Local Environmental Accountability and Defense Fund (LEADF)
The Local Environmental Accountability and Defense Fund (LEADF) is an activist group and a project of the Tides Foundation. The initiative claims to provide legal assistance for “Attorneys General and other public counsel” in lawsuits filed regarding environmental and climate-related cases. The initiative has received roughly $1.5 million in several grants donated from the MacArthur Foundation, a major left-of-center grantmaking institution. 1 2
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Funding
According to its grants directory, the MacArthur Foundation reported two separate grants to the Tides Foundation for the purpose of funding the Local Environmental Accountability and Defense Fund (LEADF): One in 2021 and another in 2024, each paying $750,000 over a three-year period. According to the grant description, MacArthur states the funding was given to assist “Attorneys General and other public counsel” in legal cases involving climate and environmental legislation and support the “decarbonization” of the U.S economy. 2
Criticism
An October 2025 report by the Capital Research Center (CRC) described the Local Environmental Accountability and Defense Fund (LEADF) as “ sound[ing] vaguely like the Michael Bloomberg-funded effort to place climate fellows in the offices of state attorneys general through the State Energy & Environmental Impact Center at New York University School of Law.” 1
The CRC report also noted that the MacArthur Foundation is a major funder of climate lawsuits against energy companies, particularly with the assistance of Sher Edling, a left-leaning law firm that received $13.6 million in charitable grants from 501(c)(3) groups between 2017 and 2023. 1