Who Depends on Federal Grants? 2024–2025

For a large part of the nonprofit sector, "independent" is a technicality. Shelters, refugee agencies, health clinics, early-learning centers and overseas relief groups run on federal money — often more of it than every private donor combined. That dependence was easy to overlook in good years. In 2025 it became hard to ignore.

This analysis sets what federal agencies obligated to each nonprofit (USAspending) against what that nonprofit reports earning (its Form 990), linked by EIN. Here is what the comparison shows.

The baseline

$67.7B

In federal grants reached 14,996 nonprofits filing full Form 990s in fiscal 2024.

The dependents

28%

3,790 nonprofits — 28% of recipients outside higher ed — have federal grant obligations equal to more than half their revenue.

The cut

−11%

Total federal grant dollars to these organizations fell from $67.7B to $60.1B in fiscal 2025.

The fallout

283

Of 1,488 large recipients, 283 lost half or more of their federal funding in a single year.

How dependent is the sector?

More than a quarter of recipients live on federal money

For the median recipient, federal grant obligations equal about 20% of revenue — meaningful, but survivable. The distribution has a long, heavy right side, though: 1,499 organizations have obligations equal to three-quarters or more of their revenue. For them, a single grant decision is an existential one.

Nonprofits by federal grant obligations as a share of revenue

13,735 federal grant recipients (excluding colleges & universities), FY2024

Under halfHalf or more

Dependency = FY2024 federal grant obligations ÷ total revenue on the organization's latest Form 990. "100%+" reflects multi-year awards obligated in one year.

Who funds, who pulled back

Same government, very different years

Health and Human Services is by far the biggest funder of nonprofits, and it held roughly steady. The declines were concentrated: USAID fell 73%, the State Department 54%, Justice 57% and Commerce 55%. EPA fell furthest. Of its $20.7 billion in FY2024, about $18.7 billion was one-time Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund awards to climate-finance lenders; in 2025 EPA moved to terminate those awards, and its FY2025 total was $2.4 billion. Meanwhile Education, Agriculture and Veterans Affairs sent nonprofits more.

Federal grants to nonprofits by agency ($ billions)

FY2024 vs FY2025 obligations to Form 990 filers

FY2024FY2025

Agency totals cover every verified recipient, including $32.1 billion to the 958 outliers left out of the $67.7 billion headline (about half of it to the climate-fund lenders), so the bars add up to more than the headline.

−73%USAID: $3.9B → $1.1B. The agency's dismantling, visible charity by charity.

−89%EPA: $20.7B → $2.4B, driven by the one-time Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund awards in FY24 and the program's termination.

+70%Agriculture: $2.7B → $4.6B. Not every agency cut — some grew sharply.

By cause

Housing runs on Washington

No part of the sector is more exposed than housing. The median housing and shelter nonprofit that receives federal grants has federal grant obligations equal to 57% of its revenue — largely HUD voucher and homelessness programs administered by nonprofits. Civil rights and advocacy groups (27%), community developers (23%) and international aid organizations (21%) follow. At the other end, the median arts and culture group that takes federal money has obligations equal to just 4% of revenue.

Median federal share of revenue, by sector

Among nonprofits receiving federal grants, FY2024 (sectors with 40+ recipients)

By state

The Deep South leans hardest on federal grants

Where private philanthropy is thinner, federal money fills the gap. Alabama's federally funded nonprofits have obligations equal to a median 43% of their revenue; Mississippi and Hawaii follow at 34%. In New York — home to the most donors and the biggest foundations — the figure is 11%. Hover any state for its numbers.

Median federal share of revenue among grant recipients, by state

FY2024 · states with 15+ federally funded nonprofits

10%

45%+

Most dependent

Least dependent

Who lost the most

The year the floor dropped

The steepest single-year declines read like a roll call of American foreign aid: Save the Children, World Vision, Mercy Corps, CARE, FHI 360, the International Rescue Committee. Refugee resettlement agencies — Church World Service, the US Committee for Refugees and Immigrants — took heavy hits too. 27 large recipients went net negative: more was deobligated from their awards in FY2025 than was newly obligated.

Federal grants, FY2024 → FY2025 ($ millions)

Bar spans from FY2025 (left) to FY2024 (right) — the length is what was lost

The biggest declines

FHI 360$548M → $111M -80%
International Rescue Committee$520M → $209M -60%
Southwest Key Programs$973M → $672M -31%
Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance$300M → $0 -100%
Save the Children$275M → $21M -92%
RTI International$571M → $331M -42%
Church World Service$316M → $102M -68%
World Vision$205M → $10M -95%

Year-over-year swings partly reflect multi-year awards obligated in a single year; utility cooperatives excluded.

