The Moment We’re In: Themes and Learnings from 2025
2025 asked philanthropy to step up in crisis. Across the Americas, communities faced attacks on immigrant rights, climate-fueled displacement, and threats to bodily autonomy and democracy—conditions that shaped HIP’s work and tested the sector’s commitments.
HIP’s response reflected this call to action.
"Our work in 2025 and beyond must stretch far beyond the headlines and the immediate moment. It's about building a future where everyone belongs. Where our differences are our strengths. Where communities have the resources, support, and voice to shape their own destinies.
We need philanthropy to step forward courageously—with a fierce commitment to support the communities fighting to protect our hard-earned rights.
To our collective corazón: we are here. We are listening. And we are committed to nurturing our vision of a just future where communities across the Americas are thriving."
Below are reflections of how we showed up—through advocacy, research, convening, donor engagement, and public calls to action—and what this defining year revealed about the choices before philanthropy.
2025: A Year That Tested Philanthropy’s Commitments
JANUARY | Responding to Policy Shifts
Our communities continued to face policy changes that drastically reshaped the social landscape. HIP urged philanthropy to step forward with courage and a fierce commitment to support the organizations fighting to protect hard-earned rights. This set the tone for the year: philanthropy must act decisively in defense of justice, not merely observe from the sidelines.
MARCH | Launching Tools for Strategic Action
HIP released Protecting Our Communities: A Resource Guide, a toolkit helping our member organizations respond strategically to policies criminalizing migration in the U.S. and Latin America. By providing actionable guidance, we empowered our partners to defend migrant rights while encouraging funders to direct resources where they were most needed.
APRIL | Strengthening Race-Explicit Grantmaking
Through the Racial Equity Advancement and Defensive Initiative (READI), HIP and partners at at ABFE, Asian Americans/Pacific Islanders in Philanthropy (AAPIP) and Native Americans in Philanthropy (NAP) published Transformative Actions to Protect Race-Explicit Grantmaking. The resource guided funders on cutting red tape, providing air cover, and sustaining commitments to racial equity, even amid legal and political challenges. This work highlighted that philanthropy must pair courage with operational support.
MAY | Responding to Racial Profiling
After experiencing first hand racial profiling by ICE—our own Jazmin Chávez witnessed philanthropy's dangerous retreat. We called on funders to take concrete action: invest in safety and legal counsel for advocates, support mental health services for leaders in hypervigilance, and fund rapid-response networks that slow deportations by protecting immigrants' rights in real-time. Philanthropy cannot observe from the sidelines while the organizations they support fight for survival.
JUNE | Defending Temporary Protected Status (TPS)
The U.S. Supreme Court decision to end Temporary Protected Status (TPS) jeopardized the safety and stability of over 500,000 people and exposed the fragility of temporary protections. HIP urged philanthropy to mobilize resources, fund emergency legal clinics, elevate leadership from directly impacted communities and build the long-term power needed to protect immigrant rights. This moment reinforced the need for strategic, sustained, and values-aligned giving.
JUNE | HIP-NAP Joint Conference: A Call to Action
The first HIP-NAP joint conference convened Latine and Indigenous leaders in Albuquerque, New Mexico, emphasizing collective liberation. Beyond inspiration and reunion, the gathering was a reminder to philanthropy that the convening is itself a form of protection and power. Deepening relationships, sharing strategies, and positioning our gente to cultivate pathways toward collective liberation.
JULY | Protecting Birthright Citizenship
In another direct assault on the constitution and on our families, the U.S. Supreme Court decided to chip away at birthright citizenship. HIP called on funders to support legal defense strategies led by impacted communities, invest in narrative infrastructure to counter fear with truth and fund organizing efforts that affirm that every child belongs. This reinforced a key HIP principle: philanthropy must fund courage, not just crisis management.
SEPTEMBER | Decolonizing Philanthropy
During Latin American Independence Days, HIP shared 10 Practices to Decolonize Philanthropy, emphasizing that breaking free from colonial practices within the sector is an ongoing responsibility. Later in the month, the U.S. Supreme Court Noem v. Perdomo decision allowed unconstitutional racial profiling, prompting HIP to urge the sector to mobilize resources, solidarity, and protection for communities whose freedom and dignity are non-negotiable.
SEPTEMBER - NOVEMBER | Good Ancestors Webinar Series
HIP launched the Good Ancestors webinar series, asking: "How do we use our resources today to build a world we may never see, but that future generations deserve?" Movement leaders, funders, and strategists explored how philanthropic wealth flows–or doesn’t–and what it means to give as an act of repair, solidarity, and long‑term world‑building. The series emphasized turning momentum into legacy, reinforcing that giving today shapes the future generations inherit.