The election is over. The refrigerator at the food bank is still running, and someone has to pay for the electricity.  This is worth remembering before we send the next email or postal mail appeal.

Democrats have overwhelmingly won both chambers of Congress and some nonprofit leaders are already talking about restoring federal funding and repairing the relationship between government and the organizations that do so much of its work.  There is reason for hope.  There’s also November’s payroll.   The new congressional terms begin January 3. Trump remains president and money that was cut does not return because someone changes the name outside a committee room. It takes decisions, legislation, administration, time.

Meanwhile, people need things.  Food, a place to sleep, a lawyer, a clinic appointment. Nonprofits need someone who answers the telephone and knows what to do next.  This election may change what becomes possible, I personally hope so.  But,  it has not yet changed what those things cost.  For fundraisers, this creates a problem we should face squarely. Some donors may feel they can stand down. Afterall, they voted, they gave, they watched the returns. Perhaps now someone else will take care of it.

Do You Still Need Me?

We don’t have evidence yet that this is happening. Ten days after an election, anyone selling a confident forecast of donor behavior should include a crystal ball and instructions for returning it.  But we must prepare for the question beneath that possible relief.  Do you still need me? Our answer needs to be better than simply another announcement that everything is terrible.

M+R’s 2026 Benchmarks study found that average online revenue increased 15 percent in 2025—the year the cuts from the OBBA, damage from DOGE and other administration actions hit. Hunger and poverty organizations, and public media organizations, each saw average increases of 37 percent. Among organizations receiving government funding, two thirds reported receiving less government money than the year before.

Those numbers don’t  mean private giving replaced every public dollar lost.  They tell us that when the Trump administration cut funding donors rallied and showed up.  Now, in this period when the post-election excitement and expectations are far greater than the than the months before a new Democratic Congress convenes and can take action, we have to decide how to treat them.   We can keep pulling the alarm, or change the subject line, move the deadline, and find another photograph that looks sufficiently desperate.  Or we can tell someone what their money helped make possible,  what remains undone and where they fit in the work ahead.

This requires knowing something about the donor beyond the fact that a credit card cleared.  It also requires remembering that donors did not all vote the same way.  The Chronicle of Philanthropy reported this week on the Food Bank of Central & Eastern North Carolina. The organization adapted digital appeals to donors’ political affinities. Its digital revenue rose 67 percent year over year.  That result doesn’t prove political segmentation caused the increase, but It does offer something worth considering. Democrats supplied 60 percent of revenue attributed to paid social advertising that retargeted previous donors. Republicans and unaffiliated donors supplied 40 percent, a considerable amount of generosity coming from people who might disagree about almost everything else.

The same report described the Chesapeake Bay Foundation taking another approach. It builds messages around shared values and what supporters say matters to them, rather than party affiliation.  Clean water gives people somewhere to begin, so does a hungry neighbor.  Before buying a political label for everyone in the database, we might try listening. Ask what brought them to us, actually read their replies. Notice the place they live, the organization’s work they support, the reason they stayed.   Keep the facts straight. A funding cut is a funding cut. We do not need separate versions of reality for separate lists.  We do need to stop confusing our reasons for giving with theirs.

Then there is the matter of what we ask for now.  “Help us bridge the gap” is a start. But which gap? How much money? For how long? What happens if we raise it?   A foundation considering a bridge grant deserves those answers. So does the person deciding whether to send $20.  Show the actual shortfall. Name the service  that will be affected and explain the period the money raised will cover. Keep hoped-for government funding “hopeful” not done or in hand,  If a monthly gift would help keep that service dependable, explain why. Dependability is a decent thing to offer someone who has spent a year being told by other nonprofits and politicians the roof is falling in.

And thank the people who helped hold your organization up.  A donor who joined because something frightened her may stay because she learns that she belongs. Doing this takes more than a tax receipt. It takes evidence that somebody noticed her gift and can explain its use. Before asking her to rescue the organization again, let her see the work she joined. There should be room in this relationship for something besides fear and another appeal.

The same obligation applies even more to civic and advocacy organizations. Their work continues after the photographs, news clips, social media videos, and reports have been filed away. Staff still need salaries, communities still need people who know them. Legal help and local relationships cannot be switched off until the next campaign.   Foundations should ask whether their support lasts as long as the work requires.  Nonprofits should ask whether their donor relationships do.

Please don’t write an election story to explain a fundraising problem you have not examined.  For now, there is a simpler piece of work:  Tell the truth about what changed with this mid-term election tsunami and what has not.  Then d give the donor something useful to help with.  The people waiting for our help should not have to wait for us to find a new emergency or a new election cycle.

Roger