• Founded by President Obama’s former “green jobs czar” Van Jones
• Aligned with Joel Rogers, George Soros, and Al Gore, among many others
• Environmental partner of progressive labor

Founded in 2007, Green For All (GFA) was created by Van Jones to lobby for federal climate, energy, and economic policy initiatives. Joel Rogers, founder of the Apollo Alliance and the Emerald Cities Collaborative, also helped to establish GFA through his primary Wisconsin organization, COWS. Both Jones and Rogers are major players in the push for Cap and Trade legislation, and they have collaborated in an effort to transform America’s environmental policy. Jones also credits Majora Carter, founder of Sustainable South Bronx and a fellow at the MacArthur Foundation, for helping to launch GFA.

Van Jones’ projects have long been bankrolled by George Soros’ Open Society Institute, which gave $1 million to the Jones-founded Ella Baker Center before becoming a major donor to GFA. Along with Soros, a host of powerful progressive funders give money to GFA, including Al Gore’s Alliance for Climate Protection, the Environmental Defense Fund, the Ford Foundation, the Hewlett Foundation, the Nathan Cummings Foundation, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the New World Foundation, the Overbrook Foundation, the Rockefeller Family Fund, the Schwab Charitable Fund, the SEIU, the Streisand Foundation, the Surdna Foundation, the Tides Center and Foundation, the Urban Ecology Institute, the Wallace Global Fund, and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.

Jones has also identified emerging green organizations that work in partnership with GFA, among them: the Blue-Green Alliance, the Commission to Engage African Americans on Climate Change, the Corps Network, the Energy Action Coalition, and the Social Venture Network.

While "holding the most vulnerable people at the center of [its] agenda," GFA aims to "build an inclusive green economy strong enough to lift people out of poverty" by "creating millions of quality jobs and careers." The key to realizing this goal, GFA explains, is to "leverag[e] government funding" in conjunction with "private investment."

In its first conference, titled “The Dream Reborn,” GFA portrayed itself as a continuation of the legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr. -- in the sense that it was striving to improve the lives of those on the lower rungs of the socioeconomic ladder. More accurately, Jones’ organization operates as the environmental linchpin of progressive labor:

• Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins, who succeeded Jones as CEO of Green For All and is also a board member of the Joel Rogers-founded Emerald Cities Collaborative, was the former head of the South Bay AFL-CIO Labor Council and of Working Partnerships USA (WP-USA), whose board is composed of labor leaders from the AFL-CIO, the SEIU, and UNITE HERE!
  
  
• GFA board member Donald Cohen is a co-founder and president of the Center on Policy Initiatives; he works with WP-USA and the Partnership For Working Families, whose board is also composed of labor leaders
  
  
• GFA board member Juliet Ellis is the Executive Director of Urban Habitat and a board member of Partnership For Working Families
  
  
• GFA board member Cynthia Ryan is the principal of the Schooner Foundation, a chair at Human Rights Watch, a partner in the Democracy Alliance, and a trustee of both the Nation Institute and the Ploughshares Fund.

In 2007, GFA helped to pass the Green Jobs Act, which authorized $125 million in taxpayer dollars each year to train workers for employment in a variety of green industries.

In 2008, GFA sought to amplify its Washington lobbying efforts by launching the Climate Equity Alliance, which seeks to "limit carbon emissions" by imposing -- as Cap-and-Trade plans would mandate -- monetary penalties on companies whose emissions are above a certain level. Members of this Alliance include such organizations as ACORN, the Center for American Progress, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, the Center for Law and Social Policy, Change to Win, the Coalition on Human Needs, Democracia USA, the Economic Policy Institute, Enterprise Community Partners, First Focus, the NAACP, the National Council of Churches, the National Hispanic Environmental Council, the National Latino Coalition on Climate Change, the National Low Income Housing Coalition, the NETWORK Lobby, Oxfam America, Redefining Progress, the SEIU, and USAction.

Attempting to earmark $60 billion in taxpayer funds for "green jobs training," in 2010 GFA strongly supported the Cap-and-Trade Climate Bill that Barbara Boxer introduced to the U.S. Senate.

In local lobbying efforts, GFA persuaded the U.S. Conference of Mayors – 1,200 mayors nationwide – to adopt its Green Jobs Pledge. GFA also launched its Green Cities Program with the Apollo Alliance, and its "Retrofit America's Cities" Program with Joel Rogers. The latter initiative seeks to "perform energy-efficiency retrofits at a city-wide scale"; these would include upgrades to such items as the insulation, duct sealing, water heaters, HVAC units, windows, roofing, and doors in people's homes. Because GFA's objective is to redistribute wealth (as indicated by its professed desire to "lift people out of poverty"), such retrofit projects would aim to employ low-income people who had completed "green jobs" training programs funded by federal taxpayer dollars.

In 2008, GFA and Al Gore's WE Campaign launched the Green For All Academy. By training “leaders from low-income communities and communities of color,” this Academy seeks to “expand, educate and engage the base of support for climate solutions and a clean energy economy in America.”

In 2009, GFA expanded its programs and lobbying efforts, achieving an unprecedented level of success for green progressivism. President Barack Obama appointed Van Jones as his Special Advisor for Green Jobs at the White House Council on Environmental Quality.

GFA was also able to expand its Green For All Academy -- training, in two consecutive years, 100 Fellows, many of whom had previously worked for such prominent progressive groups as the Annie E. Casey Foundation, Democracia USA, Global Exchange, the Human Rights Watch, Illinois League of Conservation Voters, MoveOn, Progressive Majority, and the Sierra Club. Other GFA Fellows had formerly worked for luminaries like Hillary Clinton and Dennis Kucinich .

Another GFA initiative, known as “Green the Block,” asks people to pledge to take the following environmentally conscious measures: unplug their electrical appliances when they are not in use; use less water; convert to using compact flourescent light bulbs in their residences; recycle; use public transportation; eat organic foods; use reusable bottles and bags; purchase secondhand rather than new products whenever possible; and purchase products with minimal packaging. Members of the “Green the Block” coalition include ACORN, the AFL-CIO, the Apollo Alliance, Color of Change, the National Urban League, the National Wildlife Federation, and the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition.