May 5, 2026
Impact Alpha: Big DAF platforms drop Southern Poverty Law Center, underscoring need for impact investors to choose partners wisely
[…] Last week, Fidelity Charitable, Vanguard Charitable and DAFgiving360, Schwab’s affiliated donor advised fund, or DAF, one by one announced they would no longer honor donor grant recommendations to the Southern Poverty Law Center, or SPLC. The move came on the heels of the Justice Department’s indictment of the renowned civil rights organization, claiming that SPLC’s payments to informants observing hate groups like the Klu Klux Klan equated to money-laundering.
[…] In stark contrast to Vanguard Charitable, DAFgiving360 and Fidelity Charitable, last week the San Francisco Foundation, a DAF provider under the leadership of Fred Blackwell, announced they would continue to fund donations to SPLC.
Blackwell noted that “giving platforms are not acting neutrally when they cut off access to charitable resources based solely on a charge, before any court has weighed the facts. They are imposing a penalty in advance of due process, reinforcing the very deterrent effect such prosecutions are intended to produce, and weakening civil society in the process.”
