The Trevor Project, known for its hotline for LGBTQ+ youth, received $45 million from billionaire and author MacKenzie Scott at the end of 2025, the organization said Monday.
The gift is the largest in the organization's history but also a major boon following years of management turmoil, layoffs and the loss of significant federal funding over the summer.
“I literally could not believe it and it took some time. I actually gasped,” said Jaymes Black, CEO of The Trevor Project, when they were notified of Scott's gift.
Scott, whose fortune largely comes from her ex-husband Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, gave more than $7 billion to nonprofits in 2025, but this gift to The Trevor Project was not included among the donations she disclosed on her website in December. Scott previously gave The Trevor Project $6 million in 2020.
In July, the Trump administration stopped providing specific support for gay, trans and gender nonconforming young people who called the 988 National Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. The Trevor Project was one of the organizations staffing that option and lost $25 million in funding, the nonprofit said.
The Trevor Project continues to run an independent hotline for LGBTQ+ young people that Black said reaches about 250,000 young people annually, but they served another 250,000 callers through the 988 Press 3 option, which was tailored for LGBTQ+ young people.
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services reported more than 1.5 million contacts were routed through the 988 service between Sept. 2022 and July 2025.
Since the program's end, The Trevor Project's hotline has become even more central to mental health support for queer young people, said Scott Bertani, director of advocacy at the National Coalition for LGBTQ Health.
"Their services fill a gap that generic crisis lines simply aren’t designed to meet, particularly for young people facing identity-based stress, isolation or rejection,” Bertani said in a statement.
The Trevor Project has faced internal turmoil after its budget grew from around $4 million in 2016 to over $83 million in 2023, according to its public tax returns. The nonprofit's board removed its CEO in 2022 and has gone through a series of layoffs, including in July. Black said the project's 2026 budget was $47 million.
“We are a smaller organization than we were before,” Black said. “And we will continue to be really intentional and really mindful around growth and what growth really means for the organization.”
After it lost the 988 funding, The Trevor Project launched an emergency fundraiser that brought in $20 million to date, Black said, which they also hope Scott saw as proof they would make it through this period.
“MacKenzie Scott’s folks were clear, like this gift was made for long-term impact,” Black said, adding that they would take their time deciding how to use the funds.
Thad Calabrese, a professor at New York University who researches nonprofit financial management, said it's not uncommon for nonprofits that grow very quickly to run into financial problems. But he also said the cuts and general instability in especially federal funding for nonprofits has upended many organizations' business models.
“Academic research has often viewed public funding as very stable, as a signal to donors that you’ve arrived as an organization, but the reality is you are now also open to changing political fortunes,” he said.
He said research is also unclear whether diversifying an organization's revenue streams is always a better financial strategy.
“You’re less dependent upon a few funders, but on the other hand, if you have a lot of different revenue streams, do you have the management capacity for that?” Calabrese asked, speaking generally and not commenting specifically on The Trevor Project.
Scott has distinguished herself among the biggest individual donors by giving large, unrestricted gifts to nonprofits, often with a focus on equity or social justice. With the exception of an open call in 2023, she does not ask for project proposals nor accept applications.
Despite the size of her gifts, which now often exceed the recipient organization's annual budget, research from the Center for Effective Philanthropy has found that concerns about nonprofits misusing Scott’s funds or growing unsustainably have largely not been born out.
Elisha Smith Arrillaga, vice president of research at the Center for Effective Philanthropy, said that's likely because of the vigorous vetting that Scott's team, the members of which are largely unknown, does before making gifts.
She also said just like an investor might double down on a for-profit startup that's struggling, some funders may still believe in an organization's potential despite setbacks.
“People make all different kinds of investments because they really believe in the outcomes that organization can make and what their gifts can do to help accelerate that,” Smith Arrillaga said.
In an essay announcing her 2025 gifts, Scott said, “The potential of peaceful, non-transactional contribution has long been underestimated, often on the basis that it is not financially self-sustaining, or that some of its benefits are hard to track. But what if these imagined liabilities are actually assets? ... What if the fact that some of our organizations are vulnerable can itself be a powerful engine for our generosity?”
Black called Scott's second gift “a powerful validation,” of The Trevor Project's mission and impact, saying, “We’re calling this our turnaround story.”
