Texas · Nonprofit
Texas Fair Defense Project
Texas Fair Defense Project (Texas) receives grants from 37 organizations whose IRS filings report $4,488,309 to it, the largest being FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND ($1,093,740). 17 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $223k
- Funders on record
- 37
- Grants received
- $4.5M
- Net assets
- $97k
What Texas Fair Defense Project does
Mission
Texas Fair Defense Project's mission is to fight to end the criminalization of poverty in Texas. We envision a system of justice that upholds the dignity and civil rights of all people, regardless of income, race, or gender.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Program
During 2025:* We assisted the University of Texas Law School with their Drivers License Recovery Clinic, which provided over 100 people with resources related to clearing drivers license/Class C holds.* We helped file bills supporting fines and fees relief in the States 89th Legislative Session.* We helped end bail bond requirements that violated 2017 reforms that were being enforced in multiple courts throughout Texas. We also discovered the Texas Department of Public Safety's License Division was applying a two-year license suspensions for Driving While License Invalid (DWLI) convictions after the Texas State Legislature amended the suspension to 90 days. We were able to secure rectification from DPS's General Counsel and the License Division.* We participated in a coalition working to repeal the Failure to Appear/Failure to Pay Program across Texas.
$142,694 spent100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2025 Form 990. Program spending in total: $142,694.
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 2019 to 2020, from $960k to $2.1M (+114%).
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.
Government-grant reliance: 2020 7% · 2021 11%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
100% of Texas Fair Defense Project’s revenue is contributions — more reliant on donations than three-quarters of its peers (94% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 5 of the last 9 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
Morgan Craven
Chair
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
The chief executive listed changed between the FY2022 and FY2023 filings.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 6 funders to 11 funders, grant income rose $364k → $561k.
13 of 37 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 49% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of Texas Fair Defense Project’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 37 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
Texas Fair Defense Project has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 24% 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
82% 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 Texas Fair Defense Project.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 58% · 2018 70% · 2019 33% · 2020 25% · 2021 36% · 2022 32% · 2023 37% — 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
40% of Texas Fair Defense Project's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 46% 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
Texas Fair Defense Project draws 91% of its grant income from funders outside Texas, across 9 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $2.2M arriving through sponsors registered in 8 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
Texas Fair Defense Project's funding base is broadening — from 6 funders to 11 as grant income climbed.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 1,547 crime & legal nonprofits $100k–$1M, FY2025
Organizations like Texas Fair Defense Project
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 Texas
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
54% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
65%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for Texas Fair Defense Project: 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 Texas Fair Defense Project?
- Texas Fair Defense Project (Texas) receives grants from 37 organizations whose IRS filings report $4,488,309 to it, the largest being FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND ($1,093,740). 17 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does Texas Fair Defense Project have?
- IRS filings report 37 organizations giving $4,488,309 in grants to Texas Fair Defense Project, 17 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of Texas Fair Defense Project?
- FIDELITY INVESTMENTS CHARITABLE GIFT FUND is the largest funder on record, with $1,093,740 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like Texas Fair Defense Project find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Texas. 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 FY2025 (financials across 2017–2025), and the filings of 37 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 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing