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EL Craig Foundation at a glance

· Private foundation

EL Craig Foundation

Its FY2025 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.

$3.1M
Granted FY2025still arriving
9
Grants FY2025still arriving
5
States reached
$1.0M
Largest
01What it fundsRead
02The needRead
03Its granteesRead
04Its fieldRead
05Through PlinthRead
01What it funds
01100% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2019 to 2025.

Public Benefit$4.3MCivil Rights$2.9MPhilanthropy$2.5MEducation$2.0MCrime & Legal$1.7MSocial Science$1.2MYouth Development$10kReligion$500Other$0
02FY2025 · 9 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

By grant size · FY2025

  • $50k–250k4 grants · $325k
  • $250k+5 grants · $2.8M
$300,000
Median grant
5
States reached
$4.3M
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
CATO Institute$1,000,000
Institute for Justice$500,000
Acton Institute$500,000
Donors Trust$500,000
Becket Fund$300,000
Intercollegiate Studies Institute$100,000
The Reason Foundation$100,000
Independent Institute$75,000
The Fund for American Studies$50,000
02The need
03

Does the money reach high-need areas?

Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, against the area’s typical level.

show:

Dollar for dollar, its grants (FY19–25) land where the poverty rate runs at 11%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 40% of its dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Its grants spread fairly evenly across need levels.

area typical 11%Intercollegiate Studies Institute: $100k → 10%Independent Institute: $250k → 10%REASON FOUNDATION: $100k → 14%MANHATTAN INSTITUTE: $50k → 17%The Fund for American Studies: $50k → 14%Acton Institute: $500k → 11%Joplin Regional Medical School Alliance: $125k → 18%Institute for Humane Studies: $500k → 7%Donors Trust: $1.0M → 9%Intercollegiate Studies Institute: $25k → 10%Independent Institute: $250k → 10%The Reason Foundation: $100k → 14%Acton Institute: $500k → 11%INSTITUTE FOR HUMANE STUDIES: $400k → 7%Donors Trust: $500k → 9%Independent Institute: $75k → 10%REASON FOUNDATION: $100k → 14%CATO Institute: $1.5M → 14%Acton Institute: $410k → 11%INSTITUTE FOR HUMANE STUDIES: $400k → 7%Donors Trust: $500k → 9%The Reason Foundation: $100k → 14%CATO Institute: $1.0M → 14%ACTON INSTITUTE: $258k → 11%Institute for Humane Studies: $400k → 7%Donors Trust: $500k → 9%The Reason Foundation: $100k → 14%CATO Institute: $400k → 14%ACTON INSTITUTE: $250k → 11%The Reason Foundation: $100k → 14%CATO INSTITUTE: $300k → 14%Acton Institute: $250k → 11%Institute for Justice: $500k → 7%CATO Institute: $250k → 14%Institute for Justice: $250k → 7%CATO INSTITUTE: $250k → 14%Institute for Justice: $250k → 7%Becket Fund: $300k → 14%Institute for Justice: $250k → 7%The Becket Fund: $100k → 14%INSTITUTE FOR JUSTICE: $150k → 7%The Federalist Society: $250k → 14%Institute for Justice: $150k → 7%The Becket Fund: $100k → 14%INSTITUTE FOR JUSTICE: $150k → 7%THE FEDERALIST SOCIETY: $250k → 14%THE FEDERALIST SOCIETY: $250k → 14%Becket Fund: $100k → 14%0%20%40%50%more need →
grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount
How this is measured
Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty line in the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP.
How this is measured
US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are delivered. Need from public data (U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA), shown as context about the area, never attributed to the funder’s giving.
04

Where the work is directed

The same grants placed two ways: where each recipient sits, and where its stated purpose sends the money.

About 18% of EL Craig Foundation’s grant dollars are earmarked for a different county than the recipient’s own address.

