Judge issues temporary injunction against Trump administration cancellation of humanities grants
In reaching her decision, the judge said the defendants terminated the grants based on the recipients' perceived viewpoint in an effort to drive such views out of the marketplace of ideas. This is most evident by the citation in the Termination Notices to executive orders purporting to combat Radical Indoctrination and Radical… DEI Programs and to further Biological Truth. One of the grants was to a professor writing a book on the reemergence of the Ku Klux Klan in the 1970s and 1980s. On a spreadsheet entitled 'Copy of NEH Active Grants,' the government flagged the work as being connected to diversity equality and inclusion efforts, McMahon wrote. The judge said several other history projects on the spreadsheet were also canceled in part because of their connection to DEI-related subjects.
'Far be it from this Court to deny the right of the Administration to focus NEH priorities on American history and exceptionalism as the year of our semiquincentennial approaches,' McMahon said. 'Such refocusing is ordinarily a matter of agency discretion. But agency discretion does not include discretion to violate the First Amendment. Nor does not give the Government the right to edit history.' McMahon said some of the grantees lost grants simply because they had received them during the Biden administration.
The Guild filed a class action lawsuit in May against the NEH and the Department of Government Efficiency for terminating grants that had already been appropriated by Congress. The humanities group's lawsuit said DOGE brought the core work of the humanities councils to a screeching halt this spring when it terminated its grant program. The filing is the most recent lawsuit filed by humanities groups and historical research and library associations to try to stop funding cuts and the dissolution of federal agencies and organizations.
McMahon noted her injunction is narrowly tailored to maintain the status quo until we can decide whether Plaintiffs are entitled to ultimate relief. 'It does nothing more.' The judge denied a temporary injunction request from the American Council of Learned Societies as well as several of their claims in the lawsuit. Their case included the American Historical Association and the Modern Language Association.
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