Repairers of the Breach

In July 2020, Repairers of the Breach was one of several organizations that received funding from Foundation to Promote Open Society, a philanthropic organization founded by billionaire philanthropist George Soros, as part of a $220 million racial-justice initiative announced in July 2020. ^{5 6}

Background

Repairers of the Breach is a left-of-center advocacy and organizing nonprofit based in North Carolina that trains religious leaders and community organizers to advance left-of-center policies as well as a “moral policy agenda that prioritizes love, truth, and justice.” ¹ The group was founded in 2015 by pastor William J. Barber II, who founded the “Forward Together Moral Movement” and was previously the president of the North Carolina NAACP. ^{1 2 4}

In 2018, the organization relaunched Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival, which had originally been established in 1968 as the Poor People’s Campaign by Martin Luther King Jr.’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). The relaunch was done in partnership with the Kairos Center for Religions, Rights, and Social Justice, which was associated with the Union Theological Seminary. ^{2 7}

Activities

According to its website, Repairers of the Breach organizes its activities within four main program areas: “Moral Fusion Organizing,” “Religious Affairs,” “Theomusicology and Cultural Arts,” and leadership of the Poor People’s Campaign. The organization’s Moral Fusion Organizing program provides training workshops for religious leaders and community organizers to advocate left-of-center policy goals. The organization’s Religious Affairs program trains interfaith leaders in “moral articulation, moral analysis, and moral action.” ^{8 4 9}

Advocacy

The Poor People’s Campaign, which as of 2026 was co-chaired by William J. Barber II and Liz Theoharis of the Kairos Center, organizes civil disobedience campaigns across the United States. In June 2024, the Poor People’s Campaign hosted a “Mass Poor People’s and Low-Wage Workers’ Assembly and Moral March on Washington D.C. and to the Polls” Between April and May 2025, the group organized weekly “Moral Monday” demonstrations at the U.S. Capitol to advocate against proposed federal budget cuts they alleged would target social programs. Barber and two other activities were arrested on April 28, 2025, after conducting a prayer protest inside the Capitol Rotunda. ^{3 10 11 12}

In June 2025, Barber delivered a sermon at the Pennsylvania No Kings Day protest as part of national protests against the Second Trump Administration. ¹³

Funding

In July 2020, it was announced that the Open Society Foundations, a philanthropic organization founded by billionaire philanthropist George Soros, would be investing $220 million into racial justice initiatives. Repairers of the Breach was named as one of the planned recipients. The funds were ultimately disbursed through another organization of Soros’s, the Foundation to Promote Open Society; Repairers received a total of $4.25 million from the organization from 2021 through 2023. ^{5 6 14 15}

Leadership

William J. Barber II is the founder and president of Repairers of the Breach. Barber previously worked as president of the North Carolina NAACP as well as a member of the national NAACP board of directors. As of 2026, Barber was co-chair of the Poor People’s Campaign, a professor of theology at Yale Divinity School, and director of the Yale Divinity School’s Center for Public Theology and Public Policy, which he founded. ²

As of 2024, Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove was chairman of the board of Repairers of the Breach. ¹⁶

As of 2024, Archie Black was the group’s chief operating officer, and Al McSurely was its secretary of the board. ¹⁶

Controversy

In May 2025, William J. Barber II‘s ex-wife, Rebecca Barber, filed a motion in Durham County, North Carolina alleging that Repairers of the Breach had issued monthly checks of $7,000 to a joint personal bank account that she shared with William Barber, which she claimed was made “under the guise of alimony or financial support” Rebecca Barber requested a judge to add Repairers of the Breach as a third-party defendant in the couple’s divorce proceedings over property division, arguing that the organization was “functionally an alter ego” of her ex-husband, and that its assets were potentially marital property. ¹⁷

The board for Repairers of the Breach later hired the North Carolina-based law firm Parker Poe Adams and Bernstein to conduct an independent investigation. On June 21, 2025, the board released a statement claiming “all payments made to Rev. Barber align with approved amounts, and any transfers made to a personal account were made from his own salary, independent of Repairers of the Breach.” The board also claimed that Barber had not used or directed organizational funds for personal benefit. ¹⁸