EL Craig Foundationlessmore of its giving
Placed by recipient address · 8.3% directed abroad (not shown)
How this is measured
Recipient view: each grant at its grantee’s ZIP, mapped to a county. Directed view: each grant at the county its stated purpose names, falling back to the recipient’s county when the purpose names no place; US grants only. A county shows only if it carries the top 95% of that view’s dollars. Purposes are read from the funder’s own 990 grant descriptions.
03Its grantees
repeat funding

Who it funds again

Organizations funded in more than one year, against those funded once.

98%of every dollar goes to organizations it has funded before.
$12M · 12 repeat orgs$286k to everyone else

Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +57% since the first grant, against +13% for those funded once.

12 repeat relationships: 7 still active in FY2025, 5 since wound down; 1 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

12
7

Total granted

$12M
$236k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+57%
+13%

Still filing today

92%
57%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2025, 98% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $50k went to new ones.

50%100%’19’20’21’22’23’24’25
RenewedFirst-time

Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant

’19’20’21’22’23’24’25
EducationPublic BenefitCivil RightsSocial SciencePhilanthropyYouth DevelopmentOther
How this is measured
First-time means a grantee’s first year in the filing window; renewed means funded in an earlier year too. The renewed share climbs naturally as a portfolio matures, so the signal is a year that bucks it (a wave of new grantees). The earliest year is left-censored: relationships that predate the data read as new. Theme is the grantee’s IRS cause.

Backed again, and grew

  • CI
    CATO INSTITUTE
    6× · 2019–2025 · $3.7M · revenue +108%
  • AI
    Acton Institute for the Study of Religion and Liberty
    6× · 2019–2025 · $2.2M · revenue +3%
  • IF
    INSTITUTE FOR JUSTICE
    7× · 2019–2025 · $1.7M · revenue +57%

Funded once

  • JR
    JOPLIN REGIONAL MEDICAL SCHOOL ALLIANCE
    one grant, 2019 · $125k · revenue -65%
  • MI
    MANHATTAN INSTITUTE FOR POLICY RESEARCH INCgraduated
    one grant, 2020 · $50k · revenue +38%
  • GM
    GEORGE MASON UNIV OF LAW & ECON CENTER
    one grant, 2020 · $25k
How this is measured

Repeat means funded in two or more distinct years. Growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.

04Its field

Closest unfunded matches

The nonprofits that most resemble its grantees but are not funded by it, scored along the direction from the rest of the field toward the portfolio. A resemblance in what they say they do, not a recommendation.

1
American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research

The american enterprise institute is a community of scholars and supporters committed to expanding liberty, increasing individual opportunity, and strengthening free enterprise. aei pursues these ideals through independent thinking and the…

Social Science
2
Frontiers of Freedom Institute

To educate the public on constitutional issues and public policy matters. We are dedicated to the principles of individual liberty, peace through strength, limited government, free enterprise, and the values embodied in the Declaration of…

Public Benefit
3
The International Institute for Strategic Studies - Us

To provide accurate, objective information and analysis on international strategic issues for legislators, diplomats, foreign affairs analysts, international business leaders, economists, the military, defense commentators, journalists,…

International
4
Open Markets Institute

The open markets institute works to help people relearn how to use competition policy to build stronger democracies, more just and equitable societies, more innovative and sustainable economies, and a more secure and peaceful world.

Education
5
The Libertarian Institute

Disseminate information and education about pertinent economic, social and governmental topics, via print, web and other media to educate the public about the principles of LIbertarianism.

Education
6
Foreign Policy Research Institute

The foreign policy research institute (frpi) is dedicated to producing the highest quality scholarship and nonpartisan policy analysis focused on crucial foreign policy and national security challenges facing the united states. we educate…

International
7
International Republican Institute

Iri advances freedom and democracy worldwide by developing political parties, civic institutions, open elections, democratic governance and the rule of law.

Education
8
Independence Institute

The mission of independence institute is to empower individuals and to educate citizens,legislators and opinion makers about public policies that enhance personal and economic freedom.

Public Benefit
9
Hudson Institute Inc

Hudson Institute is a research organization promoting American leadership for a secure, free, and prosperous future.

