National Collaborative for Health Equity (NCHE)

Founding and History

The National Collaborative for Health Equity was originally founded as the “Health Policy Institute” in 2005 as part of the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies. It claims that in 2006 its Place Matter program was one of the first national initiatives to focus on race as a determining factor in health outcomes. In 2014, the organization was spun off and renamed the “National Collaborative for Health Equity,” becoming a fiscally sponsored organization of the left-of-center New Venture Fund. ¹

Financials

The National Collaborative for Health Equity is a fiscally sponsored organization of the left-of-center New Venture Fund, so it does not have disaggregated public financial filings. However, the group has received funding from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the MacArthur Foundation. In 2022, MacKenzie Scott provided an unrestricted grant of an unknown amount to the collaborative. ^{1  4}

Organization Philosophy

The National Collaborative for Health Equity has a left-of-center orientation. It is heavily focused on alleged racial disparities and promoting what it terms to be “equity” after the critical race theory concept in both health care and across society. In a 2025 reflection on the fifth anniversary of George Floyd’s death, the group’s executive director at the time, Gail Crhistopher, noted with approval that various levels of government had declared racism a public health emergency, and compared opposition to President Barack Obama to the actions of the Ku Klux Klan during the Reconstruction Era following the Civil War. The collective has also promoted “resistance” to the second Trump Administration to “defend democracy.” ^{2  3  5}

Projects and Initiatives

The National Collaborative for Health Equity divides its work into three categories: leadership training, data tools and resources, and the Truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation (TRHT) program. ⁶

The group’s leadership program runs for 18 months and promotes networking and the use of the TRHT framework to address what it considers to be structural racism in American society. The program is funded by the Robert Woods Johnson Foundation. ⁷

NCHE’s data program is focused on tracking race-based health inequalities. Its various programs are geared towards studying and developing policy changes in public health programs. ⁸

The TRHT program is claimed to be a method of racial healing to amend structural racism and inequities. The program supports reparations and is focused on changing social narratives around race and oppression. ²

Leadership

As of 2025, Gail Christopher was the executive director of the National Collaborative for Health Equity, a position she had held since 2019. Immediately prior to taking this position, she was a senior advisor and vice president at the W.K. Kellogg Foundation where she led programs related to “Truth Racial Healing and Transformation” that promotes “racial equity” and “racial healing.” ⁹ Christopher has characterized opposition to President Barack Obama as voter suppression akin to the actions of the Ku Klux Klan. ³