Tag: Federal

  • Head Start, the federal child care program for low-income families, is turning 60 this year. Will it make it to 61?

    Head Start, the federal child care program for low-income families, is turning 60 this year. Will it make it to 61?

    NEW HAVEN, Conn. — Bright morning sun is streaming through her home’s windows as Sandra Dill reads a picture book about penguins to a room full of busy toddlers. While listening, the kids blow kisses, plop in a visitor’s lap, then get up to slide down a small slide.

    Dill has been running a family child care business from her home for 15 years, and every one of her 13 grandchildren has spent time here — currently it’s 20-month-old Nathaniel, who has a puff of curly hair and a gooey grin.

    “My older ones started to call it ‘grandma school,’” she said. Another one of her granddaughters, now a teenager, is returning this summer to help out.

    Four of Dill’s eight available slots are funded through Head Start. This is the federal-to-local program that funds child care and other support for the poorest families in America. (Regular Head Start serves children 3 to 5 years old; Early Head Start is for those under 3.) The program — which began right here in New Haven, Connecticut — is celebrating its 60th anniversary this year.

    It’s also never been so at risk: First a federal funding freeze hit providers, then a chunk of Head Start federal support staff were fired by the Department of Government Efficiency. On March 27, the Department of Health and Human Services announced it was cutting a further 10,000 jobs, and reorganizing the Administration for Children and Families, which administers Head Start. As of April 1, Head Start employees in five of the program’s 10 regions — Boston, New York, Chicago, San Francisco and Seattle — had reportedly been laid off, according to a LinkedIn post that day from Katie Hamm, a former official with the federal Administration for Children and Families. Hamm said there does not appear to be a transition plan laying out how Head Start programs in those regions will receive funding and support. Project 2025, the conservative policy handbook organized by the Heritage Foundation, which the Trump administration has been following closely, calls for eliminating Head Start altogether.

    “I think it’s terrible,” Dill said. “I just can’t imagine. It’s already not enough, and if this happens, it’s going to affect a lot of families that are already struggling.”

    Ed Zigler, the “father of Head Start,” was the son of immigrants from Poland. His father was a peddler and his mother plucked chickens to make a little money, according to Walter Gilliam, executive director of the University of Nebraska’s Buffett Early Childhood Institute, who counted Zigler as his closest mentor.

    When Zigler was a child, his family made its way to a settlement house in Kansas City, Missouri; these community-based charities offered a two-generation approach, caring for and educating children while also teaching English and job skills to parents and connecting families with medical care and housing help.

    “That made a huge impact on his and his family’s life,” Gilliam said.

    Related: Young children have unique needs and providing the right care can be a challenge. Our free early childhood education newsletter tracks the issues.

    As a young psychology professor at Yale, Zigler was hired as an advisor to President Lyndon Johnson to help design family programs for the federal War on Poverty. In creating Head Start, he turned to the same two-generation model he grew up with.

    To date, Head Start has served nearly 40 million children. In fiscal year 2023, the Head Start program was funded to serve 778,420 children. The program has always been underfunded: In 2020 Head Start served barely 1 in 10 eligible infants and toddlers and only half of eligible preschoolers. It’s limited to families making under the federal poverty level, which is just $31,200 for a family of four.

    The sand table at Dill’s child care is an opportunity to explore shapes, colors and textures. Credit: Anya Kamenetz for The Hechinger Report

    Still, for many of the families who do manage to make it through the doors, the program is life-changing.

    “Head Start is in every community in America,” said Cara Sklar, director of early & elementary education policy at the D.C.-based think tank New America. “It’s the original two-generation program, with wraparound support for kids. It’s really held up as a model of quality in early learning.”

    The “wraparound support” for Dill’s Early Head Start families is funded by the United Way of Greater New Haven, and comes via a network for family child care educators called All Our Kin. The network helps mothers enroll in community college and apply for housing subsidies. Dill has had mothers who lived in their cars and one who was living with her mother “six to a room,” she said. She also does regular home visits with families to talk about children’s development and support parents in goals like potty training.

