California · Nonprofit
CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS
CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS (California) receives grants from 59 organizations whose IRS filings report $23,471,116 to it, the largest being CHINESE PROGRESSIVE ASSOCIATION ($4,801,919). 28 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2024
- $9.4M
- Funders on record
- 59
- Grants received
- $23M
- Net assets
- $8.2M
What Center for Empowered Politics does
Mission
Cep specializes in people of color-led grassroots movement building 501(c)(4) organizations taht have been on the cutting edge of c3/c4 innovations, engagement in ethnic communities, campaign consultation, and integrated voter engagement 2.0.
As stated on its FY2024 Form 990.
Programs
Local electoral engagement to build grassroots power of working class.
$4,182,916 spentof which $1,112,618 as grants62% of program spendingOrganizational infrastructure, technical assistance support
$1,814,122 spentof which $533,038 as grants$312,822 earned by the program27% of program spendingCampaign consultation and technical assistance.
$800,013 spent$310,000 earned by the program12% of program spending
The 3 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $6,797,051.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2020 to 2021, from $2.0M to $6.2M (+216%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
93% of CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS’s revenue is contributions — about as donation-reliant as the typical peer (97% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 0 of the last 8 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Board chair
Timmy Lu
CEO/chair
As listed on its FY2024 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2018 → 2023: the base broadened from 2 funders to 23 funders, grant income rose $75k → $3.3M.
9 of 59 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 16% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
Left out of every figure on this page: $25k from one payer (the same organization on both sides, largest Center for Empowered Politics). These are real filings, and they are not money CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS raised.
From the IRS filings of CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 59 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 20% of grant income, and it takes 4 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 4 funders to its left
99% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2018 100% · 2019 62% · 2020 18% · 2021 34% · 2022 57% · 2023 32% — diversifying over time.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
33% of CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 47% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
54% of CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS's grant income comes from California funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $3.8M arriving through sponsors registered in 2 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Against its field
CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS has grown faster than three-quarters of the 978 civil rights nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 978 civil rights nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2024
Government funding CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $346k on record.
- DIRECT STATE SERVICES - NON-SALARY$126k
- DEDICATED$116k
- TRUST FUND$103k
Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.
Organizations like CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In California
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
82% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Part of a family of 1 related entity
- Resilient Strategies LLC · corp_trust
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS?
- CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS (California) receives grants from 59 organizations whose IRS filings report $23,471,116 to it, the largest being CHINESE PROGRESSIVE ASSOCIATION ($4,801,919). 28 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS have?
- IRS filings report 59 organizations giving $23,471,116 in grants to CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS, 28 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS?
- CHINESE PROGRESSIVE ASSOCIATION is the largest funder on record, with $4,801,919 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like CENTER FOR EMPOWERED POLITICS find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in California. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2024 (financials across 2017–2024), and the filings of 59 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 22, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing