Labor Innovations for the 21st Century (LIFT Fund) was founded under the direction of the late former AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka to support organized labor’s efforts to bring non-union-controlled worker groups across the country under the influence and eventual control of the AFL-CIO and its member unions. ^{1 2}

Described by its own leaders as “a unique partnership between philanthropy and the AFL-CIO … to redistribute resources to worker-led organizing and building power at the local level,” LIFT Fund is supported by the Ford Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, and other prominent left-of-center grantmaking institutions in the United States. ^{3 4 5}

Leadership

LIFT Fund operates as a fiscally sponsored project of the left-of-center philanthropic membership organization and grant maker Neighborhood Funders Group. Its executive director is Jennifer Epps, who was chosen in 2021 by a search committee made up of representatives of the AFL-CIO, the Ford Foundation, and TARA Health Foundation. ⁴ Epps is a former vice president of 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East (UHE) and previously worked as executive director of the Prince George’s County Educators’ Association teachers union local in Maryland. ⁶

Epps replaced former executive director Valeria Treves, who had left to join the Department of Labor in the Biden Administration as an “Advisor for Worker Voice Engagement.” ⁷

Connections to AFL-CIO

Labor Innovations for the 21st Century Fund has been described by its leaders as “a unique partnership between philanthropy and the AFL-CIO.” ⁵

It was founded in 2010 by Anna Fink, an advisor on innovation and philanthropy issues to then-AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka. ⁸ At the time, Trumka championed a strategy of engaging with and eventually controlling grassroots non-union groups of workers, such as so-called “worker centers,” a strategy that was formally endorsed by the AFL-CIO Executive Council in 2006. ^{9 2 10}

In 2019, the AFL-CIO’s Commission on the Future of Work and Unions, which was chaired by Trumka, delivered a report on potential future organizing strategies that described worker centers as “mostly small, largely foundation-funded service and advocacy organizations that do not seek to represent workers in collective bargaining and, in most cases, do not have elected officers.” It identified the LIFT Fund as having been created by the AFL-CIO and “several foundations” to support “partnerships between local unions and worker centers.” ¹¹

In an October 2022 tribute after Trumka’s death, LIFT Fund and the Neighborhood Funders Group credited him with direct engagement in LIFT Fund’s efforts, saying he had “supported this partnership to redistribute resources to worker-led organizing and building power at the local level” since its founding. ⁵

Southern Workers Opportunity Fund

In 2021, the Ford Foundation provided $7 million in seed funding for LIFT Fund to shift its primary grantmaking focus to a new “Southern Workers Opportunity Fund” initiative.  ¹² The SWO Fund is intended to advance union organizing in Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Tennessee. Notably, these are all right-to-work states where unions have failed to successfully organize factories, distribution centers, or other facilities operated by companies such as Amazon, Boeing, Honda, Hyundai, Mercedes-Benz, Nissan, Toyota and Volkswagen. ^{13 14 15 16}

LIFT Fund’s executive director Jennifer Epps said the high-profile failed efforts by the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU) to unionize an Amazon distribution center in Bessemer, Alabama had provided an impetus for the creation of the SWO Fund. ^{17 18}

In addition to the $7 million in seed funding to launch the SWO Fund in 2022, the Ford Foundation also provided the LIFT Fund with $400,000 in general support that year. ^{19 20} The initiative also received $500,000 from the Rockefeller Foundation toward its $20 million goal. ²¹

In February 2022, LIFT Fund announced an initial round of $5.1 million in grants to 16 recipient organizations over three years to advance union organizing and promote pro-union policies in its targeted Southern states. ²²

Funders

Labor Innovations for the 21st Century Fund is funded by some of the largest and most powerful left-of-center and left-wing donors in the United States. ³ Funders include the Ford Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, Omidyar Network,  James Irvine Foundation, JPB Foundation, Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation, Open Society Foundations, Solidago Foundation, Surdna Foundation, TARA Health Foundation, The Unitarian Universalist Veatch Program at Shelter Rock, W.K. Kellogg Foundation, Wellspring Philanthropic Fund, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Northwest Area Foundation, and the Service Employees International Union. ^{3 4}

Tracy Williams, a director at eBay founder and left-wing financier Pierre Omidyar’s Omidyar Network, described LIFT Fund as part of “the incredible partnership we’ve built with the AFL-CIO.” ⁵

Grantmaking

Labor Innovations for the 21st Century Fund regularly makes grants to projects designed to tie local grassroots worker centers together more tightly with AFL-CIO member labor unions.  The unions involved in these grants have included local or regional components of American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), Communications Workers of America (CWA), International Union of Painters and Allied Trades (IUPAT), Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU), Unite Here, United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW), and Workers United. ²³