    Thanks to Early Head Start, a nurse, a mental health consultant and a nutritionist all help Dill keep the kids healthy and safe. And the program also provides extra funds she can use to get back up and running if, for example, the furnace needs fixing.

    But Head Start is now facing funding challenges that go far beyond a broken furnace. “The past month has been harrowing for child care providers,” said Carolina Reyes, director of Arco Iris Bilingual Children’s Center, a preschool in Laurel, Maryland, that is a Head Start partner, and also a member of the nationwide advocacy group MomsRising. 

    The first blow to Head Start in this administration was President Donald Trump’s January 27 executive order calling for a federal funding freeze. Since Head Start is a direct federal-to-local grant program, even temporary interruptions in funding can cause programs to close their doors.

    “ Programs like mine operate on razor-thin margins,” said Reyes. “I don’t have any reserves to pull from if funding is delayed or slashed.”

    Related: Is Head Start a failure?

    While funding for most programs has resumed, Joel Ryan, the executive director of the Washington State Association of Head Start, said in a recent press conference that as late as the week of Feb. 17, one in four of his programs still had trouble accessing the Head Start payment website. 

    That same week of the 17th, almost 70 Head Start staffers were pink-slipped in the federal government’s sweep of “probationary” employees — about one-fifth of the program’s workforce. One laid-off employee, who didn’t want to give his name because he is still fighting his dismissal and fears reprisal, said he spent five years as a contractor before switching to full time this past summer, which accounted for his probationary status. He wore many hats at Head Start, doing data analytics, working with grant recipients and serving as a liaison for state partners.

    “They say we’re bloated; we could have used two more full-time people,” he said.

    The cuts, he feared, will lead to further delays in programs getting the payments they rely on, not to mention the oversight that keeps kids safe.

    “I come from the private sector. I will find another job,” he said. “The issue isn’t us, it’s the children and the families. We’ve got all these people in poverty who are getting screwed over by what’s happening.” 

    A third blow came on February 25, when the House passed a budget resolution calling for $880 billion in cuts to discretionary spending programs over the next decade, with Medicaid the prime target, along with the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. Head Start families overwhelmingly rely on these safety net programs. The White House’s gutting of the Department of Education also threatens many services for preschoolers, especially those in special education. (This process, which maps out the next fiscal year, is separate from the recent vote to fund the government until Sept. 30.)

    “This is going from the precipice of disaster to decimating the system,” Sklar said. “All the parts that help families, from Head Start to child care to food to health care, are all being destabilized at once.”

    Gilliam said that threats to eliminate Head Start are nothing new. After designing the program during the Johnson administration, Zigler was appointed to run it under the presidency of Richard Nixon. “Some folks told him that his job was to destroy, essentially, the program that he had created,” Gilliam said.

    Related: In 2024, Head Start programs are still funded by a formula set in the 1970s

    Head Start advocates said the program has been able to fight off political challenges in the past because it is widely distributed geographically and has bipartisan support.

    “I agree that Project 2025 is a real threat to Head Start, as well as to other programs that we all care about,” said Ryan, with the Washington State Head Start association.

    “But I will say this: We have great research. We have great data. We have a great track record. We have a lot of bipartisan support in Congress. And we have parent power.”

    By coincidence, the week the House passed its budget resolution, a group of 150 Head Start parents were on Capitol Hill lobbying as part of a group called Start Early, and they met with many Republican senators.

    Tommy Sheridan, the deputy director of the National Head Start Association, struck an almost defiantly optimistic tone after the visit to lawmakers: “We still believe and have seen indicators that this administration is supportive of Head Start. And Congress as well.”

    NaMaree Cunningham and her twin sister turned two on the day of our visit. Credit: Anya Kamenetz for The Hechinger Report

    Another potential bright spot is the growth of child care support and funding on the state level. Elizabeth Groginsky is New Mexico’s first cabinet secretary for the state’s new Early Childhood Education & Care Department, and she said the pandemic woke a lot of people up to the importance of early care and education.

