George Soros’ Open Society Nixes $67 Million Proposal from National Latino Groups Leaving 2024 Funding Uncertain

In April of last year, Tom Perriello, the then-executive director of Open Society Foundations (OSF) US programs, sat for lunch across Democratic operative Andres Ramirez with a pitch.

As a donor and a funder, he said he would like to see if national Latino groups could come together, and wondered if they would be willing to submit a joint proposal to work on Latino voter mobilization ahead of 2024, according to two sources familiar with the meeting. Would top Latino groups be willing to submit a joint proposal, he asked, stressing that he would be willing to take the proposal himself?

Perriello communicated that from his perch at OSF, the joining of forces would be seen as “historic.”

Just over a year later, three top national Latino groups did just that, submitting a $67 million proposal for TV, digital, radio, and mail spending on May 5, 2023, according to the leaked memo obtained by The Messenger, with work to begin in July 2023.

The Messenger has learned, however, that the “historic” opportunity ran into a wall of reality; the proposal will not move forward.

Mi Familia Vota, Latino Victory Fund, and UnidosUS Action Fund laid out a plan to play to their strengths in presidential and competitive U.S. Senate battleground states including Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Wisconsin, as well as high Latino population states with key congressional races, including California, Colorado, Florida, New Mexico, and Texas.

But after Perriello announced in April that he would be leaving his post in mid-July, a key validator and supporter of the proposal was gone.

With Perriello out, the plan faced renewed scrutiny, one that it ultimately did not survive.

Ramirez confirmed the 2022 meeting but declined to comment on the fate of the proposal. Perriello did not respond to a request for comment.

The decision not to fund one proposal doesn’t represent the end of funding conversations, which are ongoing, but does highlight the feeling among many established Latino leaders and Democrats that the Hispanic community has been historically underfunded. It also underlines the belief that the reaction from progressive groups is often to invest money in white swing voters when Latino Democrats argue the answer is clearly that voters of color have repeatedly upheld democracy cycle after cycle.

This window into erecting Latino mobilization infrastructure on the fly and under a time crunch, comes as Democrats have seen Latinos peel away from the party in recent cycles. And there is fear that the realization it is happening again in 2024 could come too late as states like Arizona or Nevada fall to Republicans, gifting Senate seats or even the presidency to Republicans.

Asked about the failed proposal, the national Latino groups were quick to laud OSF, highlighting strong working relationships that go back multiple cycles.

“The Open Society Foundation has been a partner to Latino Victory from day one,” president Sindy Benavides told The Messenger. “Their support has been instrumental to Latino Victory’s efforts to empower our community, from engagement and mobilization efforts to building a pipeline of Latino leaders and connecting with the Latino community to ensure their voices and issues are reflected in our electoral process. We will continue doing great work together going into 2024 and beyond.”

“Open Society Foundation is a partner of Mi Familia Vota — they currently support our work to protect our democracy and build Latino political power,” said Hector Sanchez-Barba, the group’s CEO and president. “At this critical moment in our history, we look forward to continuing to work with them and other progressive foundations, making necessary investments to strengthen our democracy and fight extremism.”

UnidosUS declined to comment on ongoing private discussions.

For its part, Open Society stressed the level of its funding to a variety of Hispanic groups for 2024.

“Open Society is a leading funder of Latino organizations in the United States. We are moving roughly $30 million to groups to engage Latino communities next year. And, that is just a part of a larger and multi-year strategy to support groups at the federal, state, and local levels,” said an Open Society Policy Center spokesperson.

The long term effort was described as a “Latino power-building strategy” by an OSF source: a 5-year commitment from 2021 to 2025 with a $100 million price tag.

Latino Victory and Mi Familia Vota are current OSF grantees, with MFV recently receiving $500,000 to start, still far short of what would have been included under the May proposal. Latino Victory has a multi-year grant from the foundation including $500,000 in 2024 and 2025. An OSF source said the funding deadline for 2023 has passed, but opportunities for funding will exist under the 2024 budget.

