MCN is excited to share a report on the exceptional voter engagement work done by our grantees in 2022! Voting is a critical part of our democracy and nonprofits play an important nonpartisan role in elections. As nonprofits, we can encourage our communities to register to vote, inform constituents about voting process such as dates and deadlines, share what is on the ballot, and remind people to vote on Election Day.
Download the 2022 Nonprofit Voter Engagement Grant Report
A few highlights from the report:
- Grantees engaged over 682,000 people both digitally and in-person
- 96% of grantees reported they plan to conduct nonpartisan voter engagement beyond the 2022 election
- The grantees engaged every part of the state with: 8 statewide, 16 metro-based, and 7 greater MN-based organizations
In 2022, MCN had the opportunity to give Minnesota nonprofits to promote voter engagement for the 2022 midterm elections. 2022 was a big election year as many Minnesota races were being decided, such as the Governor and Lt. Governor, Secretary of State, Attorney General, State Auditor, Minnesota Legislature and all 8 MN U.S. Representative seats.
________________________________________________________________________________________
Background: Thanks to McKnight Foundation and an anonymous foundation, MCN was able to grant out $340,000 to nonprofits across the state. We were particularly interested in funding culturally specific organizations and organizations focused on people in rural areas of Minnesota.
We had two grant funding tiers: category 1 and category 2. Category 1 ($5,000 grants) were designed for nonprofits to do election engagement work in their communities, whether that organization has done voter engagement work in the past or whether it was their first time. Category 2 ($10,000-$25,000) were for on-going voter engagement activities and for organizations who have a history of large-scale voter engagement work.
We received over 90 applications with a total grant funding request of $1.1 million. Our grants selection review committee comprised of six individuals – a mix of nonprofit partners, MCN board members, and staff with diverse racial and geographic backgrounds and experience in grantmaking and advocacy work. We were only able to fund 27 percent of the grant applications, making the grants review committee’s job quite difficult. Selected grantees ranged from disability organizations in the Twin Cities to Asian American organizations engaging folks in the suburbs to Latinx organizations serving Spanish speaking residents in southeast Minnesota.
View the full voter engagement report. Thank you again to our 2022 voter engagement grantees and to everyone who played a part in the 2022 elections!