    “People began to understand the impact that child care has on children’s development, families’ ability to work, the overall economy,” Groginsky said.

    Since 2020, New Mexico has gone through a major expansion in home visits, child care and preschool. Vermont has made similar moves, and New York and Connecticut are heading in that direction as well. Even the deep-red state of Kentucky has expanded access.

    What all of these state-level programs have in common is that they are much more widely available to middle-class families, rather than tightly targeted to families in poverty, as Head Start still is. Historically, with programs like Medicare and Social Security, universal access has meant durable support.

    Now those states are contemplating stepping in further if the federal government drops the ball.

    “Because the state has made such an impressive commitment to child care, we’re potentially in a better spot than others,” said Janet McLaughlin, deputy commissioner for Vermont’s Department of Children and Families. And Groginsky, in New Mexico, said firmly, “The governor and the legislature — I don’t think we’ll let New Mexicans go without. They’ll find a way.”

    Support for this reporting was provided by the Better Life Lab at New America.

    Contact editor Christina Samuels at 212-678-3635 or samuels@hechingerreport.org.

    This story about Head Start was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for the Hechinger newsletter.

    The Hechinger Report provides in-depth, fact-based, unbiased reporting on education that is free to all readers. But that doesn’t mean it’s free to produce. Our work keeps educators and the public informed about pressing issues at schools and on campuses throughout the country. We tell the whole story, even when the details are inconvenient. Help us keep doing that.

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  • Tribal Colleges Fear for Their Federal Funding

    Tribal Colleges Fear for Their Federal Funding

    Leaders of Nueta Hidatsa Sahnish College were thrilled to find out two years ago that they won a nearly $5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to promote Indigenous food and agriculture practices. That five-year grant, which is roughly the same amount as the college’s endowment, funded student internships and several staff positions.

    But just as the college was gearing up to work on the project after putting in place the initial pieces, like selecting interns, funds for the program ceased when the USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture froze the grant in February.

    The college has already spent about half a million dollars on the project, expecting those funds would be reimbursed, like other government grants, said Twyla Baker, president of Nueta Hidatsa Sahnish College. Now, six students have lost their internships, and the college is scrambling to reassign staff to other projects to avoid having to let anyone go.

    “We don’t have a timeline or any type of information as to when or if that [funding] will be restored to us,” Baker said.

    She and other tribal college leaders across the country are scrambling to make contingency plans as the Trump administration continues to review, freeze and slash federal grants in a massive effort to downsize government and roll back federal programs they perceive as related to diversity, equity and inclusion. Some have already seen grants disappear, while others are preparing just in case. Meanwhile, staff cuts to the Bureau of Indian Education and the Department of Education—not to mention plans to dismantle the department—are exacerbating fears and uncertainty on campuses.

    Tribal college leaders watched nervously as the two tribal colleges administered by the bureau, Haskell Indian Nation University and Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute, experienced major layoffs in February, spurring a lawsuit from tribes and students. The cuts sent the two institutions into what some worried was a death spiral, with professor-less classes and mounting infrastructure problems, until those layoffs were reversed in recent weeks.

    We’re survivors, and we’ll be here, but it’s going to be a rough couple years, that’s for sure.”

    —Dan King, president of Red Lake Nation College

    The country’s 37 tribal colleges already live a precarious existence. They tend to serve small, disproportionately first-generation and low-income student populations in remote areas on or near reservations and operate on lean budgets. They depend heavily on federal dollars, and many campuses are struggling with crumbling infrastructure thanks to chronic underfunding from Congress. Some tribal college presidents fear even small changes to federal funding or staffing could mean losing critical student supports, services and academic programs or risk the most vulnerable institutions closing altogether.

    “It takes so many different tiny little grant programs and resources woven all across the federal government just to keep the doors open and the lights on,” said Moriah O’Brien, vice president of congressional and federal relations at the American Indian Higher Education Consortium. “Any interruption or disruption or pausing of federal funding and resources or the federal employees that support those programs … could have very disruptive impacts.”

