Judge rules Trump administration’s cancellation of humanities grants was unconstitutional

Trump administration cancels more than $100 million humanities grants A federal judge in New York ruled Thursday that funding to academics, authors, research groups and other organizations is unconstitutional and that the Department of Government Efficiency has no authority to terminate the funding.

U.S. District Judge Colleen McMahon in Manhattan sided with the Writers Guild, several other groups and several individuals. grants were canceled and a lawsuit was filed DOGE and the National Endowment for the Humanities. McMahon permanently barred the administration from ending the grants and criticized DOGE’s use of the grants. artificial intelligence while cutting funding.

Government lawyers argued that the more than 1,400 funding cuts approved by Congress were legal moves to implement President Donald Trump’s directives and eliminate related grants. Orientation, equity and participation and reducing discretionary spending within the scope of the administration’s priorities.

The White House and the Justice Department, which is defending against the lawsuit, did not immediately respond to emails seeking comment Thursday evening. It was not immediately clear whether an appeal was planned.

McMahon said the government was violating the First Amendment and Fifth Amendment rights to equal protection and that DOGE did not have the legal authority to revoke the grants. For example, he wrote, officials rescinding grants based on DEI is “a textbook example of unconstitutional viewpoint discrimination.”

“The public interest favors permanent relief,” McMahon wrote in his decision. “The public has a strong interest in ensuring that federal officials act within the limits established by Congress and the Constitution.”

Several groups that sued the government, including the American Council of Scholarly Societies, the American Historical Association and the Modern Language Association, welcomed the decision in a joint statement.

“This decision is a significant achievement in our effort to restore the NEH’s ability to fulfill the vital mission Congress charged it with: to help create and sustain ‘a climate that fosters freedom of thought, imagination, and inquiry’ through the humanities,” said Sarah Weicksel, executive director of the American Historical Association.

Authors Guild lawyer Yinka Ezekiel Onayemi called the grant revocations “a direct attack on constitutional freedom of expression and equal protection.”

“We are pleased with the court’s decision, which vindicates our clients: brilliant academics, writers and institutions who are doing critically important work for our democracy,” Onayemi said in a statement. “It also reaffirms that Congress’s 60-year commitment to the humanities cannot be undone by an overpowering executive.”

The judge examined how government officials classified grant projects as DEI and used ChatGPT to target them for funding cuts. In one case, authorities used the AI ​​platform to label an anthology titled “In the Shadow of the Holocaust: Short Fiction by Jewish Writers from the Soviet Union” as DEI, he said. He also listed numerous other examples.

McMahon also rejected the government’s argument that there was no constitutional issue because any viewpoint classification was ChatGPT’s job, not the government’s.

“ChatGPT was the Government’s chosen tool for the purposes of this project, and DOGE’s use of AI to identify DEI-related material neither excuses conduct deemed unconstitutional nor gives the Government carte blanche to do so,” he wrote.

The grant cancellations were announced in April 2025, three months after Trump issued a proclamation. executive order An article titled “Ending and Opting for Radical and Wasteful State DEI Programs” was published. In February 2025, Trump issued another executive order implementing DOGE’s “cost efficiency initiative.”

Michael McDonald, then acting president of the National Endowment for the Humanities, sent letters to grant recipients informing them that their grants had been canceled.

“In light of the fact that NEH is redesigning funding allocations in a new direction to advance the President’s agenda, NEH has reasonable cause to terminate your grant,” he wrote in an April 1, 2025, letter to an organization.

Most of the canceled grants were awarded during the Biden administration, and only about 40 of the grants awarded by that administration escaped the cuts, the judge wrote.

McMahon wrote that the new administration may pursue legislative funding priorities but “does not have the authority to suppress unpopular ideas.”

One temporary block Of the grant reversals issued last year that raised First Amendment and other issues, the judge said that “defendants terminated grants based on recipients’ perceived viewpoints in an effort to remove such views from the marketplace of ideas.”