John Bennett is a Partner in the Firm’s Exempt Organizations Practice and is Co-Head of the Group’s Endowment Advisory Practice. John advises endowed universities, foundations, hospitals, cultural institutions and other institutional investors, such as family offices, in connection with a broad range of investment activities, including the review and negotiation of documentation relating to investments in private equity funds, venture capital funds, real estate funds, energy and other natural resources funds, hedge funds, managed accounts, funds-of-one and similar investment vehicles, as well as in secondary market transactions involving the purchase and sale of interests in such investment vehicles. As a key piece of his investment-related practice, John represents public charities and private foundations in connection with impact investments and mission- and program-related investments in areas including education, conservation, climate change mitigation and remediation, affordable housing, and support of small businesses. A significant part of John’s practice also includes advising public charities and private foundations on structural and operating issues, including formation, governance, mergers, reorganizations, complex issues around domestic and international grantmaking and taxation, including, in particular, compliance with the portions of the tax rules applicable to tax-exempt organizations.
John is a regular speaker on topics of interest to tax-exempt organizations and institutional investors. John has spoken on various topics at the American Bar Association Business Law Section’s Institutional Investors Committee, the International Grantmaking Symposium and the annual Georgetown conference on Representing & Managing Tax Exempt Organizations. He has also presented at various events hosted by the Practising Law Institute, Allocator Collective (f/k/a IADEI), the New York State Society of Certified Public Accountants, Nonprofit New York and New York Lawyers for the Public Interest, among others. John is the co-author, with David A. Shevlin, of chapters entitled “Tools for Direct International Grantmaking: Expenditure Responsibility” and “Tools for Direct International Grantmaking: Equivalency Determination” in Cross-Border Giving: A Legal and Practical Guide, published in 2018 by Charity Channel Press.
John plays an integral role in several of the Firm’s pro bono initiatives. John has been significantly involved in the Firm’s pro bono work with Election Protection, the nation's largest non-partisan voter protection coalition, since 2008 and, during the 2020 election, John was featured in a number of publications, including ABC News and Law360, highlighting that work. John also frequently represents small non-profit organizations across the country in incorporating and obtaining tax-exempt status.
John is a pro bono legal advisor to Allocator Collective (f/k/a IADEI), and serves as Secretary of the Board of Directors of each of the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Natural Resources Defense Council Action Fund. John is a member of the Exempt Organizations Committee of the American Bar Association’s Tax Section and the Subcommittee on Digital Technologies Issues for Nonprofits of the NYC Bar’s Presidential Task Force on Artificial Intelligence and Digital Technologies. John is a former member of the New York City Bar Association’s Committee on Non-Profit Organizations and the Global Impact Investing Network/ISLP Legal Practitioner Group.
Prior to his legal career, he worked in grantmaking and in compliance at the Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund. John received his J.D. from Columbia Law School in 2008, where he was a James Kent Scholar and a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar. He received his B.A. from Tufts University in 2001.