The Manna-hatta Fund is a donation portal managed by the American Indian Community House (AICH) that is used to support AICH’s programs, including the promotion of Native American culture, education, health, and social services. ¹

The fund was established to encourage non-Native Americans, whom the fund identifies as “settlers,” to acknowledge a “legacy of theft and genocide that comprise the history of New York City and the United States.” ²

About

The Manna-hatta Fund is a donation portal maintained by the American Indian Community House (AICH) that is used to fund AICH’s programs that support Native American culture, education, health, and social services in New York City. ¹ AICH has complete authority over the use of donations to the Manna-hatta Fund and is volunteer-led by individuals who believe they “have settler privilege and benefit from colonization of [North America].” ^{3 4}

AICH shares the funds generated by the Fund with other activist Native American organizations in New York, including the American Indian Law Alliance and Lunaapew, the Lenape diaspora project. ¹

Manna-hatta Fund has been operating in partnership with AICH since at least 2018. ⁵

Activities

The Manna-hatta Fund is organized by “non-Natives in New York City” ⁶ and was established to encourage non-Native Americans, whom the fund identifies as “settlers,” to acknowledge what the Manna-hatta Fund calls a “legacy of theft and genocide that comprise the history of New York City and the United States.” ⁷

The fund supports the critical race theory-influenced concept of social justice ⁸ and claims that “Native [American] land literally underpins everything about our lives in the [United States].” It asserts that homes, schools, places of worship, culture, recreation, agriculture, businesses, and friendships are all made possible because Native Americans were “displaced from their ancestral lands.” ⁹

The Manna-hatta Fund suggests that supporting individuals should contribute $24 per month and that supporting nonprofits and businesses should contribute 2.4 percent of their operating budgets to the organization. ⁴ It argues that donations to the organization are a legacy of “reconciliation, repair, and “rematriation,” a term Native American groups use to define restoration of a sacred relationship with the land. ^{7 10}

While the fund refrains from using the term “land tax” to define these contributions at the direction of the American Indian Community House (AICH), ⁴ Philanthropy New York has said the Manna-hatta Fund is organized to encourage individuals to “gift money as a kind of land tax” to AICH. ¹¹ The Manna-hatta Fund also identifies itself as “inspired” ⁹ by the Shuumi Land Tax in the San Francisco, California, Bay Area ¹² and the Real Rent Duwamish ¹³ in Seattle, Washington. ⁴

Ideology and Activism

The Manna-hatta Fund has said that European settlers in the New World profited at the expense of Native people and that modern white Americans continue to benefit from these harms to this day ⁴

The Fund has claimed that New York City would not exist without “original theft from Native peoples” and the “stolen labor of Black people who literally built the city for Dutch and British colonists.” ⁴ The Manna-hatta Fund asserts that Dutch settlers did not purchase Manhattan Island, and that their interaction with Native Americans was merely an exchange of gifts. ⁴

As such, the fund believes wealthy individuals who have benefitted from this alleged “theft of Native land and displacement of Native communities” bear a “special responsibility” to address these wrongs. ⁴

The Manna-hatta fund has said that “white supremacy has its roots in the violence of European Christianity,” under which the fund says that “the Crusades, Holocaust, and colonial conquest was carried out.” It also says that non-Europeans are not excluded from honoring Native Americans through gifts such as those to the Manna-hatta Fund. ⁴

The Manna-hatta Fund encourages its supporters to engage in other far-left practices to support its priorities. These activities include issuing “land acknowledgements” affirming that Native American tribes are the true owners of lands, transferring land deeds to Native American-run organizations, supporting the removal of monuments of Europeans and Americans, and calling for museums to return artifacts to Native American organizations. ⁸

Supporting Foundations

The Manna-hatta Fund works closely with the far-left Showing Up for Racial Justice (SURJ) and Resource Generation. The Fund may share donation history for reporting and organizing purposes if donors are a member of SURJ or Resource Generation. ¹⁴

The Northlight Foundation has donated a part of its operating budget to support the Manna-hatta Fund’s actions. ¹¹ In 2019, the Manna-hatta Fund received funding from the Third Wave Fund in the form of a “rent contribution.” ¹⁵

1. “Where does my gift go?” Manna-hatta Fund. Accessed December 6, 2024. https://mannahattafund.org/aich.
2. “Manna-hatta Fund.” Action Network. Accessed December 6, 2024. https://actionnetwork.org/groups/manna-hatta-fund.
3. “Reciprocity.” American Indian Community House. Accessed December 6, 2024. https://aich.org/donate/.
4. “Frequently Asked Questions.” Manna-hatta Fund. Accessed December 6, 2024. https://mannahattafund.org/faq.
5. “Home.” Manna-hatta Fund. Accessed December 6, 2024. https://mannahattafund.org/.
6. “Reciprocity.” American Indian Community House. Accessed December 7, 2024. https://aich.org/donate/#:~:text=The%20donation%20portal%20is%20maintained%20by%20the,use%20of%20donations%20to%20the%20Manna%2Dhatta%20Fund.
7. “Manna-hatta Fund.” Action Network. Accessed December 6, 0224. https://actionnetwork.org/groups/manna-hatta-fund.
8. “What else can I do?” Manna-hatta Fund. Accessed December 6, 2024. https://mannahattafund.org/what-else-can-i-do.
9. “Frequently Asked Questions.” Manna-hatta Fund. Accessed December 7, 2024. https://mannahattafund.org/faq.
10. Sabina Vaught and Heather Shotton. “Rematriation of Indigenous Epistemologies in Education.” University of Oklahoma Office of the Senior Vice President and Provost, Presidential Dream Course. Fall 2019. Accessed December 7, 2024. https://www.ou.edu/dreamcourse/past-courses/fall-2019/rematriation-of-indigenous-epistemologies-in-education.
11. Bottger, Celia. “From Land Acknowledgement to Land Back: Philanthropy’s Role & Responsibility in Returning Stolen Land to Native Communities.” Philanthropy New York. February 3, 2022. Accessed December 6, 2024. https://philanthropynewyork.org/news/land-acknowledgement-land-back-philanthropy-s-role-responsibility-returning-stolen-land-native.
12. “Shuumi Land tax.” Sogorea Te’ Land Trust. Accessed December 7, 2024. https://sogoreate-landtrust.com/shuumi-land-tax/.
13. “Home.” Real Rent Duwamish. Accessed December 7, 2024. https://www.realrentduwamish.org/.
14. “Give.” Manna-hatta Fund. Accessed December 6, 2024. https://mannahattafund.org/give.
15. “A Tangible Step Towards Reconciliation.” Third Wave Fund. September 27, 2024. Accessed December 6, 2024. https://www.thirdwavefund.org/blog/a-tangible-step-towards-reconciliation.