Donate Less to AI Safety*
Summary
Argues that AI safety donors should shift funding from 501(c)3 research organizations to 501(c)4 advocacy groups to address the lobbying gap compared to the AI industry.
Key quotes
The highest-leverage path for donors looking to give to AI safety right now is to give less money, but to more neglected destinations.
The asymmetry is staggering: On the industry side: OpenAI spent $2.99 million on lobbying in 2025... On the safety side: The CAIS Action Fund spent $310,000 on lobbying in all of 2025.
Legislation is what makes technical safety advances mandatory for frontier labs.
The author analyzes the funding imbalance between technical AI safety research (c3) and political advocacy (c4). It provides a mathematical formula for calculating equivalent personal costs for c4 donations and recommends specific advocacy organizations.