The climate-finance whiplash

Billions in, then zero

The Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund handed some of the largest federal awards in history to a handful of nonprofit lenders, several only a year or two old. In fiscal 2024 they were among the best-funded nonprofits in the country. In fiscal 2025 they received no new obligations — expected for one-time awards — and EPA moved to terminate the awards already made. It is the clearest example in the data of a nonprofit's fate being decided entirely in Washington.

Coalition for Green Capital

$5.1B→ $0

DC · FY2024 → FY2025

Opportunity Finance Network

Appalachian Community Capital

$501M→ $0

VA · FY2024 → FY2025

Several GGRF recipients were too new for their Form 990s to reflect the awards, so they are shown here rather than in dependency rankings.

Every dot is a nonprofit

Big budgets, small exposure — and the exceptions

Plot the 400 largest federal grant recipients by size and dependency and two worlds appear. Large health systems and research institutes sit low: federal grants are a fraction of enormous budgets. Human-services and international organizations float high — big operations that are, in practice, federal contractors with a charitable mission.

Revenue vs. federal share of revenue

400 largest federal grant recipients (revenue $10M+), FY2024 · hover for names

The most exposed

Large nonprofits that run on federal money

Among organizations with more than $25 million in revenue, these draw the largest share of it from federal grants. Many are household names in their fields — and several appear in the cuts above.

#	Organization	Main funder	FY24 federal	Federal share of revenue
1	Georgia HAP Administrators GA · Housing & Shelter	HUD	$47M	148%
2	Catholic Charities of Tennessee TN · Human Services	Health & Human Services	$37M	141%
3	Assn. of State & Territorial Health Officials VA · Health Care	Health & Human Services	$101M	138%
4	Ethiopian Community Development Council VA · Human Services	State Dept.	$97M	133%
5	Catholic Charities of Louisville KY · Human Services	Health & Human Services	$92M	131%
6	IMA World Health MD · Human Services	USAID	$66M	120%
7	Arkansas Early Learning AR · Human Services	Health & Human Services	$32M	119%
8	MAG America DC · Human Services	State Dept.	$91M	117%
9	CNFA DC · International Affairs	USAID	$80M	114%
10	Church World Service IN · International Affairs	State Dept.	$316M	113%
11	Association of Village Council Presidents AK · Human Services	Interior	$59M	110%
12	Improving Economies for Stronger Communities DC · International Affairs	Agriculture (USDA)	$35M	109%

Revenue $25M+. Shares above 100% reflect multi-year obligations; quasi-governmental entities (including the U.S. Agency for Global Media's grantee networks) and colleges excluded.

Private, nonprofit colleges and universities — the ones that file a Form 990 — collected $21.1 billion across 1,261 institutions, the most of any group. Public universities don't file 990s and aren't counted here. For large research universities the money is a modest slice of enormous budgets; the real exposure sits with the shelters, clinics and aid groups that have no endowment to fall back on.

How we did this

Methodology

At a glance

Federal data: USAspending.gov prime assistance transactions for federal fiscal years 2024 and 2025 (October–September): project, formula and block grants, cooperative agreements, and direct payments for specified use. Loans and insurance excluded. Net obligations, including deobligations. Data as of February 12, 2026.
Subawards: Not included. Federal money that reaches nonprofits through a state or another prime recipient is reported as a subaward and doesn't appear here, so these figures understate how much federal money nonprofits receive.
Matching: Of $2.46 trillion in FY2024 grant obligations, most went to state and local governments, which don't file Form 990s; $274 billion went to recipients 990iQ linked to an EIN. Each match was then verified: the recipient must file the full Form 990, its name must match the USAspending recipient name, and governments are removed. That leaves $99.8 billion to 15,954 organizations. A few recipients whose legal names differ from their 990 names (e.g. Tanana Chiefs Conference) or that were matched to the wrong EIN (Climate United Fund) were corrected by hand.
Universe: Organizations with $250,000+ in revenue. Governments, public universities and quasi-public authorities are excluded.
Dependency: FY2024 federal grant obligations ÷ total revenue on the latest Form 990. Obligations are commitments, not cash received, and can be multi-year — so treat dependency as an exposure indicator, not an accounting figure.
Excluded outliers: 958 organizations whose FY2024 obligations exceeded 150% of reported revenue (mostly multi-year awards or organizations too new for their 990 to reflect the award, including the climate-fund lenders) are left out of every count, median and total in this report — the 14,996 organizations, the $67.7 billion, and the 3,790 and 1,499 figures. Because all of them are above 150%, including them would only raise those counts. Agency totals include them.
Sectors: NTEE major group from the IRS Business Master File. Colleges and universities are analyzed separately.