1. Steven Greenhouse. “Embracing and Resisting: The Variable Relationships Between Worker Centers and Unions.” The American Prospect. April 22, 2021. https://prospect.org/labor/the-alt-labor-chronicles-america-s-worker-centers.
2. Noam Scheiber. “As Grass-Roots Labor Activism Rises, Will Unions Take Advantage?” New York Times. September 1, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/01/business/economy/labor-unions.html.
3. “Funders.” The LIFT Fund. Accessed August 8, 2023. https://theliftfund.org/funders/.
4. “Jennifer Epps Named New Executive Director.” The LIFT Fund. December 7, 2021. https://theliftfund.org/jennifer-epps-named-new-executive-director/.
5. “The Lift Fund and Neighborhood Funders Group Statement on President Trumka’s Passing.” Neighborhood Funders Group and The LIFT Fund. August 12, 2021. https://nfg.org/statement-on-president-trumkas-passing/.
6. “Worker Power and the National Labor Relations Act.” Aspen Institute. March 16, 2022. https://www.aspeninstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Food-is-Medicine-Action-Plan-Final_012722.pdf.
7. “Congratulations Valeria!” The LIFT Fund. Accessed August 8, 2023. https://theliftfund.org/congratulations-valeria/.
8. “Anna Fink,” Funders’ Committee for Civic Participation. Accessed August 8, 2023. https://funderscommittee.org/staff-board/anna-fink/.
9. Noam Scheiber. “Richard Trumka, A.F.L.-C.I.O. Chief, Dies at 72.” New York Times. August 5, 2021. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/05/business/richard-trumka-dead.html.
10. Victor Narro, Saba Waheed, and Jassmin Poyaoan. “Building a Movement Together: Worker Centers and Labor Union Affiliations.” UCLA Labor Center. June 2018. https://www.labor.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/AFL-CIO_UCLAreportnobug_final.pdf.
11.  Richard L. Trumka, Elizabeth H. Shuler, and Tefere A. Gebre, et al. “AFL-CIO Commission on the Future of Work and Unions Report to the AFL-CIO General Board.” AFL-CIO. September 13, 2019. https://aflcio.org/reports/afl-cio-commission-future-work-and-unions.
12. “Southern Workers Opportunity Fund.” The LIFT Fund. Accessed August 8, 2023, https://theliftfund.org/southern-workers-opportunity-fund/.
13. “Right-to-Work Resources.” National Conference of State Legislatures. Accessed August 8, 2023. https://www.ncsl.org/labor-and-employment/right-to-work-resources.
14. Laura Putre. “UAW Power Struggles: Electrification, Lack of Southern Organizing Success Define the Stakes.” IndustryWeek. May 22, 2023. https://www.industryweek.com/talent/labor-employment-policy/article/21263416/uaw-power-struggles-electrification-lack-of-southern-organizing-success-define-the-stakes.
15. Cliff Sims. “Even Pro-Union Employees at Alabama’s Mercedes Plant Want the UAW to Go Away.” Yellowhammer News. June 3, 2014. https://yellowhammernews.com/even-pro-union-employees-alabamas-mercedes-plant-want-uaw-go-away/.
16. Dawn  Kent Azok. “Employees at Mercedes-Benz Supplier Reject UAW Bid to Organize a Union There.” AL.com. August 23, 2013. https://www.al.com/business/2013/08/employees_at_mercedes-benz_sup.html.
17. Alex Daniels. “In Unusual Step, Foundations Embrace Organized Labor With $20 Million Plan to Help Workers in the South.” Chronicle of Philanthropy. June 8, 2022. https://www.philanthropy.com/article/in-unusual-step-foundations-embrace-organized-labor-with-20-million-plan-to-help-workers-in-the-south.
18. William Thornton. “Could There Be a Third Amazon Union Election in Bessemer?” AL.com. June 6, 2023. https://www.al.com/business/2023/06/could-there-be-a-third-amazon-union-election-in-bessemer.html.
19. “139626 – Neighborhood Funders Group, Inc.” Ford Foundation. Accessed August 8, 2023. https://www.fordfoundation.org/work/our-grants/awarded-grants/grants-database/neighborhood-funders-group-inc-139626/.
20. Ford Foundation. Return of Private Foundation (Form 990 -PF). 2021. https://www.fordfoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/2021-annual-tax-return-form-990-pf.pdf.
21. “Neighborhood Funders Group 2022.” The Rockefeller Foundation. Accessed August 8, 2023. https://www.rockefellerfoundation.org/grant/neighborhood-funders-group-2022-2/.
22. “SWO Fund Grantees.” The LIFT Fund. February 2022. https://theliftfund.org/swo-fund-grantees/.
23. “National Partnerships.” The LIFT Fund. Accessed August 8, 2023. https://theliftfund.org/nationalpartnerships/.