OUR MISSION

We support and connect community organizers on democracy’s frontlines.

To support and connect community organizers, advocates, and activists working year-round in places traditionally under-resourced, excluded, and ignored.

To invest in hyperlocal efforts that create sustainable civic infrastructure, engage and educate voters, and build power for the underrepresented and disenfranchised.

To advocate for systems, policies and practices that will deliver justice, equity and democracy for all.

Our Vision

In the fight to defend American democracy, frontline community organizers are our single most impactful asset. This theory of change defines Groundwork Project, an organization founded in 2021 by former Congressman Joe Kennedy III.

Anti-democratic forces provide a compelling test case for our theory. Far outside of coastal centers and the American Midwest, they have invested, organized, and consistently base built across the Deep South, Appalachia and the Plains – largely unopposed for generations. Today, these investments are bearing fruit, as anti-democracy forces are using the awesome civic power they have accrued in these places to threaten bodily autonomy, public education, voting rights, climate action and democratic freedom for us all.

This moment demands a response, and an end to the unopposed resources regressive, anti-democratic and anti-equality forces have funneled into these regions.

Enter: Groundwork Project.

We show up in the real battlegrounds – where the fight isn't about one candidate or one election, but about the survival of our democracy and our truest ideals. With a focus on Appalachia, the Deep South, and the Plains, Groundwork Project is the sole national pro-democracy and social justice organization singularly focused on supporting frontline organizers on the most crucial fronts in this generation’s battle for civil rights, equality and democracy itself.

We do this by working with partners on the ground to resource local organizers; support statewide infrastructure, shift civic narratives; and develop local leaders.

What sets Groundwork apart is our commitment to organizers who are working in regions that have otherwise been ignored and overlooked. These advocates are essential architects of the base-building required to compete with anti-democracy power in our states. We have uniquely positioned ourselves to find the best organizers with the biggest impact and get them more resources to do the work that our country's future is, quite literally, depending on.

We believe the stakes of this work are not political, but deeply human. Facing the highest rates of poverty, incarceration, illness and oppression anywhere in the country, Groundwork’s regions live everyday with the dire consequences of our failure to protect justice and equity for all.

This lends unique urgency to the Groundwork mission.

The Groundwork Fund supports local community organizers executing non-partisan, grassroots civic engagement strategies in areas of the country where justice, equity and democracy are most at risk.

Groundwork Action supports local community organizers fighting to build political power in places where justice, equity and democracy are most at risk.

Our Model

Supporting Frontline Organizers

The anchor of Groundwork’s engagement model in our focus states is providing capital, community and capacity to local frontline organizers, creating a unique and powerful Groundwork Organizer Network. Through our flagship Organizer Grant Program, we deliver multi-year, unrestricted grants to the Network, as well as significant wraparound support for all of our Network partners, from trainings to 1:1 mentorship and other technical assistance.

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Investing in Statewide Infrastructure

We take time to earn trust with the organizers, organizations and local leaders working in coalition to build lasting political infrastructure in our focus states. Through engagement with donor alliances, civic engagement tables, local talent pipelines and issue campaigns, we support efforts to sustainably grow progressive, pro-democracy power statewide. Using the robust relationships developed via the Groundwork Organizer Network, we help deploy collective grassroots organizing capacity towards long-term progress.

Shifting Civic Narratives

We challenge boom-and-bust civic spending and dismantle the false narrative that tough regions are not worth progressive investment, aggressively elevating the work of our state partners in front of our national networks and on our large digital platforms. Within our states, where anti-democracy voices can dominate public discourse, we utilize our digital assets and external communications vehicles to elevate pro-democracy voices and resource them to expand the reach of their voices.

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Developing Local Leaders

We invest in the local leaders that change depends on, helping them build full-time organizing careers where they are challenged, cared for and compensated fairly. Pro-democracy work in Groundwork States is difficult, often dangerous work. We know that getting more resources, community and support to local leaders is essential to building the long term organizing capacity required to win. Through the Groundwork Organizer Network and The Organizing Accelerator, a first-of-its-kind partnership with the NAACP, Groundwork is training and mentoring the next generation of organizing leaders working on democracy’s frontlines.

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