—
10
Institute for Policy Innovation

It is the mission of the Institute for Policy Innovation (IPI) to provide education, research, analysis and recommendations to policy makers, opinion leaders and the American people designed to help solve public policy problems through…

—
11
Defense of Freedom Institute for Policy Studies Inc

To provide thoughtful, conservative solutions to the challenges presented by education, workforce, labor and employment issues.

Education
12
The Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis Inc

The institute performs research which has a three-fold purpose: to examine issues of u.s. foreign policy, formulate policy options and programs for submission to u.s. government agencies and dissemination to the public, and to train…

—
How this is measured
The grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Intercollegiate Studies Institute Inc; the most unlike its peers is Joplin Regional Medical School Alliance. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
05the grantee network

17 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2025.

Each grant beside the grantee’s revenue from every source, year by year.

How this is measured

Counted here: distinct organizations funded across 2017 to 2025, not grant rows in a single year, so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 17 of the 21 grantees resolved in that span have returns of their own we could reconcile.

Each grantee is resolved to its own IRS returns. Association, dated; never a causal claim.

0
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
2
Early backer (in before they grew)
17/17
Grantees still filing
12/17
Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

Acton Institute for the Study of Religion and Liberty: $2,167,532 · Civil RightsActon Institute for the Study…INSTITUTE FOR JUSTICE: $1,700,000 · Civil RightsINSTITUTE FOR JUSTICECATO INSTITUTE: $3,700,000 · Public BenefitCATO INSTITUTE+1 more: $50,000 · Public BenefitInstitute for Humane Studies: $1,700,000 · OtherInstitute for Humane Stu…THE FEDERALIST SOCIETY FOR LAW AND PUBLIC POLICY STUDIES: $750,000 · OtherTHE FEDERALIST SOCIETY F…THE INDEPENDENT INSTITUTE: $575,000 · OtherTHE INDEPENDENT INSTITUT…+6 more: $125,550 · OtherDonors Trust Inc: $2,500,000 · PhilanthropyDonors Trust Inc+1 more: $30,000 · PhilanthropyTHE REASON FOUNDATION: $600,000 · EducationINTERCOLLEGIATE STUDIES INSTITUTE INC: $125,000 · EducationJOPLIN REGIONAL MEDICAL SCHOOL ALLIANCE: $125,000 · Education+1 more: $25,000 · EducationThe Becket Fund: $600,000 · Social ScienceAmerica's Future Foundation: $10,000 · Youth Development
Civil Rights$3,867,532Public Benefit$3,750,000Other$3,150,550Philanthropy$2,530,000Education$875,000Social Science$600,000Youth Development$10,000

Each grantee by its size and the funder’s share of it; top left is load-bearing

25%50%75%100%$10M$100Mgrantee revenue →↑ funder's share of their budgetCATO INSTITUTE: $3,700,000 over 6y, 2.1% of budgetDonors Trust Inc: $2,500,000 over 4y, 0.2% of budgetActon Institute for the Study of Religion and Liberty: $2,167,532 over 6y, 4.6% of budgetINSTITUTE FOR JUSTICE: $1,700,000 over 7y, 0.9% of budgetInstitute for Humane Studies: $1,700,000 over 4y, 2.8% of budgetTHE FEDERALIST SOCIETY FOR LAW AND PUBLIC POLICY STUDIES: $750,000 over 3y, 1.3% of budgetTHE REASON FOUNDATION: $600,000 over 6y, 0.7% of budgetThe Becket Fund: $600,000 over 4y, 1.7% of budgetTHE INDEPENDENT INSTITUTE: $575,000 over 3y, 6.1% of budgetINTERCOLLEGIATE STUDIES INSTITUTE INC: $125,000 over 2y, 1.1% of budgetJOPLIN REGIONAL MEDICAL SCHOOL ALLIANCE: $125,000 over 1y, 8.4% of budgetMANHATTAN INSTITUTE FOR POLICY RESEARCH INC: $50,000 over 1y, 0.3% of budgetTHE FUND FOR AMERICAN STUDIES: $50,000 over 1y, 0.3% of budgetBill of Rights Institute: $30,000 over 3y, 0.2% of budgetTHE PHILANTHROPY ROUNDTABLE: $30,000 over 3y, 0.1% of budgetMISSOURI SOUTHERN FOUNDATION: $25,000 over 1y, 0.3% of budgetAmerica's Future Foundation: $10,000 over 1y, 0.4% of budget
Grantee by grantee: a decade per organization, before and after funding

A decade per grantee: revenue shaded, grants as bars, all rows on one timeline.

