Court Rules Against the Trump Administration’s Widespread Grant Termination

A federal judge in Massachusetts ruled last week that agencies cannot use a White House Office of Management and Budget clause to cancel previously awarded grants simply because the administration has adopted new priorities. U.S. District Court Judge Indira Talwani found that while the termination clause may allow agencies to end grants that no longer fulfill the goals in place when they were originally awarded, it cannot be used to rescind them based on priorities the administration adopted after the fact. The ruling, which applies only to the 23 states that sued and covers more than $5.3 billion in active grants, restricts one of the administration’s primary tools for dismantling federally funded research programs it opposes. Inside Higher Ed reports that the victory may be short-lived: the OMB is moving to finalize a proposed rule change that would explicitly allow grant terminations based on priorities “as they exist at the time of the termination,” a change that has drawn more than 490,000 public comments and widespread condemnation from higher education and research advocacy groups and which, if finalized, could render the court’s ruling moot.