National Endowment for Democracy (NED): donor analysis 2026

In fiscal year 2024, Ukraine received $9.2 million from the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), more than any other country in the Endowment’s European portfolio. In 2025, even with its money frozen in Washington, NED backed nearly 100 Ukrainian organisations with $10.6 million in direct assistance.

It is also the donor that 2025–2026 shook harder than anything in its history. The US administration twice tried to zero out NED’s funding, payments were held back, and the Endowment went to court and won. As of 6 November 2026, NED is operating and accepting proposals: the next submission deadline is 27 January 2027. Here is how the Endowment works, what happened to it, which Ukrainian organisations can apply, and how to avoid wasting an application.

Who they are and where the money comes from

NED is a private nonprofit created in 1983 with the support of the US Congress. It is not a government agency: a bipartisan board of directors governs it, it is audited every year, and it reports to Congress. Yet almost the entire budget is an annual congressional appropriation channelled through the State Department, topped up by modest private contributions from foundations, companies, and individuals.

The scale is large. According to NED itself, it is active in more than 90 countries and supports over 1,900 projects. Its application page speaks of more than 2,000 grants a year to nongovernmental groups abroad. For fiscal year 2026, Congress provided $315 million for NED and its core institutes.

One detail people often miss: NED has four core institutes that receive part of the money – the International Republican Institute (IRI), the National Democratic Institute (NDI), the Center for International Private Enterprise (CIPE), and the Solidarity Center. Each runs its own programmes in Ukraine. Applying directly to NED and working with these institutes are separate channels; this article covers the first one, NED’s direct grants to local organisations.

2025–2026: the freeze, the lawsuits, and the outcome

This matters, because it shapes how predictable the donor is for you.

• Late January 2025. NED lost access to funds Congress had already appropriated. According to US media reports, it furloughed staff and suspended grants to about 1,800 partners in more than 100 countries.
• 5 March 2025. NED filed a lawsuit in federal court in the District of Columbia over $167 million in obligated funds plus another $72 million appropriated by Congress.
• 10 March 2025. The State Department partially restored funding, and NED resumed grantmaking.
• August 2025. Judge Dabney Friedrich found that the government had likely violated the NED Act by tying payments to “Administration priorities”. The Justice Department then made nearly $95 million available.
• Fiscal year 2026. The White House budget request proposed eliminating NED’s funding. Congress disagreed and provided $315 million; the law was signed on 3 February 2026. In January 2026, the House rejected an amendment to bar funding for NED.
• March 2026. With money again not arriving, NED filed a motion for an injunction on 9 March. On 30 March part of the 2026 funds reached its account, and the motion was withdrawn.
• Fiscal year 2027. The budget request again proposes zero for NED. The House passed its State Department funding bill for 2027 with money for NED, but less of it; in a statement dated 14 July 2026 the White House welcomed the cut and called for full elimination. As of 6 November 2026, we could not find a final decision on NED’s 2027 budget in public sources.

What it means in practice: the Endowment survived. It has a stable bipartisan majority behind it in Congress, and the court confirmed that the executive branch cannot simply sit on appropriated money. But the risk of delays is real. Plan your project so that a first tranche arriving a month or two late does not stop the work, and do not make an NED grant your organisation’s only source of funding.

How NED works with Ukraine

NED has supported Ukrainian civic activists, journalists, and human rights defenders for more than three decades. Within NED, Ukraine belongs to the Europe region, where it is by far the largest country programme. According to NED’s FY2024 Europe infographic, out of $38.2 million for the whole of Europe, Ukraine received $9,220,380: $7,884,250 in direct grants to local organisations and $1,336,130 through core institute projects.

In fiscal year 2025, according to NED’s Ukraine impact report of 30 September 2025, the Endowment supported nearly 100 local partners with $10.6 million in direct assistance. That works out to roughly $100,000 per partner per year on average, though this is our own rough calculation: individual grants can be much smaller, especially for newer organisations.

NED’s Ukrainian partners include anti-corruption and watchdog groups, independent media, grassroots networks and volunteer movements, business associations (through CIPE), independent trade unions (through the Solidarity Center), war crimes documentation groups, and legal organisations.

Who can apply and what NED funds

Direct NED grants go only to nongovernmental organisations: civic groups, associations, independent media, and similar bodies. NED does not fund individuals, government bodies, or state-supported institutions such as public universities. Projects must be nonpartisan and consistent with the Endowment’s principles and objectives.

NED is interested in local, independent programmes that:

• promote and defend human rights and the rule of law;
• support freedom of information and independent media;
• strengthen democratic ideas and values;
• promote accountability and transparency;
• strengthen civil society organisations;
• strengthen democratic political processes and institutions;
• promote civic education;
• support democratic conflict resolution;
• promote freedom of association;
• strengthen a broad-based market economy.

An unregistered group can still apply: instead of a registration certificate, it explains why it is not registered and the status of any pending registration. In Ukraine this is rare, but it can matter for initiatives working in occupied territories or in displacement.

How to apply

Proposals go through NED’s online portal in this order:

• choose the application language on the portal;
• complete the Organization Profile Form;
• complete the Application Proposal Form;
• upload the Proposal Narrative following NED’s guidelines – in English or your local language;
• upload the budget as an Excel file, ideally on NED’s template;
• add registration documents if the organisation is registered.

Ukraine is handled by NED’s Europe team, whose general proposals address is europeproposals@ned.org. The portal also has a separate form for renewing existing grants, so current NED partners should use that one.

What is open as of 6 November 2026

NED does not run separate calls. It accepts proposals all year, and its board of directors decides three times a year. A proposal submitted after a deadline simply moves to the next board meeting. The official schedule from NED’s website:

So a proposal submitted now will be considered at the 7 May 2027 meeting. More than three months pass between submission and decision, which means a project meant to start in spring 2027 is already too late for NED. A realistic start for a new project under the January deadline is summer 2027, and only if Congress and the State Department do not delay the 2027 money.

How to work with this donor

A local initiative, not someone else’s plan

NED looks for projects that grew out of the organisation’s own work and the country’s needs. The strongest proposals show an organisation that has worked on the issue for years, has its own audience, and knows exactly what the grant will change. A project bent to fit imagined donor priorities is easy to spot.

Strict nonpartisanship

Any hint of support for a specific party or candidate is grounds for rejection. Voter outreach, election monitoring, and civic education are all possible, but with equal treatment of every political force. In 2026, with the Endowment under close scrutiny from critics in Washington, this rule carries even more weight.

A budget that matches the narrative

Every budget line should lead to a specific activity in the narrative. NED checks partners’ financial capacity and is audited every year itself, so it expects clean reporting. For a first proposal, a moderate 12-month request is a safer bet than the largest possible multi-year one.

Security for sensitive work

If you document war crimes, work with occupied territories, or protect journalists, the proposal should show how you keep people and data safe. NED does not treat this as a formality.

Watch out for scams

NED warns that people are impersonating the Endowment by email and on social media. Proposals go only through the official portal at form.ned.org, and any “NED” message offering a grant without an application should be checked against the official page.

Aim for the next deadline, not “some day”

Because proposals are accepted at any time, many organisations keep postponing. It is better to have a finished text by 27 January 2027: even if the 2027 money is delayed again, the queue of proposals still moves by deadline.

NED remains one of the largest direct funders of Ukrainian civil society in democracy, human rights, and independent media. Since 2025 it has become less predictable, but it has not gone away: Congress and the courts protected it, and its Ukraine programme even grew in 2025. The next window is 27 January 2027, and there is still time to prepare a strong proposal.