Opinion: This is how democracies erode

Just over a decade ago, I watched as governments in Nicaragua and Venezuela began dismantling the infrastructure of civil society. Back then, it felt distant and unlike something that couldn’t happen here. But today, I am watching my own country walk that same path.

In 2022, after revoking the legal status of hundreds of nonprofits, Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega said, “They are not here to help the people, but to destabilize our government.” In Venezuela, the Maduro regime has long targeted journalists, labor leaders, and nonprofits. In 2021, Maduro called nonprofits “insurgents,” claiming they were part of a coup. In 2024, his government considered legislation to strip all nonprofits of legal status and force them to re-register through a centralized, government-controlled process.

Now consider what we’re hearing and seeing at home.

In May 2025, The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump administration officials were “exploring ways of challenging the tax‑exempt status of nonprofits.”

And just weeks ago, a new Executive Order, 14332, “Improving Oversight of Federal Grantmaking,” changed the very structure of federal grantmaking. Final authority over federal grants has been shifted away from independent reviewers and handed to presidential appointees.

The message is unambiguous: Align with the administration’s views or lose funding. 

This isn’t about oversight. This is about suppressing self-determination and politicizing community needs.

The combination of hostile rhetoric and policy change is not accidental—it is strategic. These are the same tactics used in fragile democracies and outright authoritarian states around the world.

• Delegitimize dissent
• Discredit and defund independent institutions
  Consolidate power through political loyalty tests

Make no mistake. The nonprofit sector is being cast as a political opponent, not a partner. But this framing is deeply disconnected from the reality on the ground. Nonprofits are not the problem. We are the ones who step in when systems fall short. We provide critical services in communities that are too often overlooked. We respond in moments of crisis, organize local resources, and advocate for those pushed to the margins. Far from destabilizing democracy, nonprofits are helping to hold it together.

To attack this sector is to attack the very infrastructure of democracy.

We must name this moment for what it is: an authoritarian breakthrough fueled by xenophobia, white nationalism, and the politics of fear.

And then we must act.

Protecting civil society starts now.

We must:

• Speak the truth, even when it’s politically inconvenient
• Build coalitions across lines of difference to defend our shared mission
• Prepare our organizations to adapt without compromising our values
• Challenge every attempt to silence, defund, or dismantle our sector
• Defend the social impact sector by protecting our freedom of speech and right to collective action.

This is bigger than one organization, one policy, or one administration. It’s about defending the values we as Californians and Americans depend on and protecting civil society. 

Let’s not wait until more damage is done. Let’s act now.