Associated Press coverage of philanthropy and nonprofits receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. For all of AP’s philanthropy coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/philanthropy.
FILE - Billionaire philanthropist MacKenzie Scott arrives at the Vanity Fair Oscar Party, March 4, 2018, in Beverly Hills, Calif. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP, File)
Iran eased some restrictions on its people and, for the first time in days, allowed them to make phone calls abroad via their mobile phones on Tuesday. It did not ease restrictions on the internet or permit texting services to be restored as the death toll from days of bloody protests against the state rose to at least 2,000 people, according to activists.
Although Iranians were able to call abroad, people outside the country could not call them, several people in the capital told The Associated Press.
The witnesses, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal, said SMS text messaging still was down and internet users inside Iran could not access anything abroad, although there were local connections to government-approved websites.
It was unclear if restrictions would ease further after authorities cut off all communications inside the country and to the outside world late Thursday.
Here is the latest:
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen says the new sanctions will be imposed on Iranian officials over the crackdown on protestors.
“The rising number of casualties in Iran is horrifying. I unequivocally condemn the excessive use of force and continued restriction of freedom,” von der Leyen said in a post on social media.
She said that in cooperation with EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas “further sanctions on those responsible for the repression will be swiftly proposed. We stand with the people of Iran who are bravely marching for their liberty.”
The EU has already imposed sanctions on members of the Revolutionary Guard Corps and others over past concerns about human rights abuses in Iran.
Kaja Kallas said in Berlin Tuesday that the Iranian government might go the way of former President Bashar Assad’s government in Syria, which fell swiftly in late 2024 in a “surprise for everybody.” But she added that “very often these regimes are very, very resilient.”
Kallas said that “right now … it is not clear whether the regime is going to fall or not.” She said it would ultimately have to be up to the Iranian people to make decisions.
The U.S.-based Human Rights Activists News Agency, which has been accurate in previous unrest in recent years, gave the latest death toll on Tuesday.
It said 1,847 of the dead were protesters and 135 were government-affiliated.
This came a day after the European Parliament announced it would ban Iranian diplomats and representatives.
“Iran does not seek enmity with the EU, but will reciprocate any restriction,” Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi wrote Tuesday on X.
He also criticized the European Parliament for not taking any significant action against Israel for the more than two-year war in Gaza that has killed more than 71,400 Palestinians, while banning Iranian diplomats after just “a few days of violent riots.”
Dutch Foreign Minister David van Weel said he summoned Iran’s ambassador to the Netherlands “to formally protest the excessive violence against peaceful protesters, large-scale arbitrary arrests, and internet shutdowns, calling for immediate restoration of internet access inside the Islamic Republic.
In a post on X, Weel also said the Dutch government supports EU sanctions against “human rights violators in Iran.”
The United Nations human rights chief is calling on Iranian authorities to immediately halt violence and repression against peaceful protesters, citing reports of hundreds killed and thousands arrested in a wave of demonstrations in recent weeks.
“The killing of peaceful demonstrators must stop, and the labelling of protesters as ‘terrorists’ to justify violence against them is unacceptable,” U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk said in a statement Tuesday.
Alluding to a wave of protests in Iran in 2022, Türk said demonstrators have sought “fundamental changes” to governance in the country, “and once again, the authorities’ reaction is to inflict brutal force to repress legitimate demands for change.”
“This cycle of horrific violence cannot continue,” he added.
It was also “extremely worrying” to hear some public statements from judicial officials mentioning the prospect of the use of the death penalty against protesters through expedited judicial proceedings, Türk said.
“Iranians have the right to demonstrate peacefully. Their grievances need to be heard and addressed, and not instrumentalized by anyone,” Türk said.
Finland’s foreign minister says she is summoning the Iranian ambassador after authorities in Tehran restricted internet access.
“Iran’s regime has shut down the internet to be able to kill and oppress in silence," Elina Valtonen wrote in a social media post Tuesday, adding, “this will not be tolerated. We stand with the people of Iran — women and men alike.”
Finland is “exploring measures to help restore freedom to the Iranian people” together with the European Union, Valtonen said.
Separately, Finnish police said they believe at least two people entered the courtyard of the Iranian embassy in Helsinki without permission Monday afternoon and tore down the Iranian flag. The embassy’s outer wall was also daubed with paint.