    ‘Sitting and Waiting’

    Nueta Hidatsa Sahnish College isn’t the only tribal college waiting on frozen USDA funds. College of Menominee Nation in Wisconsin, for example, found out that a grant covering 20 student scholarships was suspended, putting those students’ continued enrollment in jeopardy, ProPublica reported.

    Baker worries other federal funding sources could be next. At this time of the year, she normally would have received a request for proposals for Title III grants from the Department of Education by now. (Title III funds help to support infrastructure improvements at tribal colleges as well as other minority-serving institutions.)

    “We’re sitting and waiting,” she said. “And if those dollars go away, it’s another colossal loss.” Tribal colleges received roughly $82 million in discretionary and mandatory Title III funds last year.

    Amid the uncertainty, tribal colleges are tightening their belts. Nueta Hidatsa Sahnish College is considering a travel moratorium and looking into ways to strengthen partnerships with foundations and state lawmakers in hopes of diversifying its funding. Although Red Lake Nation College in Minnesota hasn’t had its grants suspended, the college has frozen hiring, pay increases and nonessential travel. Red Lake Nation is aiming to cut spending by 20 to 25 percent to prepare for any future funding losses.

    Dan King, president of Red Lake Nation, said he’s been trying to stress to others, “We’re going to make it through this … We’re survivors, and we’ll be here, but it’s going to be a rough couple years, that’s for sure.”

    O’Brien said that AIHEC is working to assess how many institutions have had grants suspended and how colleges are responding to this moment of uncertainty. In the meantime, the group is working to educate federal policymakers about tribal colleges—namely that the federal government is obligated to support them by treaty and that funding for tribal colleges is unrelated to DEI.

    “The federal government’s unique responsibilities to tribal nations have been repeatedly reaffirmed by the Supreme Court, legislation, executive orders and regulations … and this legal duty and trust responsibility applies across all branches of the federal government,” she said. As a result, the “conversation about tribal sovereignty and the federal trust and treaty obligations is entirely separate and distinct from the conversation around diversity, equity and inclusion.”

    Uncertainty at ED

    Tribal college leaders are also anxiously waiting to see what comes of the Education Department after mass layoffs and President Donald Trump’s order to close it down “to the maximum extent appropriate and permitted by law” and “return authority over education to the States.”

    O’Brien noted that not only do many funding sources for institutions flow out of the department, but 75 percent of tribal college students are also eligible for the Pell Grant, a federal financial aid program for low-income students.

    American Indian communities are incredibly resilient, because we have to be, but [there’s] not an unlimited supply of resources to be resilient with. And so, there’s a breaking point.”

    —Sandra Boham, chief operating officer at Native Forward

    “We want to make sure that there’s no interruption to the resources that are going to TCUs as institutions and to individual tribal citizens who are students,” she said.

    O’Brien also wants to ensure that any funding set aside for tribal colleges, through tribal college–specific or broader federal programs, goes directly to them, rather than being administered by states.

    “It’s not clear that those funds would ever get to TCUs,” she said. Plus, “the trust and treaty obligations are between tribal nations and the federal government,” not the states.

    Cheryl Crazy Bull, president and CEO of the American Indian College Fund, said it’s hard to know what will happen to department programs, so tribal colleges are preparing for all kinds of scenarios, including programs possibly coming under the auspices of other federal agencies.

    “We don’t want the Department of Ed to be dismantled,” she said. “At the same time, if it’s going to be dismantled, what strategies need to be used in order to ensure continued funding?”

    Education Secretary Linda McMahon has said that shutting down the department won’t mean funding cuts and said that core functions will continue.

    But major reductions in force at the Department of Education and other federal agencies have made it difficult for tribal colleges to find out which of their funding streams may be at risk.

    Tribal college leaders stressed that getting through to the right people at the Education Department, the USDA, the Department of the Interior or other federal agencies to ask questions is a challenge in and of itself, let alone budgeting for an uncertain landscape.

    Not being able to even “get ahold of” the people who administer grant programs “causes a lot of worries for people, too,” said King at Red Lake Nation. “It’s very stressful. It’s chaotic and it’s unpredictable right now.”

