Commentary & Analysis

Life for civil society in the United States has changed dramatically in the course of just one year. President Donald Trump’s administration has hit the NGO sector and its funders with a flurry of attacks — both rhetorical and regulatory — in a pattern that is recognizable to campaigners living under oppressive regimes worldwide.

A Cautionary Tale

There is a storied and celebrated non-profit organization in Russia called Memorial. Over the years, its staff and volunteers painstakingly built an extraordinary archive of oral histories, letters, and journals — a uniquely important record of the unimaginable atrocities that took place within the vast system of forced labor camps known as Stalin’s Gulag. Founded in 1989, as the Soviet Union teetered on the brink of dissolution, Memorial became the country’s first human rights group.

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Memorial’s searchable database has over 3 million records about victims of state terror, allowing anyone to uncover family histories that would have otherwise been lost. People from countries across the former Soviet region have made use of Memorial’s archives, searching for answers to questions that plagued their families for generations. Countless stories about finding photographs of parents and grandparents and correspondence from the Gulag era made the organization a household name, a true institution in a country where there were so few. Memorial not only made memory accessible by providing step-by-step guidance to navigating archives and finding details of families’ histories, but it for the first time placed value on memory itself in a country where the past routinely gets rewritten by whoever is in power. As a result, Memorial became an important and well-respected organization not just in Russia, but globally.

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Most were shocked when Memorial, whose work and mission were apolitical by design, became a target of the state. But in autocracies, there is no such thing as being “apolitical.” To further his own geopolitical ambitions, Vladimir Putin needed to retell the history of Russia, Ukraine, and the Soviet Union in order to justify his invasion of Ukraine. Memorial’s commitment to historical memory and to truth directly threatened this new version of the past.

STROIKA had the honor of joining Everyday Authoritarianism and Human Rights: Comparative and Transnational Lessons -- a global convening organized by Nobel Peace Laureate Leymah Gbowee, bringing together Nobel Laureates, movement leaders, journalists, and scholars from across the world. On the panel “Lessons from Frontline Activists and in the Face of Repression,”  our co-founder Yelena Litvinov joined Tawakkol Karman, Cristina Jiménez Moreta, and moderator Nermeen Shaikh to reflect on solidarity and courage in authoritarian times.

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“If there is one single lesson to take away from global experience and our own history in the U.S., our own history globally, it is that this is not the time to freeze up," Yelena shared. "We know an attack on one is an attack on everyone -- we know all the catchphrases -- but there’s a real action and agency that solidarity requires. It requires not shying away from the fear and the grief. We should feel the grief and let it compel us into action: to stand up for each other, to stand up for our communities, to keep pushing back and saying that a better world is possible.”

‍Tatyana Margolin shared an urgent message with RepresentUS: free enterprise is impossible in an autocracy, especially without fair courts."

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Before they even exert any pressure, authoritarians send enough signs for people just to fall in line... You can’t as a business person continue doing business under authoritarians. Unless you become a lackey to them, become their bank – you become owned by them.”

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Watch an interview highlight at RepresentUS.

When Executive Producer Bill Owens resigned from 60 Minutes last month, citing a loss of editorial independence, we felt a chill of recognition. In 2011, one of us (Roman) resigned from Russia’s leading news organization, Gazeta.ru. The outlet had published an interactive project outlining falsified election results that had once again handed victory to Vladimir Putin’s United Russia party. Within hours, the calls started. Pressure from ownership. Questions about loyalty. A quiet but unmistakable order to stop. There was little choice but to leave.

In the week preceding Earth Day 2025, rumors of a new executive ​o​rder rippled across the nonprofit sector. No one knew the details, but “insiders” had shared the broad strokes of a document that would directly target nonprofit organizations​ and​ singl​e​ out those working on issues of climate and environment. ​O​rganizational leaders and executive teams across the country​ were shaken with alarm​. Emergency calls were held. Vacations were canceled. Panic set in.

Over the last century, millions have fled authoritarian regimes for the relative freedoms of the United States, but as authoritarianism arrives here, many Americans have found themselves unable to understand, accept, or push back against the new reality.

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Today, we bring you a conversation with two experts on life under authoritarianism: Tatyana Margolin and Yelena V Litvinov. Veterans of the Open Society Foundations, the George Soros-founded network promoting civil society across the globe, the pair now lead STROIKA, whose mission is to reverse the tide of rising authoritarianism by supporting resistance movements with fundraising and strategic advice, in the interest of building a resilient anti-authoritarian network.

As Donald Trump begins his second term, the nonprofit world is rightfully shoring up its defenses to protect immigrants, LGBTQI rights, reproductive freedoms, and basic civil liberties. Such efforts are crucial, but another tool of repression demands greater attention: the targeting of civil society itself, particularly by attacking the legal, financial, and communication infrastructure of nonprofits and their donors.

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Governments using this authoritarian playbook don’t need to shut down an organization or arrest activists to be successful. Audits, frivolous lawsuits, and endless paperwork can bring their work to a halt. They can be labeled foreign agents, terrorists, or extremists. Bank accounts can be frozen. Nonprofits can lose funding if their donors, intermediaries, and fiscal sponsors are targeted.

Reflecting on 2024, we are filled with both pride and a sense of urgency. As we approach STROIKA’s third anniversary, the importance of our mission — to build, resource, and connect anti-authoritarian movements globally — has never been more critical.

The US election outcome made clear that the lessons learned by our global partners are increasingly urgent and relevant for the United States.

In the final stretch of this tumultuous year, our message of hope remains as powerful as ever: it is possible to resist and preserve democratic space, even in the most seemingly impossible circumstances.

Explore our full end-of-year update, or click below for the text-only version.

Over the past year, STROIKA has worked closely with U.S. human rights and civil liberties groups, climate justice activists, and philanthropic donors to prepare for potential impacts of a Trump re-election.

What we’ve found is consistent: organizations, regardless of size, are woefully underprepared for potential targeting. This readiness gap is critical — and one we must address now.