„SOROSAID” - Part 1

$800 MILLION, 1846 GRANTEES
“SOROSAID”: EUROPE IS PERMEATED BY THE OPEN SOCIETY NETWORK

According to figures declared by Open Society Foundations (OSF), the network provided a total of $1.4 billion, equaling over HUF 538 billion at current exchange rates, in grants to organizations operating in Europe and the post-Soviet sphere between 2016 and 2023. Comprehensive research carried out by the Center for Fundamental Rights confirms that the volume of funding increased steadily during this period, almost doubling in the year following the outbreak of the war between Russia and Ukraine. Although Open Society has disclosed transparent data including reference to grantees on only part of the total sum ($781 million, corresponding to about HUF 300 billion), it can be concluded that a significant share of these funds were funneled into lobbying activity and the exertion of political pressure.
Grant recipients’ ideological profile reflects a clear pattern of political affiliation, with the majority of beneficiaries engaged in identity politics, human rights fundamentalism, gender and abortion issues, “media freedom”, and migration-related matters. Among the most generously funded recipients of the network of nearly 2,000 entities are notorious globalist organizations including the European Council on Foreign Relations, the CEU, Transparency International, and Helsinki Committees operating in multiple European countries. This means that while the Trump administration’s recent move to dismantle the USAID program, which has promoted woke ideology instead of providing international aid, will certainly take a serious toll on the political machine championing Open Society causes, a complete drying up of financial resources is far from likely.
Over the past decades, the Open Society network has constructed a political machine of almost unimaginable dimensions, operating in parallel with and often at the expense of democratically elected structures, in order to gain and retain control of both formal and informal levers of power. Prior to President Trump’s re-election, its financing was provided partly by the U.S. Democratic deep state through various channels, one of them being the now defunct USAID. While organizations promoting migration, gender ideology, woke insanity or identity politics no longer receive support from USAID, this does not mean that they are suddenly left without funding. Indeed, the Open Society Foundations (OSF), established by George Soros, spent $781 million (HUF 300 billion) between 2016 and 2023 to bankroll 1,846 “non-governmental organizations” in pursuit of its political agenda. Data put forward in our analysis outlines the specific political objectives for which millions of dollars have been spent to lubricate the decision-making machine in Brussels and capitals across Europe.

Graph 1: Funding provided by OSF in Europe, 2016-2023 (in millions of dollars)

The Soros empire’s strategy of influence-building is based on encirclement. OSF first expanded its operations in the broader European region, resulting in a network of thousands of organizations. Subsequently, they occupied the continent’s decision-making hubs before gaining a foothold in NGOs registered in Brussels, the symbolic center of European politics. The cost of this strategy of encirclement is enormous: OSF transferred an average of HUF 100 million each day to its partners just to represent what the Open Society network demanded. Additionally, the volume of grants increased almost year on year, with total financial contributions made by OSF in 2023 rising to almost three times the 2016 figure. In fact, the combined value of transfers almost doubled from 2022 to 2023, which is particularly interesting given the outbreak of the war in Ukraine.
Grant recipient organizations share a highly similar profile, with the majority engaged in the promotion of identity politics, human rights fundamentalism, gender and abortion issues, “media freedom”, and migration-related matters. The Open Society network also supports a system of manipulation that seeks to undermine state sovereignty, relax immigration rules, and explicitly pushes the transgender agenda and gender ideology as a whole.
A good example of promoting the pro-war narrative is the Soros-funded European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR), which is the second most generously funded recipient of OSF grants with $29 million in support. In a report published in February 2024, the ECFR argues that it is necessary to prevent “Trump – and Putin – from posing as the ‘party of peace’ in a conflict whose outcome is still far from decided.”1 The top 30 grantees include a number of organizations engaged in the field of abortion, migration, and LGBTQ issues, such as the CEU (4th), the Helsinki Committee (8th), the Civil Liberties Union for Europe (9th), and Transparency International (18th), which has ranked Hungary worst for the third year running on its heavily manipulated index.
 

Table 1: The top 30 grantees having received the most support from OSF, together with total funding

#	Recipient organization	Funding in USD	Funding in HUF
1	Roma Education Fund	33,115,768	12,812,838,354
2	European Council on Foreign Relations	29,202,849	11,298,888,908
3	Roma Foundation for Europe	20,230,213	7,824,914,892
4	Central European University	19,718,703	7,627,066,148
5	American University of Central Asia	14,963,533	5,785,949,305
6	Institute for HumanSciences	13,464,307	5,206,243,587
7	Solidarity Now	10,299,087	3,982,347,970
8	Helsinki Committees	9,897,244	3,826,967,337
9	Civil Liberties Unionfor Europe	8,479,437	2,378,743,904
10	International Partnership for Human Rights	8,237,870	3,185,337,192
11	Network of European Foundations for Innovative Cooperation	8,124,500	3,141,500,415
12	Carnegie Endowment for International Peace	7,186,692	2,779,798,092
13	Roma Education Fund Romania Foundation	7,100,000	2,746,514,300
14	Foundation Roma for Democracy	6,475,045	2,504,761,082
15	More in Common	6,100,000	2,359,681,300
16	Democracy Development Foundation	5,920,500	2,290,244,776
17	Civil Rights Defenders	5,559,972	2,150,780,648
18	Transparency International	5,536,716	2,140,898,585
19	European Roma Institute for Arts and Culture	4,456,037	1,723,029,194
20	UK-EU Open PolicyLtd.	4,429,729	1,712,856,601
21	Stanislaw Brzozowski Association	4,299,068	1,662,333,520
22	European Climate Foundation	4,237,715	1,638,609,972
23	CAPS Unlock	3,997,500	1,545,725,317
24	The GermanMarshall Fund of the United States(GMF)	3,981,537	1,539,644,431
25	Roma Entrepreneurship Development Initiative Association	3,630,435	1,403,874,692
26	EurasiaNet, Inc.	3,455,670	1,336,293,766
27	Sponsorship Association of German Council on Foreign Relations	3,410,069	1,318,660,042
28	Civil College Foundation	3,337,859	1,290,736,723
29	Municipality of the Capital Cityof Budapest	3,322,784	1,284,907,281
30	Civil Society Foundation	3,304,000	1,277,825,284
Total		265,474,839	102,677,973,618

Despite previous statements by George Soros to the contrary, OSF maintains an active presence in Central Europe, spending a record amount of money – double the sum afforded in 2022 – on operation in the first year since the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine war. In the coming weeks, the Center for Fundamental Rights will disclose further details on how these grants have fallen on fertile ground, together with information on the funding of Hungary-based organizations and the undermining of the country’s EU advocacy.