IRI was founded in 1983 following then U.S. president
Ronald Reagan's 1982 speech before the
British Parliament in
Westminster in which he proposed a broad objective of helping countries build the infrastructure of democracy. Quoting the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Reagan said, "we must be staunch in our conviction that freedom is not the sole prerogative of a lucky few but the inalienable and universal right of all human beings." IRI operates globally, providing training and assistance to political parties. As a
501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization, IRI plays no part in domestic U.S. politics. However, the majority of its board are drawn from the
Republican Party.
2004 Haitian coup IRI received funding for its
Haiti programs from
USAID from 2002 until 2004. IRI ended its Haiti program in summer 2007. On January 29, 2006,
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation television premiered a documentary film about the IRI's role in the coup,
Haiti: Democracy Undone. Brian Dean Curran, U.S. Ambassador at the time and a former Clinton appointee, accused IRI of undermining his efforts to hold peaceful negotiations between
Jean-Bertrand Aristide and his opposition after contested
parliamentary elections in 2000. According to Curran, Stanley Lucas, then IRI's representative in Haiti, advised opposition leaders not to compromise with Aristide, who was later driven from power. Curran also alleges that Lucas represented himself to the opposition as the
Washington, D.C. envoy and his advice, which was contrary to that of the
U.S. State Department, was advice from the
U.S. government. IRI responded to Ambassador Curran's allegations in a letter to the New York Times.
2009 Honduran constitutional crisis In 2009, IRI received $550,000 from the
National Endowment for Democracy to "promote and enhance the participation of think tanks in
Mexico and
Honduras as pressure groups to impel political parties to develop concrete positions on key issues" and to "support initiatives to implement political positions during the campaigns in 2009" following the
2009 Honduran constitutional crisis.
Cuba In 2008, the government of
Cuba accused former
U.S. congressional staff member
Caleb McCarry of orchestrating the
2004 Haitian coup and attempting to provoke a coup d'état in Cuba.
Middle East According to an April 15, 2011 article in
The New York Times, IRI, the
National Democratic Institute for International Affairs, and other groups were credited for training activists in the
Middle East, including
Egypt and
Tunisia, who advocated for reform in authoritarian regimes. In 2011,
Egypt's Ministry of Justice issued a report on foreign funding of NGOs operating in Egypt that alleged that IRI had received approximately $7 million by USAID for the
Egyptian 2011–12 elections. The
military rulers who gained control of Egypt following the
January 2011 revolution considered this foreign funding interference in Egypt's internal affairs.
Poland IRI has operated programs in
Poland since 1991, where it says it has worked to unite and organize a diverse range of "
center and
center right" political parties together to create the
Solidarity Electoral Action (AWS), which governed Poland in coalition with the
Freedom Union (UW) party between 1997 and 2001. It also said that it provided training in political campaigning, communications training and research which helped organise and create the AWS.
Second Trump term IRI has been funded by the
National Endowment for Democracy (NED). After
Elon Musk's
Department of Government Efficiency cut funding to the NED by blocking disbursement from the
US Department of Treasury in February 2025, IRI was forced to lay off two-thirds of its work force in
Washington, D.C. and closed more than 20 of its overseas offices. ==Operations and programs==