U.S. foundation funding to address gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) issues totaled $192.5 million in 2019 and $200.8 million in 2020, a report from Funders for LGBTQ Issues finds.

According to the 2019-2020 Tracking Report: LGBTQ Grantmaking by U.S. Foundations (36 pages, PDF), funding totals were down from $209.2 million in 2018, even as foundation grantmaking jumped 17 percent year-over-year in 2020. The report’s authors note that the 2019-20 study included fewer foundations than in previous years as a result of delays in the availability of data and the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The study found that giving to transgender communities reached a record high of $36.1 million in 2019, but remains a very small fraction of total foundation giving. For every $100 awarded by U.S. foundations, fewer than 5 cents supported transgender communities in both 2019 and 2020. Funding for U.S. LGBTQ communities rose to a record high of $18.7 million in 2020, up 71 percent from 2019, possibly in response to the nationwide racial justice demonstrations that year. However, funding for LGBTQ people of color overall fell from $34.9 million, or 23 percent of the total, in 2019 to $25.7 million, or 16 percent, in 2020.

The study also found that the funding landscape for LGBTQ issues and communities in the U.S. is becoming increasingly top-heavy, with the top funder, Gilead Sciences, awarding 15.4 percent and 18 percent of the total in 2019 and 2020, respectively. The top 10 funders—which included the Arcus, Ford, Tides, Gill, Elton John AIDS, Open Society foundations, the Foundation for a Just Society, and the Evelyn and Walter Haas, Jr. Fund—accounted for 57 percent and 63 percent of the 2019 and 2020 totals. The top recipients in terms of grant dollars included GLAAD, the Transgender Law Center, Funders for LGBTQ Issues, Freedom for All Americans, the National Center for Lesbian Rights, and the Trevor Project.

While funding from private foundations fell 21 percent between 2018 and 2020, it accounted for the largest share of foundation support for LGBTQ issues (40 percent in 2019 and 36 percent in 2020), followed by grantmaking public charities (23 percent and 27 percent), corporate foundations (19 percent and 18 percent), and community foundations (4 percent and 5 percent). In terms of issues addressed, in 2020, civil and human rights received 35 percent of grant dollars, followed by strengthening communities, families, and visibility (23 percent), health and well-being (21 percent), economic issues (6 percent), and education and safe schools (5 percent). The top strategies supported were advocacy (33 percent), direct service and health care (18 percent), and capacity building (13 percent).

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