Kim Dennis is a nationally respected philanthropic leader and former foundation executive with decades of experience helping donors advance the principles, institutions and ideas that sustain a free society.
Dennis is chair of the DonorsTrust board of directors and serves as a philanthropic advisor. From 1996 until its sunsetting in 2025, she was president and CEO of the Searle Freedom Trust, a grantmaking foundation established by the late Daniel C. Searle to support public policy research. During her tenure at the Searle Freedom Trust, Kim directed the National Research Initiative for five years—a Searle-funded program of the American Enterprise Institute that expanded AEI’s work with outside scholars.
With more than four decades of experience in philanthropic leadership, Kim first began working in the grantmaking arena in 1980 as a staffer for the John M. Olin Foundation. She later became the first executive director of Philanthropy Roundtable, establishing its mission to advance philanthropic freedom and connect major donors committed to liberty and free enterprise. Kim co-founded DonorsTrust, where she currently serves as board chair, leading a donor-advised fund dedicated to protecting charitable intent and advancing liberty through strategic philanthropy.
Throughout her distinguished career, Kim has served on the boards of the Arthur N. Rupe Foundation, the Beth and Ravenel Curry Foundation, the Earhart Foundation, the W. H. Brady Foundation, Philanthropy Roundtable, Property and Environment Research Center, American Enterprise Institute and George Mason University.
