Who We Are
We focus on building a deeper and broader pro-democracy movement, with organizations led by working-class people from diverse backgrounds at the center. This movement aims to challenge the structural flaws in our system and forge a truly representative democracy.
Who We Are
At the Freedom Together Foundation (formerly The JPB Foundation), we believe that protecting and expanding multiracial democracy is the defining challenge of our time. Philanthropy has a crucial role to play in this work.
Our President
Meet Deepak Bhargava
Deepak Bhargava is President of the Freedom Together Foundation, leading its mission to support people who have been denied power to build it, so they can change unjust systems and create a more democratic, inclusive, and sustainable society. Before assuming the presidency in February 2024, he spent many years as a foundation grantee and board member, most recently as vice chair of the board.
Deepak brings over 30 years of expertise in social justice movements as a leader, campaigner, and strategist. Before becoming Freedom Together’s President, he led the grassroots organization Community Change for 16 years, working to strengthen the community organizing field and launch coalitions that won major policy victories on issues such as poverty, health care, and immigration. Deepak also served as a distinguished lecturer at the CUNY School of Labor and Urban Studies and a Senior Fellow at the Roosevelt Institute.
Deepak has trained and mentored hundreds of leaders who have played key roles in progressive organizations and social justice movements. At CUNY, he co-founded a new institute, Leadership for Democracy and Social Justice, that trains and supports early and mid-career activists working for social change, especially people of color, women, LGBTQ+ people, and people from working-class backgrounds.
He also served on the boards of numerous organizations, including the Leadership Conference for Civil and Human Rights, the Open Society Foundations (US), and 350.org, where he was Board Chair. He currently serves on the board of the Democracy Fund.
Deepak is the co-author, with Stephanie Luce, of Practical Radicals: Seven Strategies to Change the World (New Press, 2023) and co-editor, with Ruth Milkman and Penny Lewis, of Immigration Matters: Movements, Visions, and Strategies for a Progressive Future (New Press, 2021). While he was a Fellow at the Roosevelt Institute, he co-authored, with Rich Stolz, The Statue of Liberty Plan: A Progressive Vision for Migration in the Age of Climate Change, and, with Shahrzad Shams and Harry Hanbury, The Death of “Deliverism” (published in Democracy Journal) and The Cultural Contradictions of Neoliberalism: The Longing for an Alternative Order and the Future of Multiracial Democracy in an Age of Authoritarianism.
He has written extensively about community organizing, public policy related to poverty and economic justice, progressive strategy, civic engagement, and racial justice, among many other topics, for The New York Times, The Guardian, USA Today, The Nation, The American Prospect, Huffington Post, and Democracy Journal, and he has been featured in major news outlets such as National Journal, The Washington Post, Politico, National Public Radio, and MSNBC.
Our History
The Freedom Together Foundation began as The JPB Foundation, which was founded in 2012 by Barbara Picower.
Under Barbara’s decade of leadership as president and chair of the board, the foundation had a massive impact on the crucial issues of poverty, the environment, and medical research. From 2012 through 2023, the foundation made 3,900 grants totaling $2.7 billion.
In April of 2023, Barbara announced that she would step down as president the following year and would be succeeded by Deepak Bhargava, who was then a JPB board member and former CEO of Community Change, a longtime grantee of the foundation.
Under Deepak’s leadership, The JPB Foundation was renamed the Freedom Together Foundation in 2024.
“While we have changed our name, we will continue to honor the pillars of the foundation’s success since its founding. We will continue to practice philanthropy with both patience and a fierce sense of urgency, and develop deep partnerships with the communities we seek to support.”
– President Deepak Bhargava
To learn more about the foundation’s history and lessons from the first decade, read our retrospective report “Beyond the Grant: A Decade of Philanthropy at The JPB Foundation.”