Action Alert: Your Voice is Needed to Protect the Charitable Sector and Communities
This week, the U.S. House of Representatives introduced a sweeping tax bill — "The One, Big, Beautiful Bill" — that would extend the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act for another decade.
What’s at stake?
- Deep cuts to Medicaid, SNAP, the Child Tax Credit and environmental programs
- Attacks on free speech and due process for nonprofits
- Increased financial instability for the charitable and philanthropic sector
Philanthropy Northwest strongly opposes this legislation. This bill threatens to strip vital resources from underinvested communities and severely restricts the charitable sector’s ability to advocate, operate freely and meet community needs.
Contact your representatives now. Tell them to reject this harmful legislation.
Make Your Voice Heard
Tell Congress how this bill would impact your communities and mission, using real stories and data. Urge them to:
- Reject cuts to programs like Medicaid, SNAP, the Child Tax Credit and environmental programs.
- Oppose new powers that let the Treasury Secretary revoke nonprofit status without due process.
- Push back on harmful taxes that burden nonprofits and foundations, limiting their ability to serve communities – including raising the excise tax on private foundations with assets over $50 million and imposing changes to nonprofits’ unrelated business income tax.
Take Action Today
Call your Members of Congress and urge them to oppose this bill.
Find contact info on their websites or call the U.S. Capitol switchboard at (202) 224-3121.
If you have relationships with other offices, reach out to them too.
Need help or want to share an update? Contact the Philanthropy Northwest policy team.
Lobbying Reminder
Community foundations and other 501(c)(3) public charities may lobby on the bill or any of its provisions. Private foundations, under the IRS self-defense lobbying exemption, may lobby on the bill based on provisions that would impact the foundation’s existence, governance, tax-exempt status or deductibility of contributions to the foundation. We advise that you consult with counsel if you need specific guidance for your foundation.
Stay Informed and Ready to Act
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Update
On July 4, a major piece of legislation — The One, Big Beautiful Bill Act (H.R. 1) — was signed into law. This sweeping tax bill quickly moved through Congress and extends the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act for another decade.
Philanthropy Northwest opposed the bill. The law will have damaging impacts on communities through severe cuts to many programs that people depend on, like Medicaid, SNAP and student financial aid, and climate and environmental investments. Immigrants and their families will also be ineligible for many forms of assistance. The law will increase the national debt by $3.3 trillion over the next decade, due to tax cuts that mostly benefit the wealthy.
Some provisions targeting the charitable sector were also changed over the course of the legislative process. A provision that would have allowed the Treasury Secretary to rescind the nonprofit status of any organization without due process (adapting language from last year’s failed H.R.9495 bill) was removed. An increased excise tax on the largest private foundations was also removed, as was a proposed reinstatement of the unrelated business income tax (UBIT) on nonprofits’ transportation benefits. Other sector tax proposals remained in the bill. For businesses, the corporate giving deduction will be subject to a 1% floor. For individuals, a proposed $150 above-the-line charitable deduction (applicable to non-itemizers) was increased to $1,000 per person.
Many other provisions will also impact our communities and the charitable tax landscape. The National Council of Nonprofits anticipates the bill to have a negative impact on both charitable giving and public funding to communities.
As the bill advanced through Congress, Philanthropy Northwest activated our network with action alerts to catalyze direct outreach to lawmakers. Voices from the charitable sector made a difference. Together we helped prevent some harmful proposals and elevated our shared concerns around the provisions that remain.
Our work to address the bill’s impacts must continue.
We urge you to keep engaging with your members of Congress. Share your data and stories about how policies are affecting communities and charitable organizations in the Northwest. Check our resource list for more about how foundations can — and should — engage in advocacy. If you have a story to share, we invite you to contribute to Philanthropy Northwest’s Storybank so we can partner with you to amplify these examples to policymakers and strengthen our collective impact.