Co-funders

Grantmakers whose grantees overlap with this funder’s far more than size alone predicts. Closer means stronger alignment; arcs show where they also fund each other. Here they form a tightly interlocked group: most of these funders back each other's grantees too.

National Philanthropi…Morgan Stanley Global…Donor Advised Charita…Fidelity Investments …
National Philanthropic TrustPA11.2× affinity4 shared granteesties to 3 of 3Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: National Philanthropic Trust · Morgan Stanley Global Impact Funding Trust Inc · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund

How this is measured
Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. Overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.

How much its grantees rely on government

Each dot is one organization EL Craig Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from EL Craig Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.

2024
’20’21’22’23’24’25
no gov · 10%1%3%6%10%funder's share of their income ↑0%1%3%4%5%share of the org’s income from government →
    no gov moneyreceives it· size = income
    1get no government money at all
    1report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)
    0rely on government for over half their income
    ⤢ axis zoomed · 0–5%
    typical government reliance, FY20–25
    How this is measured
    Government income is each org’s traced federal awards (USASpending grants and contracts) plus state payments (open checkbooks) as a share of its total revenue (IRS Form 990); the self-reported government-grant line (990 line 1e) is carried for cross-check: a grantee that reports government grants we could not trace to a source is left off the chart rather than shown as receiving none. An association, not a claim that a grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first, a floor rather than a census; state records exist for 9 states, so a grantee outside them shows no state figure (dimmed) rather than a false zero. Federal award amounts are obligations, which can span years, so a single-year share is indicative. 990 filings lag 12 to 24 months.
    05Through Plinth

    Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

    How do I get to EL Craig Foundation?

    Find your warmest path to EL Craig Foundation through trustees and officers whose names appear on both boards. Search for your organization and Plinth traces the shortest route it can evidence.

    Each link is a name appearing on two organizations’ public IRS 990 filings, matched on that name and, where the filings support it, on location. A same-state match has geographic support, which is a second matching feature rather than confirmation that the two are one person; a cross-state one is the likeliest to be two people who share a name. Every hop shows its tier, low-confidence and distant paths are held back rather than guessed, and it is worth confirming the person before you use the introduction.

    On method. Every financial figure here is read from IRS e-file XML, the funder’s own 990/990-PF, and from the multi-year returns of the 21 grantees we resolved, each linked to its source. Grantee outcomes are each organization’s own program-service reporting (Form 990, Part III), read as association with funding, never as caused by it. Low-confidence name matches are suppressed rather than guessed. How we build these →

    How this is measured
    Each figure carries one of six labels. Filed is what the funder reported on its return. Official is another government record about an organization, such as a federal award or a charity register, joined by name where no shared identifier exists. Resolved is an identity we worked out where the filing named a recipient without an EIN, kept only above a measured confidence threshold. Computed is arithmetic over those, like themes, portfolio clusters and co-funder strength. Context is a statistic about a place rather than about an organization, which is what the need overlay is: it describes the area a grantee’s address sits in, not where its work lands. Inferred is drawn by a model from text, like the partnerships read out of public news and organization websites. Each is labeled where it appears.

    Generated from the IRS Form 990-PF e-file return for fiscal year 2025, released 2025. Filings run roughly 12 to 24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

    Source object · view filing

    Play a game based on EL Craig’s filings →

    More from the funding graph

    The unnamed billions
    grants reported with no recipient in the public record
    The regranting layer
    51% of grant dollars land in the regranting layer
    The DAF merry-go-round
    $9.7B circulates between donor-advised funds
    The endowment market
    who holds foundation money, and what just moved
    The camps
    funders cluster by geography, not ideology
    By state
    where grant money is based, and what stays home