February 6, 2026
Note: With the publication of a new piece by Oren Cass in The New York Times today attacking capitalism – titled, “How the Capitalists Broke Capitalism” – Pinpoint thought it appropriate to post the following overview of who’s been funding “conservative” Oren Cass and American Compass in recent years…
Highlights
2024 Funding Sources
An analysis of American Compass’ 2024 fundraising indicates that it has accepted at least $1.7 million in donations from prominent liberal foundations in the U.S., including the Omidyar Network Fund, Rockefeller Foundation, and the William & Flora Hewlett Foundation.
Taken together, this accounts for approximately 65% of the organization’s total contributions in 2024, which was a banner year for left-of-center donations.
| Donor | Purpose | Amount | Source |
| Omidyar Network Fund Inc | General Operating Support | $150,000 | URL |
| Omidyar Network Fund Inc | General Operating Support | $25,000 | URL |
| Omidyar Network Fund Inc | General Operating Support | $150,000 | URL |
| Rockefeller Foundation | Toward the cost of coalition-building,research and outreach around taxpolicies that would benefit low wageworkers in the U.S. | $125,000 | URL |
| William & Flora Hewlett Foundation | General Operating Support | $475,000 | URL |
| William & Flora Hewlett Foundation | General Operating Support | $300,000 | URL |
| William & Flora Hewlett Foundation | General Operating Support | $475,000 | URL |
The Hewlett Foundation
The William & Flora Hewlett Foundation (“Hewlett”) accounts for $1.25 million in donations, nearly half of American Compass’ donations for the year. And more is coming. In November 2025, Hewlett pledged an additional $1.5 million for the next two years. Between 2020 and 2024, Hewlett has given American Compass $3,761,000, or 40% of all contributions it has ever received.
Hewlett is well-known as one of the most prominent and well-funded liberal foundations in the U.S. today. According to the Capital Research Center, it is among the largest donors all-time to Planned Parenthood, granting over $100 million to the group between 2000 and 2023. In 2017, Hewlett made a landmark $600 million grant to climate change initiatives, supports the Green New Deal and made tens of millions in donations to environmentalist organizations including the Sierra Club, EarthJustice, etc.
Much has been written about Hewlett’s plan to co-opt conservative policy though grantmaking, and American Compass is perhaps their most prominent investment.
While Oren Cass has sought to publicly position himself as a top ally of the Trump Administration, he has a record of calling President Trump a “disaster in many ways,” and condemning Trump’s signature tax cuts as “an expensive failure.”
Funding Trends (2020-2024)
Since its inception in 2020, American Compass has accepted more than $5.3 million from major liberal foundations, including the Hewlett Foundation, the Omidyar Network Fund, Action Now Initiative, the Rockefeller Foundation, the San Francisco Foundation, and the Nick and Leslie Hanauer Foundation. This accounts for at least 56.7% of all contributions the organization has ever received.
American Compass’s well-defined donor history does not align with its mission of backing conservative economic policies, and calls into question the organization’s true ideologies.
| Year | Liberal Foundations | Contributions | Percentage |
| 2024 | $1,700,000 | $2,619,896 | 64.89% |
| 2023 | $875,000 | $2,464,960 | 35.50% |
| 2022 | $750,000 | $1,016,876 | 73.76% |
| 2021 | $875,000 | $1,787,568 | 48.95% |
| 2020 | $1,161,000 | $1,564,751 | 74.20% |
| TOTAL: | $5,361,000 | $9,454,051 | 56.71% |
(American Compass’ IRS Form 990s)