If not us, who? If not now, when? Why funders must continue to invest in reparations and racial repair in the current political climate.

During Trump’s first few weeks in office, we have seen his administration enact a barrage of policies that threaten the safety, security, and stability of our communities. Massive layoffs in critical government offices, wholesale elimination of DEI programs, and immigration raids on community members. These are only the beginning of what is to come.

With fires raging literally and figuratively, many are wondering: is now really the time to invest in the reparations movement? I’m getting the question often, and every time, it leads to a generative discussion about the state of our movement, why we lost the election, what we’re building towards, and what it will really take to win. After a few of these conversations, the Liberation Ventures leadership team and I decided it was time to write down our thoughts.

The short answer is: Yes. Building a culture of repair — one in which reparations are common sense and commonplace — is what will equip us to fight today, win tomorrow, and sustain our progress for generations to come.

At the highest level, “reparations” is the process of the state making amends for harm. While most people think of reparations simply as compensation, a wider variety of material, systemic, and symbolic repair for victims, their families, and broader society is involved. Reparations for Black Americans involves reckoning, acknowledgement, accountability, and redress — applying the comprehensive UN definition of reparations to the human rights violations of U.S. chattel slavery and its modern legacies.

The topline answer to the question is this:

• Comprehensive reparations remain critical to achieving the thriving multiracial democracy that the vast majority of us — across race — want. Longstanding economic, social, and political inequalities along racial lines undermine our democratic norms. Comprehensive financial and non-financial reparations are uniquely situated to repair the swath of harmful policies that undergird this inequality. Pluralistic societies inevitably see harm; a culture of repair is what is necessary to hold the dignity and belonging of all people.
• We are at the beginning of a harmful political era — and we will need a reparative one to heal from it. The harm Trump will cause to all marginalized people will sow the seeds for a broad coalition seeking repair. Reparationists have been pushing for repair for centuries, and are experts the country needs to imagine and work towards a transformative future.
• Movements are not just about federal victories. Reparations policies at the state and local level can be proof points and laboratories for learning that will inform broader policy when the ground is more ripe. Yes, Trump will attack place-based efforts too — and we must defend them.
• A focus on reparations balances necessary defensive strategies with an affirmative vision of what we’re building towards. It ensures we know what we want, not just what we don’t. When the pendulum swings back in our direction and a window of opportunity opens again (which history tells us it will) we must BE ready to build that world. If we are only getting ready when that moment comes, we will miss the opportunity.
• Being ready takes investing in movement infrastructure now, not just when the winds are blowing in our favor, but in all types of weather. That’s the work we need and intend to do right now: researching to find what truly works, developing agile strategies, prioritizing for sequential wins and strengthening relationships.

At Liberation Ventures, we believe reparations will come TO Washington, not FROM Washington. Since our inception, Liberation Ventures’ strategy has been bottom up. Over the last five years, we have learned from other at-scale successful political movements both in the US and abroad, and a bottom up strategy is a common pattern across all of them. While our north star is passing comprehensive federal reparations and instituting a culture of repair in American society, we know we have to build up to being successful at the federal level.

In order to do so, we co-created a 10-year grantmaking strategy with a steering committee of movement leaders, called the Reparations Grantmaking Blueprint, and more than 50 people across our movement provided input. Even with the latest political sea change, our strategy holds, which is a marker of a strong strategy. The three identified priority pillars of work remain the right ones in this climate — wins within them are possible AND critical to winning comprehensive federal reparations within the next 30 years. The three highest priority pillars of the strategy are:

1. Investing in reparations efforts at the city and state level
2. Building an at-scale, multiracial mass movement
3. Changing the narrative on reparations and uprooting anti-Blackness from American culture

We worked hard to incorporate as many perspectives as possible into this grantmaking strategy. However, no movement has ever had 100% agreement on ideology, strategy, and tactics. Not everyone in our movement agrees with our decision to deprioritize funding federal advocacy, and you will still see some people in the movement advocating at that level. We respect everyone’s perspective, even when we disagree. The next four years present an opportunity for our movement to get more strategically aligned and ready to seize the next moment of opportunity. This takes real resources.

Funders should continue to invest in our work for both short and long term impact. In the short term, we can win at the state and local level. The Reparations Grantmaking Blueprint prioritizes state and local work and this strategy is already proving successful. Most recently, one of Liberation Ventures’ grantees, Section 14 Survivors, secured a $6M settlement in Palm Springs with potential for $21M more. Last year, California allocated $12M of its budget to reparations efforts after Liberation Ventures grantees led a campaign in the state. There are reparations task forces in progress across the country — in Chicago, New York, Tulsa, Colorado, and more — excavating harm and designing solutions for repair. We must make sure all our investments in this work do not die on the vine. These are just a few examples of the wins we’ve seen over the last few years, and the impact we’re poised to have.

