Over the last week, rumors have been swirling that President  Donald Trump may attempt to revoke a broad swath of NGOs’ tax-exempt status. Trump amplified these concerns when he suggested last week that Harvard University should lose its tax-exempt status after the school defied the administration’s demands.

POLITICO has since reported that “No such orders are being drafted or considered at this time.” Still, even as the president does not have legal authority to request tax investigations into particular people or entities he could still issue a broad presidential directive to target nonprofits’ tax-exempt status and cause severe damage to American civil society. 

We know from our work on the ground for so many years in Israel that civil society often functions towards democratic accountability: it is a grassroots check on executive power. 

NIF, alongside hundreds of other philanthropic foundations and not-for-profit groups signed the below letter to make clear to the American administration that we will stand as one, that we will not be cowed, and that we will continue to push for progress, insist on democratic values and norms, and hold power to account.

Here is the full text of the letter we signed: 

We are a coalition of nonprofit and nonpartisan organizations formed to champion causes dear to all Americans. We work in communities across the country to protect our air and water, our right to vote, to worship, and to organize; we fight for consumers, workers, and our children; we advocate for civil and human rights at home and abroad; we have made it safer to drive on our roads, easier to start a business, and healthier to live in our cities. We span the full ideological spectrum. And today, we stand together for our democracy and in solidarity with the nonprofit groups unjustly and illegally targeted by the Trump administration.

We won’t mince words. No president–Democrat or Republican–should have the power to punish nonprofit organizations he disagrees with. That is not about protecting Americans or defending the public interest. It is about using unchecked power to silence opposition and voices he disagrees with. That is un-American and flies in the face of the Constitution, including the First Amendment bar on targeting organizations for their advocacy.  

Charities perform crucial functions in every community across our country, including providing healthcare, housing, education, religious services, food and water, and so much more. Like other nonprofits, the organizations threatened by Trump have a mission to serve the public good and are composed of everyday people fighting for dignity, safety, and opportunity. 

This attack on nonprofits is not happening in a vacuum, but as a part of a wholesale offensive against organizations and individuals that advocate for ideas or serve communities that the president finds objectionable, and that seek to enforce the rule of law against the federal government. Whether the target is a church, an environmental or good government group, a refugee assistance organization, university, a law firm, or a former or current government official, weaponizing the executive branch to punish their speech or their views is illegal and wrong. It is also an attack on the very notion that government power must serve the people, not those in office.  

Charitable organizations serve our communities in various ways, playing a central role in public protection, health, accountability, anti-discrimination, and in creating the moral fabric of our nation. That is, of course, precisely why this administration is targeting them. They know that the organizations they are attacking exist to lift up the voices of everyday Americans and shine the spotlight of accountability on those who seek to abuse power.

Efforts by the president of the United States to defund, discredit, and dismantle nonprofit groups he disagrees with are reprehensible and dangerous—a violation of a fundamental freedom in America. This Administration is trying to bully people into silence but speaking out is, and has always been, our collective mission. We stand with those wrongly targeted and with each other. No exceptions.