MAC makes $1M gift to The Trevor Project. As LGBTQ advocacy groups confront mounting political and funding pressures, The Trevor Project is drawing renewed support from both corporate and philanthropic backers. MAC Cosmetics, the Estée Lauder - owned beauty brand, has announced a $1 million grant to the organization, which focuses on ending suicide among LGBTQ+ youth. The gift marks MAC's third year partnering with The Trevor Project and comes as the organization works to stabilize its funding after a sharp setback last year. In 2025, The Trevor Project lost roughly $25 million when the Trump administration ended federal support for the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline's LGBTQ+ Youth Specialized Services program, administered by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, according to Deborah Barge, the Trevor Project's chief advancement officer. "That impacted our services, so we're really grateful that supporters and donors have stepped in in such a major way, as we launched our emergency crisis campaign to serve young people through our own hotline," Barge said. The MAC grant follows a separate $45 million gift made several weeks ago by billionaire philanthropist MacKenzie Scott, part of a broader effort to help the organization continue its crisis-prevention work amid rising demand for services. Beyond funding, the MAC partnership also includes "Makeup Services for All," a training program developed with The Trevor Project to educate MAC artists on gender-inclusive communication and makeup techniques for gender-diverse customers. "There are 1.8 million young people in the U.S. who seriously consider suicide each year in the LGBTQ+ community, and we estimate that a young person is attempting suicide every 45 seconds," Barge said. "We know how badly our mission is needed." The collaboration aligns with MAC's long-running Viva Glam platform, which has historically tied product sales to social-impact causes. Separately, The Trevor Project has released a new episode of its "Sharing Spaces" docuseries, featuring a moderated discussion with six survivors of homosexual conversion therapy. While more than 20 states have enacted laws to protect LGBTQ+ young people from conversion therapy practices, the Supreme Court is currently considering a challenge to Colorado's state ban in Chiles v. Salazar, a case that advocates say could have broad implications for youth mental health protections nationwide.

Trevor Project receives $45M donation from MacKenzie Scott. WEST HOLLYWOOD, Calif. (KESQ) - The Trevor Project, a West Hollywood nonprofit known for its hotline for LGBTQ+ youth, has received a $45 million donation from philanthropist and author MacKenzie Scott after the Trump administration cut its funding, it was announced today. The organization's national suicide-prevention hotline has been accessible by dialing 988 since 2022. The following year, an option was added to the hotline to provide specialized counseling to LGBTQ+ youth, who could press the number 3 on their phones to access the service. The service had been provided locally by The Trevor Project. In July, however, the federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration eliminated funding for the "Press 3" option for LGBTQ+ youth. Shortly afterward, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors directed its Department of Mental Health to develop a pilot program restoring services tailored for LGBTQ+ youth to the suicide-prevention hotline. On Monday, The Trevor Project announced that Scott had made the donation at the end of 2025 in support of the organization's long-term efforts for LGBTQ+ youth. Jaymes Black, chief executive of The Trevor Project, said in a blog post that Scott's gift - the single largest one-time donation in the organization's 27-year history - comes at "a pivotal moment for our organization and the LGBTQ+ young people we serve." Black said the gift "is a powerful step toward building on our sustainable capacity - but our organization will continue to face one of the largest public health crises of our time: LGBTQ+ youth suicide." Research shows that LGBTQ+ young people are more than four times as likely to attempt suicide than their peers, Black said. "The Trevor Project's latest study found that, sadly, the mental health crisis among LGBTQ+ youth in the U.S. is getting worse, showing increasing rates of anxiety, depression, and suicidality for these young people over time." Black said the organization received a $6 million gift from Scott in 2020. "We are committed to investing this funding with great care," Black said. "Over the coming months, we will roadmap a strategic and thoughtful investment plan focused on strengthening our core crisis services, improving long-term sustainability, and accelerating our progress toward a world where every LGBTQ+ young person knows they are loved and supported." Scott, 55, was married to Jeff Bezos, the co-founder of Amazon, from 1993 to 2019. In 2006, Scott won an American Book Award for her debut novel, "The Testing of Luther Albright." Her second novel, "Traps," was published in 2013.

The Trevor Project receives $45M from MacKenzie Scott after difficult years and federal funding cuts. Scott previously gave The Trevor Project $6 million in 2020. This latest gift is a major boon following years of management turmoil, layoffs and the loss of significant federal funding over the summer. 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' Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) reported more than 1.5 million contacts were routed through the service between Sept. 2022 and July 2025. The Trevor Project has gone through years of internal turmoil after exploding in size from an organization with an annual budget 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 that the organization was determined to stick around and 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 at all 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. That may be because Scott's team, the members of which are largely unknown, conducts extensive research on organizations before making grants. 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. 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