From Anticipation to Reality: Political Impact Report 2026

Research Overview:

In January 2025, AFG launched its Political Impact Project — the first effort of its kind to track how the current federal administration is affecting the girl and gender-expansive youth-serving sector in California. The first survey captured a sector in anxious anticipation: bracing for cuts, uncertain about the future, but still largely intact. At that time, in February 2025, 62% of responding organizations said they were feeling the impact of the political environment.

One year later, that number is 93%.

Our 2026 report documents a crisis that arrived faster and hit harder than organizations planned for — and one that is not random. The losses follow a clear pattern: the organizations doing the most visible equity work are bearing the steepest consequences, while philanthropy has largely failed to fill the gap. The human cost is being absorbed by those who can least afford it — staff running on empty, youth carrying adult burdens, and immigrant families navigating a system shaped by fear. And yet the organizations in this network are still here, still holding their missions, and still showing up for the young people who depend on them.

Key findings:

In 2025, organizations serving girls and gender-expansive youth were bracing. They anticipated political headwinds, funding uncertainty, and increased community need. What they could not have anticipated was the speed. In one year, uncertainty became a confirmed loss. Anticipated cuts became real closures. And a factor that didn’t appear in the 2025 survey at all — immigration enforcement — had by 2026 become inseparable from every other indicator we tracked. Community-based organizations fill gaps in essential services young people and their families, particularly those that are hardest to reach, need to thrive, and many organizations found themselves managing immigration-related fear and disruption as a constant backdrop to everything else their organization, the youth, and communities they serve are expected to navigate daily. What we captured is likely an undercount of the actual damage.

• 93% of surveyed organizations said they were negatively impacted by the current political climate in 2026, compared with 62% in 2025;

• 84% reported known funding loss, with foundation and federal funding accounting for the largest shares in reported losses;

•  14% of organizations are considering closure;

• Organizations reported more than $113 million in documented funding losses;

• 65% reported staff morale being significantly or severely impacted, while 56% reported significant effects on retention and burnout;

• 63% of organizations need team resilience coaching but cannot access it — only 21% currently have it;

• 84% reported their communities have been experiencing heightened anxiety due to immigration enforcement, and 40% are now actively providing or connecting people to  immigration services — work many had never taken on before;

• 63% reported higher anxiety among the young people they serve, while 53% report their youth feeling less safe;

• At the same time, 42% of organizations also report increased youth activism — up from 23% in 2025.

Despite these challenges, organizations serving girls and gender-expansive youth are not standing still. Even as the pressures mount, these organizations are making deliberate choices about where to put their energy.

• The top strategy for organizations remains creating safe spaces for their young people (61%)

• 40% reported including political education and 35% include civic engagement and advocacy in their work with young people, both up 15 points compared to 2025;

Three themes arose from the survey and interview data about the bright spots that participating organizations have observed over the past year: relationships with community are holding, coalition work is generating wins, and youth are exercising their power to shape what is invested in their communities when given the structure and resources.

Recommendations:

Girls and gender-expansive youth need structural support to advance meaningful systems change, not just maintain essential services. AFG is calling on funders, partners, advocates, girls’ champions, and the public to act now to keep this ecosystem intact and protect the young people depending on it.

Funder and donor support can make a significant difference in the lives of girls and gender-expansive youth:

• Move funds to general operating support now.

• Center girls and gender-expansive youth of color explicitly in funding priorities.

• Fund intersectional work that doesn’t force organizations to fragment a young person’s identity to qualify for support.

• Provide emergency funding to organizations at risk of closure. The loss of even one anchor organization in a community is a loss that can take years, sometimes decades, to recover from.

• Protect advocacy organizations from disproportionate cuts.

• Fund resilience, coaching, and leadership support alongside programs.

• For partners and peer organizations:

  • Coordinate across organizations to share resources, data, legal insight, and message discipline, and build coalitions intentionally.

  • Name the crisis clearly and document what communities and staff are experiencing.

  • Invest in internal culture. 

• For policymakers and public leaders:

  • Recognize that attacks on equity, immigration, health, and youth-serving infrastructure are producing compounding harm.

  • Invest in the community organizations already holding the line for young people.

• For community members and advocates:

  • Amplify the report’s findings.

  • Support organizations serving girls and gender-expansive youth with visibility, donations, and public solidarity.