To fight fascism we need opposition media with a backbone. Liberal Currents is that. Help us grow our voice.

If you find yourself frustrated with how our media ecosystem has facilitated the current disaster and how liberal media outlets have failed to rise to the occasion, contributing to this fund is an opportunity to make a difference.

“Liberal Currents is reclaiming the radical, vigorous legacy of liberalism, all but forgotten over the decades in an increasingly helpless and confused Democratic Party. We badly need that energy as part of the popular front against Donald Trump's fascism.” —Ryan Cooper, Senior Editor at The American Prospect and cohost of Left Anchor

“At a time when many liberals were chasing fashionable anti-woke nonsense, Liberal Currents took actual liberal principles of equal freedom seriously. Now, as the second Trump administration has vindicated the Liberal Currents approach, its work is more important than ever.” —Zack Beauchamp, Senior Correspondent at Vox

“Liberal Currents is raising funds to continue its work promoting a principled, humane liberalism: one that refuses to pick and choose whose freedom matters.” —Sharon Kuruvilla

“Liberal Currents is an important space for expansive progressive thought in a media environment saturated by center-right opinions. Most notably, they offer variety without ever sacrificing the humanity of any of their readers.” —Marisa Kabas, independent journalist at The Handbasket

“As we're continually hit with a barrage of disinformation, moral chaos, and political anxiety, Liberal Currents continues to be a sanctuary for honest dialogue, clear thought, and basic decency.” —Radley Balko, independent journalist at The Watch

"Liberal Currents is a rare publication which takes seriously the ideas that are foundational to liberalism and progressivism. It is especially vital in a moment like this one to be able to critically examine how we let ourselves get here, especially on the global level, and Liberal Currents does just that.” —Layla al-Sheikh, Palestinian-American writer

“The core values of liberalism—democracy, liberty, pluralism, rationalism—built the modern world, but many of our institutions have grown embarrassed of them. Liberal Currents has stepped into the breach to defend these vital ideas.” —Will Stancil

“Liberal Currents is an indispensable guide to understanding politics in the present and reimagining a broad-based, small-l liberalism for the future.” —Elizabeth Popp Berman, Professor of Organizational Studies and Sociology at the University of Michigan

“Indie media that’s a real outlet, with multiple contributors and a strong collective voice. Liberal Currents is a welcome influence on political discourse, unabashedly standing up for liberalism, and making it seem like something worth standing for.” —Nicholas Grossman, International Relations Professor at the University of Illinois

“At a time when most publications chase wherever the Overton Window shifts, we need ones like Liberal Currents that stay grounded in principles.” —Mike Masnick, Founder and Editor of Techdirt

“Liberal Currents is doing some of the most important intellectual work out there deconstructing the underpinnings of our ongoing slide into illiberalism. Deeply theoretical and creatively argued, it's finding new ways to fire up the liberal imagination with an eye toward explaining what a liberal future might really look like.” —Greg Sargent, staff writer at The New Republic and the host of the podcast The Daily Blast

Our mission

Since Trump's victory last year, we have seen a stampede of pundits, publications, and politicians rushing to sell out trans people, immigrants, universities, and their own integrity in a desperate hope that the authoritarian right might finally be appeased.

The country does not need another media organization trying to win back Trump’s base as loyal readers. It does need a media organization that steadfastly opposes the implementation of reactionary authoritarianism in America.

Liberal Currents is that media organization. We are liberals who mean it—liberals who do not bend with the political wind or this week’s poll result. And we need your help in order to increase our reach so we can compete with voices who are less than fully committed to, or who outright oppose, liberal values.

What is Liberal Currents?

Liberal Currents publishes writers of diverse perspectives who share an unflinching commitment to freedom, pluralism, and democracy, in opposition to authoritarianism at home and around the world. All our essays are free to the public. We are funded by readers and patrons who support our mission of advancing the liberal project in the face of reactionary opposition.

Since the election of Trump in 2024, the influence of Liberal Currents has surged. We have grown traffic to LiberalCurrents.com by 600 percent and our 2025 revenue will be ten times our 2024 revenue. Social media follows have gone from four thousand to over thirty thousand. An article by our editor-in-chief Adam Gurri was published by MSNBC, and associate editor Samantha Hancox-Li appeared on CNN to discuss an article she wrote for Foreign Policy. Contributing editors Toby Buckle and Alan Elrod consistently see large readership for their Liberal Currents essays. And our work is frequently cited in prominent sources, such as the newsletter written by Jamelle Bouie for the New York Times.

We are ready to take this momentum and push onto another level, and we know that there are many people beyond our current patrons who wish to support us. The Liberal Currents Startup Fund is how our readers and the broader community can help us become a major voice for change in this country.

How will the money be spent?

At present, nearly 100% of our funding goes straight to our writers. With every advancement in the scale of our funding, we have increased the fee we pay to writers. But in 2025, that isn’t enough. We need full-time staff to pursue our core mission as effectively as possible. And we need to make some major one-time investments to transform Liberal Currents into a fully professionalized organization.

If we meet our goal and are able to onboard some permanent staff, in addition to improving our core publication and raising the rate we pay our writers, we will expand in a few ways. First, we will be in a position to organize special issues that will be available in print. We have been planning the first of these for most of 2025. The desire to put ourselves in a position to commit the time and work required to make it happen was a key motivation for launching this fund.

Second, we will be expanding our video content. Right now, we have two podcasts which can be viewed or listened to. We have dabbled very lightly in short form video. With full-time staff, our first step would be to greatly expand our short form video content. We want to reach Americans where they are, and short-form video is rapidly becoming how many Americans consume their news. Other projects we don't have the resources for now but could potentially consider would include video essays and livestreams.

Samples of our work