A source familiar with the deliberations said the back and forth has been frustrating.

“They’ve basically said, ‘We haven’t said you’re not getting money in 2023, but there is money available for 2024,” the source said. “It creates headaches and problems. It’s phenomenal and hilarious to me they view these as two separate things given the time crunch.”

One senior Democratic strategist said the decision not to deliver funding at that level will impact the political arms of the groups who believed as late as the summer that it was still coming.

“It’s devastating for these groups who don’t get that money,” the source said, “it was going to be a huge part of what Unidos was going to do with their c4.”

“It’s Disheartening That It Would Turn Into a National vs State Argument”

Most sources spoke to the The Messenger on the condition of anonymity due to the sensitive nature of discussing the inner workings of engaging with one of the pillars of Democratic Party fundraising and many repeatedly stressed what they were about to say could not be tied to them, underlining the high stakes nature of the conversation on Latino investment ahead of 2024.

One view that emerged as the proposal was discussed from sources with knowledge of the internal deliberations was that Sarah Audelo, deputy advocacy director for states at the Open Society Policy Center, was hampering the efforts of the national groups hoping to secure funding because she did not believe they were strong enough to do the work.

Most sources who have heard Audelo speak about the topic in various closed door settings felt it was clear she was speaking from a professional standpoint, but at least two sources saw a more personal edge to her decision-making.

“One Latina is holding the fate of the country and Latinos in her hands over some petty sh**,” one of the sources said.

But in a conversation with The Messenger, Audelo stressed the importance of state-based groups to the greater national Latino mobilization work.

“We’re proud to support a wide range of national and state organizations that make up the Latino organizing and advocacy ecosystem,” she said. “This is an issue of nuance: Arizona is different than North Carolina and Wisconsin, let alone Texas and California. To understand where resources are needed, we listen to our partners doing the hard work on the ground. In the end, real resources need to go to Latino communities and there’s a role for everyone, on both the national and state level.” 

One Latino leader said Audelo “never said national groups suck” but the tone of her lines of questioning “made it clear she sees more value in the local groups and in canvassing, in groups that do the door-knocking.” The source was of the belief that Open Society was more interested in funding groups doing field work.

No one who spoke to The Messenger disagreed that there are some standout state-based groups, from LUCHA in Arizona which has done critical work since the opposition to the SB1070 immigration law began more than a decade ago, or The Culinary Union, which has been helping Democrats win in Nevada since the Harry Reid days. But there has long been tension between new groups who come into states and existing groups who have already been there, as came into view in a recent story from The Messenger which outlined the rift between the Texas Democratic Party and Texas Majority PAC, a new Soros-backed entrant.

A veteran Democratic strategist with ties to the Latino groups questioned the move by Open Society.

“At a time when Latino support for Democrats is waffling why would you sideline these organizations?” the source asked. “They’re going to get their money super late.”

But an OSF source was quite literally stunned into long periods of silence when presented with the complaints. “I’m just trying to understand what it means to draft a proposal, tell folks it’s for sure when it never was, and then be upset when the funder didn’t fund it — I’m trying to find the words.” 

The source said 2023 included a lot of important funding work, including grants to Latino organizations not included in the OSF five-year strategy.

“We are spent,” the source said. “Some early resources for 2024 did go to Mi Familia Vota, they did get a grant in 2023. For 2024 we’re still working on a strategy, still waiting on a budget, and the fact that we moved some early resources is pretty unprecedented. The dream is always to get resources early, we’re doing some of that. But at the end of the day, we don’t have an unlimited budget, so we have to take a harder look on field vs. digital vs. comms.”

One source steeped in the Latino Democratic world, however, reviewed the proposal and found it to be disappointing.

“It was a sh**ty plan, I was really disappointed. Many of us believe national groups need to be at the front of this and be able to say we just delivered votes, but the plan…