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2025: A year of mission statement edits?

Published about 1 month agoΒ β€’Β 2 min read

Hi friends πŸ‘‹πŸ»

Back in February, I wrote an email sharing my thoughts on the question of whether nonprofit orgs should try to remove DEI-related keywords from their websites in response to the Trump administration's order to eradicate β€œillegal” diversity, equity and inclusion efforts.

Recently nonprofit newsroom ProPublica released analysis of nonprofit electronic tax filings to the IRS in 2025, to compare mission statement language from their most recent filing to the 2024 version. Let's take a quick look at the takeaways ...

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First, a reminder πŸ‘‡πŸ»

Fundraising Breakthrough Summit
(Free Registration)

Join me and 24 other speakers for this free online learning event, January 5-18, 2026. Start the new year with expert insights to grow donations, deepen supporter relationships, and create lasting financial stability in 2026.

ProPublica covers the DEI retreat

You can take a look at the email I sent back in February here (or the shorter LinkedIn post version).

Last week, ProPublica shared some examples of the changes nonprofit organizations have made to their mission statements in the past ten months. You can read the full story here (complete with animated mission statement changes).

The analysis reveals three "strategies" organizations have used as mission statements are edited:

  1. Don't name the disadvantaged racial groups
  2. Don't acknowledge the past
  3. Gloss over the details – and meaning

Here's an example:

As I wrote back in February, it sucks that organizations have to make these choices. And if equity-focused work is truly woven into your programming, there's probably no hiding that.

Editing some trigger words in your mission statement might just save you from the first (probably AI-powered) pass of IRS 990 forms to identify organizations that could be targeted.

The full article is worth reading as your organization reflects on 2025, and prepares those IRS 990 submissions.

Until next time ✨

β€” Ed Harris (your digital strategy guide)

​

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Ed Harris

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