new-venture-fund arabella dark-money liberal 501c3 fiscal-sponsorship
related: Arabella Advisors Sixteen Thirty Fund Democracy Alliance
Who They Are
New Venture Fund. A 501(c)(3) nonprofit managed by Arabella Advisors that serves as a fiscal sponsor for progressive organizations — providing legal, financial, and administrative infrastructure for advocacy campaigns that don’t have their own nonprofit status. The New Venture Fund is one of the largest nonprofits in America by revenue ($900+ million in 2020), functioning as a pass-through entity that receives donations from progressive foundations and individuals and distributes them to hundreds of projects.
New Venture Fund is part of the Arabella Advisors network that includes the Sixteen Thirty Fund (501(c)(4) for political advocacy), the Windward Fund (environmental), the Hopewell Fund (government accountability), and the North Fund. Together, the Arabella network managed $3+ billion in spending from 2020-2022 — making it the largest dark money operation on the progressive side.
The “dark money” designation: like conservative counterparts (DonorsTrust, Marble Freedom Trust), New Venture Fund allows donors to contribute to progressive causes without public disclosure of their identities. The fund’s 501(c)(3) status provides tax deductions; the fiscal sponsorship model allows rapid creation of advocacy campaigns without the overhead of forming new organizations.
Money
New Venture Fund is the liberal counterpart to DonorsTrust — a pass-through organization that launders donor identities through a fiscal sponsorship model. The fund’s $900+ million annual revenue flows to hundreds of progressive projects, but the original donors are shielded from public disclosure. The structural function is identical to conservative dark money: allow wealthy donors to influence policy debates through intermediary organizations that obscure the money’s origin. Democrats who decry conservative dark money fund their own advocacy through the same anonymous mechanisms.
Sources
- IRS: New Venture Fund 990 filings (Tier 1)
- ProPublica: Nonprofit Explorer - New Venture Fund (Tier 2)
- Ballotpedia: Arabella Advisors (Tier 3)
content-readiness:: ready