investment in communities who are already doing the work.
Because Queer communities have always known how to take care of each other. We just need foundations to catch up.
And fund us like they mean it.
Sincerely,
Queers
Queer For Hire provides fundraising support to Queer nonprofits, LGBTQIA+ cultural competency to straight-led organizations and corporations, and individual coaching for Queer professionals.
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