Another short-term imperative is to fortify the progress we’ve already made. In the last five years alone, the reparations movement has entered the political mainstream, with 23 cities and states establishing commissions to study reparations and passing reparations policy. In the last 20 years, public support for reparations has doubled. Just like DEI and affirmative action, our movement is facing legal threats. Evanston, the first city in the country to distribute reparations, is being sued and we know we can expect more attacks. The best way to fortify ourselves against legal backlash is strong, rigorous research on harm that links directly to policy designs to repair that harm. There is copious precedent for compensatory government policy; we have to ensure that reparations are understood that way.

We must also invest now for impact over the long term. Our opposition has far outpaced us on this front, and has been working toward big goals like banning abortion and a far right supreme court for decades. We must develop the courage and fortitude to invest for aspirational systems change 10, 20, 50 years down the road. Reparations are the path to the multi-racial democracy our nation has promised but not yet realized. They are a necessary condition for a true multiracial democracy because they repair the racial inequality that undermines equal participation and justice for us all. Long term, reparations will also cultivate a wider culture of repair that infuses our entire society with the practices, norms, values needed to repair harm whenever it is caused. This focus on a transformative future balances necessary short-term, defensive strategies with an affirmative vision. Over the next four years, many social justice organizations will be entirely focused on mitigating and stopping the near-constant harm done by the Trump administration and its business co-conspirators. This work is imperative. And, we must walk and chew gum at the same time — in a Block and Build strategy, we are Build. We are defining the society we want, not just the one we don’t.

In addition, working to uproot anti-Blackness from American culture creates a flywheel effect that benefits not only the reparations movement, but all movements for social and economic justice. Anti-Black narratives stand in the way of so many things we need to build a flourishing multiracial democracy: collective worker power, a strong social safety net, humane immigration policy, and more. If anti-Black narratives — especially about immigrants and crime — couldn’t be used as a tactic to win votes, all justice organizations would benefit. Reparations narrative work inherently counters these and more.

Funders must also continue to invest to build the health and sustainability of the movement, which enables those long and short term wins. Relationships and trust between movement leaders — both within and across institutions within an ecosystem — take a long time to build and very little time to fall apart. Our movements are only as strong as our ability to work collectively, and this relies heavily on relationships between individuals. When funders disinvest, organizations contract, people get laid off, and bonds within and between organizations fray. This means when windows of opportunity for progress open, we are more likely to be fighting internally, operating in silos, or duplicating work — and we are not able to just move. I wonder — what might have been possible in 2024 if our movement organizations hadn’t all been roiled by internal cultural issues since 2020? It takes resources to build resilient and reparative organizations.

Now is the time to scoop up and cultivate great talent, which means organizations need to be able to hire. In the early days of Liberation Ventures, one of my advisors told me that the best time to hire is in an economic downturn. This is when more people are looking for jobs — and therefore the pool of applicants is higher quality than when jobs are in greater supply. I believe the same is true for a “movement winter” — or the season of backlash we’re in. Incredibly talented people have exited the Biden administration. People across sectors are looking for more meaningful work, because after the election the world doesn’t seem to be as they thought it was. And most of all, we’re all being forced to get smarter and sharper in this climate. Organizations need to be able to hire now — so that teams can fail fast, learn lessons together, and put them to use when a new era comes.

Finally, we can and must sharpen more than just talent — our research, policy design, political strategies, and more need attention. Now is the time for principled struggle: for setting ego aside and engaging in honest reflection about what works and what doesn’t. This climate forces us to cross all our t’s and dot all our i’s. We also need the freedom to experiment, so that we learn which strategies/tactics/messages work and are ready to use them when the winds change. For example, Liberation Ventures is doing ongoing qualitative and qualitative research about audience beliefs and sentiments so that we understand what narratives and messages are most effective at moving people to support our cause. We need to invest in this kind of learning now so that we are ready to put it to use.

Our long-term strategy can propel us through this political moment, but it needs continued support to survive. This is and always has been the nature of the fight: three steps forward, two steps back. Those two steps back do not mean we give up and go home — they mean we regroup, get sharper, and ready ourselves for the next push. Our opposition uses tactics of bullying and confusion to distract us; when we stay focused on our work, we call their bluff. Our justice movements are currently being forged in fire. Funders must have the courage to withstand the heat — if they do, we’ll collectively emerge stronger, clearer, and ready to win on the other side.

Aria & The Liberation Ventures Leadership Team