A campaign is underway to terminate annual congressional funding for the National Endowment for Democracy, the bipartisan foundation that has assisted countless grassroots democrats abroad since its founding during the Reagan Administration. 

In his historic address before the British Parliament on June 8, 1982, President Reagan called for launching a bipartisan effort by America’s business, labor, political, and civic leaders to assist new and aspiring democracies in building and strengthening “the infrastructure of democracy — the system of a free press, unions, political parties, universities — which allows a people to choose their own way, to develop their own culture, to reconcile their own differences through peaceful means.”  

Since that time, NED and its core institutes representing our political parties and business and labor communities have provided thousands of grants and technical assistance to groups resisting authoritarianism, upholding the rights of working men and women, developing independent press organizations, promoting the rule of law, advancing civic education, fighting corruption, the list goes on and on.

NED’s critics have argued that the foundation is a Cold War entity that has outlived its usefulness, that it runs its own foreign policy, that its grants are not transparent, and that it should be privately funded. They are wrong on every count.

Perhaps the Cold War argument is understandable, given the NED’s close work with Poland’s Solidarity, Czechoslovakia’s Charter 77, and other opposition movements in communist countries in its early days. And to the lifelines it provided these heroic democrats add that the Reagan speech helping to launch the Endowment boldly predicted the fall of Soviet Communism. 

The simple reality, though, is that the Endowment never believed that fighting Communism was its only mission. NED’s Statement of Principles and Objectives, adopted shortly after its founding, stresses that “the democratic idea has enormous appeal; that, indeed, it is an ideal that billions of people in all parts of the globe revere and aspire to. These people are our partners, or our potential partners.”  

In addition, the fall of Communism hardly ended the threats to American democracy posed by the “axis of autocracies,” consisting of China, Russia, Iran and North Korea.

Regarding NED’s independence from the day-to-day concerns of American foreign policy, this has from the start been considered not a defect but rather a strong asset. 

When the Endowment’s budget was last challenged twenty-five years ago, all seven of the most recent Secretaries of State took the initiative to come to its defense. The Senate Appropriations Committee in 2013 noted its recognition of “the comparative advantages of the NED in the promotion of democracy and human rights abroad, particularly given its status as an NGO,” not to mention its “continued ability to conduct programs in the most hostile political environments.”  

The Committee added that in “many circumstances,” NED was “a more appropriate and effective mechanism to promote democracy and human rights abroad than either the Department of State or USAID.”

Take the example of Communist China, which suppresses the democratic aspirations of its people through daily violations of basic human rights. Providing support to courageous freedom fighters doesn’t conflict with, but rather complements the necessary diplomatic engagement between America and China. 

A letter signed by leading figures in China’s human rights movement recently called NED “a cornerstone of support for pro-democracy and human rights initiatives.” The rights advocates noted that while they could not “delve into specific details here, it is important to note that for many programs, NED serves as the primary or sole funding source. It is NED’s support that makes these programs possible and sustainable.” 

Moreover, the advocates emphasized that NED “is the only institution capable of providing aid to activists inside China. The fact that the CCP consistently attacks NED is a tacit acknowledgment of the value of its support. The consequences of losing NED’s support cannot be overstated, given the lack of alternative funding sources.”

Far from running a “rogue” foreign policy, as critics contend, NED’s sole purpose is to support indigenous democracy efforts, and it communicates frequently with both the State Department and the United States Agency for International Development about its work.

As for transparency, the congressional authorization of NED not only required an annual report to Congress of every one of its grants, which now number each year in the thousands, but also added an extra layer by making its work subject to the Freedom of Information Act despite its non-governmental status. 

NED has scrupulously complied with these requirements, although it has done so by not jeopardizing the safety of partners in repressive countries such as China, Russia, Iran, Cuba, and Belarus.

Terminating aid to the National Endowment for Democracy will leave thousands of worthy organizations around the world without the support they need to carry out their critical work. The notion that the void can be filled by private funding is completely unrealistic. 

 It is misguided as well. The Endowment’s important mission not only reflects the best of our ideals as Americans but also stands firmly in our nation’s interests, since a more democratic world will necessarily be a more peaceful one.

This piece was co-authored by Carl Gershman, founding president of the NED.