Iranian security forces arrested what a state television report described as “terrorist groups” linked to Israel in the southeastern city of Zahedan.
The report, without providing additional details, said the group entered through Iran’s eastern borders and carried U.S.-made guns and explosives that the group had planned to use in assassinations and acts of sabotage.
The Israeli military did not immediately comment on the allegations.
The Nobel Peace Prize laureate hailed people who have “long warned about this repression, at great personal risk.”
“The protests in Iran cannot be separated from the long-standing, state-imposed restrictions on girls’ and women’s autonomy, in all aspects of public life including education. Iranian girls, like girls everywhere, demand a life with dignity,” Yousafzai wrote on X.
“(Iran’s) future must be driven by the Iranian people, and include the leadership of Iranian women and girls — not external forces or oppressive regimes,” she added.
Yousafzai was awarded the peace prize in 2014 at the age of 17 for her fight for girls’ education in her home country, Pakistan. She is the youngest Nobel laureate.
The French Foreign Ministry said it has “reconfigured” its embassy in Tehran after reports that the facility's nonessential staff left Iran earlier this week.
The embassy's nonessential staff left the country Sunday and Monday, French news agency Agence France-Presse reported.
The ambassador remained on site and the embassy continued to function, the ministry said late Monday night.
Associated Press writer Angela Charlton contributed from Paris.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said he believes the Iranian government is in its “final days and weeks,” as he renewed a call for Iranian authorities to end violence against demonstrators immediately.
“If a regime can only keep itself in power by force, then it’s effectively at the end,” Merz said Tuesday during a visit to Bengaluru, India. “I believe we are now seeing the final days and weeks of this regime. In any case, it has no legitimacy through elections in the population. The population is now rising up against this regime.”
Merz said he hoped there is “a possibility to end this conflict peacefully," adding that Germany is in close contact with the U.S. and European governments.
The Israeli military said it continues to be “on alert for surprise scenarios” due to the ongoing protests in Iran, but has not made any changes to guidelines for civilians, as it does prior to a concrete threat.
“The protests in Iran are an internal matter,” Israeli military spokesperson Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin wrote on X.
Israel attacked Iran’s nuclear program over the summer, resulting in a 12-day war that killed nearly 1,200 Iranians and almost 30 Israelis. Over the past week, Iran has threatened to attack Israel if Israel or the U.S. attacks.
Mobile phones in Iran were able to call abroad Tuesday after a crackdown on nationwide protests in which the internet and international calls were cut. Several people in Tehran were able to call The Associated Press.
The AP bureau in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, was unable to call those numbers back.
Witnesses said the internet remained cut off from the outside world. Iran cut off the internet and calls on Thursday as protests intensified.
This frame grab from videos taken between Jan. 9 and Jan. 11, 2026, and circulating on social media purportedly shows images from a morgue with dozens of bodies and mourners after crackdownon the outskirts of Iran's capital, in Kahrizak, Tehran Province. (UGC via AP)
This frame grab from videos taken between Jan. 9 and Jan. 11, 2026, and circulating on social media purportedly shows images from a morgue with dozens of bodies and mourners after crackdown on the outskirts of Iran's capital, in Kahrizak, Tehran Province. (UGC via AP)
This frame grab from videos taken between Jan. 9 and Jan. 11, 2026, and circulating on social media purportedly shows images from a morgue with dozens of bodies and mourners after crackdown on the outskirts of Iran's capital, in Kahrizak, Tehran Province. (UGC via AP)
Protesters hold up placards and flags as they demonstrate outside the Iranian Embassy in London, Monday, Jan. 12, 2026. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant)
Shiite Muslims hold placards and chant slogans during a protest against the U.S. and show solidarity with Iran in Lahore, Pakistan, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)
Activists carrying a photograph of Reza Pahlavi take part in a rally supporting protesters in Iran at Lafayette Park, across from the White House, in Washington, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
Protesters burn the Iranian national flag during a rally in support of the nationwide mass demonstrations in Iran against the government in Paris, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Michel Euler)
People attend a rally in Frankfurt, Germany, Monday, Jan. 12, 2026. (Boris Roessler/dpa via AP)
A picture of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is set alight by protesters outside the Iranian Embassy in London, Monday, Jan. 12, 2026. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant)
