Paul Di Donato (he/him/his)
President and CEO - New York, NY
Paul Di Donato (he/him/his) has been President and CEO of the Proteus Fund and Proteus Action League since 2016. For over thirty years, he has been a social justice activist, lobbyist, litigator, funder and nonprofit executive working across many progressive issues and movements.
At Proteus Fund, Paul oversees a wide range of dynamic progr...
Paul Di Donato (he/him/his) has been President and CEO of the Proteus Fund and Proteus Action League since 2016. For over thirty years, he has been a social justice activist, lobbyist, litigator, funder and nonprofit executive working across many progressive issues and movements.
At Proteus Fund, Paul oversees a wide range of dynamic programming—from Donor Collaboratives and Donor Advised Funds to Fiscally Sponsored Projects (FSPs)—aimed at organizing and partnering with foundations and individual donors while engaging in deep collaboration with local, state and national movement actors to advance equity, justice and an inclusive, representative democracy.
Under Paul’s leadership, Proteus has nearly doubled its annual grantmaking to approximately $23 million, with a primary focus on the local and state level. During this time, Proteus has also expanded its donor collaborative work to not only provide funds to organizations, but also to provide grantees and movements additional tools, capacities, and networks to enhance their overall effectiveness. Since 2016, Proteus has also doubled the number of FSPs to 15 while developing a model of tailored services and support to proactively incubate these critical social-justice initiatives. Today, Proteus is a $40-million progressive philanthropic organization supporting 33 funds and initiatives with a highly skilled and committed staff of over 75 individuals.
Prior to becoming President, Paul directed Proteus Fund’s Civil Marriage Collaborative (CMC) for eight years. The CMC was a groundbreaking donor collaborative that played a critical role in helping to win the freedom to marry in the United States in 2015. Under his leadership, the CMC created a space for committed donors, visionary activists and advocates, and talented allies from across many sectors to innovate and advance the most effective strategies. The CMC awarded over $20 million in grants and played a significant role in organizing other funders to dedicate more than $20 million in additional grantmaking.
Before the CMC, Paul worked in New York and San Francisco in a variety of capacities in pursuit of social justice. As a consultant, Paul worked on organizational and program development, strategic planning, evaluation, leadership coaching, and governance with a wide range of philanthropic, nonprofit, and academic clients. As Executive Director, he transformed Funders Concerned About AIDS into a leading international philanthropic actor in the response to the pandemic’s impact across the Global South while also advancing a variety of other initiatives to educate and mobilize U.S. grantmakers to address HIV/AIDS and its attendant issues of healthcare disparity, racism, sexism, and homophobia. As Federal Affairs Director and Public Policy Director at the San Francisco AIDS Foundation and Public Policy Director at the AIDS Legal Referral Panel, Paul provided key leadership on a wide range of national and California-specific HIV/AIDS legislative and related public policy victories. He also served as both Executive and Legal Director for National Gay Rights Advocates, one of the first national LGBTQ legal rights organizations. In private civil-rights practice, Paul litigated a wide range of cases from prison reform and employment discrimination to voting rights. After graduating law school, Paul was the first man to be named a Revson Women’s Law & Public Policy Fellow.
Paul graduated summa cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania and received his law degree from Harvard Law School.