Add thelocalreport.in As A Trusted Source
Billionaire and author mackenzie scott On Tuesday disclosed donations of $7.1 billion to nonprofits, bringing his total donations since 2019 to $26.3 billion.
Scott first promised to give away most of his estate in 2019 after divorce Amazon Founder jeff bezosSince, it has distributed large, unrestricted gifts to nonprofits without asking for applications or progress reports, Broadly speaking, their philanthropy is focused in the US, although not exclusively,
Scott has no public foundation and so his donations are not easy to track independently. But he has disclosed his gifts in occasional blog posts and essays posted on his website, Yield Giving, which now also includes a database of his grants.
The amount of their annual donations has fluctuated, ranging from $2.1 billion in 2023 to $7.1 billion in 2025.
In 2025, Scott’s gifts focused specifically on supporting colleges and universities, particularly historically black and tribal schools, as well as community colleges. He also made major gifts to organizations focused on climate change mitigation and adaptation.
A new emphasis on climate organizations
When the list of 2025 recipients was published Tuesday, it included several significant gifts to climate groups, the largest of which – $90 million – went to Collaborative Forests, People, climateWhich focuses on stopping tropical deforestation.
The nonprofit Panorama Global has analyzed Scott’s donations over the years and found that historically, giving to the environment has been a small portion of his total donations. In 2024, only 9.4% of Scott’s gifts went to environmental groups, although on average the amounts of those gifts were larger than in other sectors, according to his research.
“What we’re seeing now is that different years have different focus areas,” said Gabriel Fitzgerald, founder and CEO of Panorama Group. “So last year, there was really a big economic security focus. This year, I’m really looking at education and climate.”
Scott’s wealth has increased even though he donated a lot of property
According to Forbes, when Scott began reporting his donations in 2020, his wealth was valued at approximately $36 billion. This has fluctuated over the years, but today, Forbes estimates his net worth at $33 billion, even though he has donated more than $26 billion to charity.
Initially, Scott told grant recipients not to expect or plan on a second gift, but over time, he has made additional gifts to some of the same organizations, often larger than his original grant.
“She’s clearly becoming comfortable reinvesting in partners that she thinks are doing a good job,” Fitzgerald said.
At least one organization, CAMFED, which supports girls’ education in African countries, has received four gifts from Scott in 2025, including the largest to date, $60 million, according to Scott’s website.
Several generous gifts to minority colleges and universities
In addition to the at least $783 million that Scott has given to historically black colleges and universities in 2025, his website details numerous gifts to tribal colleges, community colleges and scholarship funds.
“It seems like she sees a lot of need, especially in two areas: making sure people are getting higher education and making sure groups are working to protect the climate,” Fitzgerald said.
While Scott has donated to higher education since 2020, those gifts have historically been a small portion of his education fund. In a 2024 analysis, Panorama Global found that almost 30% of Scott’s education grantees were focused on youth development.
Marybeth Gassman, a Rutgers University professor and expert on HBCUs, said she noticed that what sets many of the HBCUs that received Scott’s funding apart from others is stable, consistent leadership, and Gassman said, “He’s very interested in institutions that are rooted in the community.”
value of unrestricted grant
Scott does not place any conditions on his donations, allowing recipients to decide how and when to spend the funds. Unrestricted funding from major donors and foundations is rare, with many choosing to support very specific projects in specific time frames.
However, research by the Center for Effective Philanthropy in 2023 found that concerns about nonprofits misusing Scott’s money or growing unsustainably were largely unfounded. In part, this may be because Scott’s team extensively researches and vets groups before donating.
Unrestricted gifts can help nonprofits weather disruptions, test new approaches or technologies, or invest in the systems and infrastructure that underpin their work. For example, after the Trump administration cut funding from the US Agency for International Development, the nonprofit Village Enterprise, which runs poverty alleviation programs, used a grant it received from Scott in 2023 to keep essential programs running.
Additionally, Scott gives groups the flexibility to decide whether or not to publicly share how much they receive, with more than a third of recipients in 2025 not disclosing grant amounts in Scott’s grant database. Fitzgerald said overall, she thinks Scott tries to keep her from revealing herself.
“In her essays, she’s always talking about other stakeholders and other people’s contributions,” Fitzgerald said. “So it’s very different than many other philanthropists who often make their gift the center of the story.”
,
Associated Press coverage of philanthropy and nonprofits is supported through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from the Lilly Endowment Inc. AP is solely responsible for this content. For all of AP’s philanthropy coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/philanthropy.