    What’s at Stake

    Tribal college advocates worry some of these institutions wouldn’t survive federal funding losses.

    While some tribal colleges have managed to scrape together meager endowments, many operate on low reserves. Some have as little as 90 days’ worth of operating funds on hand at any given time, said Sandra Boham, chief operating officer at Native Forward, a Native American scholarship provider, and a former president of Salish Kootenai College.

    “American Indian communities are incredibly resilient, because we have to be, but [there’s] not an unlimited supply of resources to be resilient with,” she said. “And so, there’s a breaking point.”

    Tribal college leaders are also concerned about the ripple effects if colleges are forced to cut down on student supports and services.

    “You don’t have the big travel budgets to trim,” Boham said. “You don’t have the big athletic budgets to trim. You’re talking support and instructional staff and shuttering buildings or those kinds of things, and that is not a pleasant conversation to have.”

    O’Brien described tribal colleges as “anchors of their community,” as well, that provide “not just individual classes, but often [serve] as a hub for the community, providing all kinds of different [services] from GED classes to certificate programs to community space to having their libraries open to the community.”

    Baker said the value of tribal colleges “is not a difficult story to tell,” but “just the fact that we’re having to tell it is pretty frustrating.”

    Some of these institutions “function on the brink,” Baker said, and they serve “some of the poorest parts of our nation. If it weren’t for tribal colleges, some of these students wouldn’t access higher education at all.”

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  • Trump Investigates Harvard’s Federal Funding

    Trump Investigates Harvard’s Federal Funding

    Harvard is the second Ivy League institution to be targeted by the Trump administration for how it handled alleged instances of antisemitism on campus.

    Craig F. Walker/The Boston Globe via Getty Images

    Harvard University is the latest higher education institution to be investigated by the Trump administration in response to its alleged mishandling of antisemitic harassment on campus. The institution will undergo a “comprehensive” analysis of nearly $9 billion in federal grants and contracts, according to a multi-agency news release.

    The review, announced Monday afternoon, is part of ongoing efforts by the Justice Department’s Joint Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism to tackle alleged antisemitic harassment on college campuses. The Departments of Education and Health and Human Services and the General Services Administration will carry out the investigation to “ensure the university is in compliance with federal regulations, including its civil rights responsibilities,” the news release said.

    The task force said its review process for Harvard will be similar to the one it is currently carrying out at Columbia University.

    “This initiative strengthens enforcement of President Trump’s Executive Order titled ‘Additional Measures to Combat Anti-Semitism,’” which “ensures that federally funded institutions uphold their legal and ethical responsibilities to prevent anti-Semitic harassment,” the news release said.

    In a matter of weeks, the task force’s investigation into Columbia has upended the institution. It received a notification in early March that the government had launched a review into $54.1 million in federal contracts. Then, on March 7, the department retracted $400 million in grants and contracts, and on March 13 it sent the university a sweeping list of demands, calling for immediate compliance in order to regain the funding. Columbia agreed to nearly all of the demands a week later, but the administration has not reinstated the funds.

    Shortly after announcing the decision to comply, the university’s interim president, Katrina Armstrong, resigned.

    The administration has said it will now review more than $255.6 million in federal contracts and $8.7 billion in multiyear grant commitments at Harvard.

    As with Columbia, the agencies will consider stop-work orders for any contracts the review identifies. But Harvard has also been ordered to submit a list of all federal contracts—both direct and through affiliates—that were not identified in the task force’s initial investigation.

    Addressing the review in a letter to the Harvard community, President Alan M. Garber acknowledged that nearly $9 billion in research funding is at risk: “If this funding is stopped, it will halt life-saving research and imperil important scientific research and innovation.”

    He said the institution had “devoted considerable effort” to addressing antisemitism on campus for the past 15 months, but added, “We still have work to do” and committed to working with the task force.

    “We resolve to take the measures that will move Harvard and its vital mission forward while protecting our community and its academic freedom,” he said.  

    Critics have broadly opposed the Trump administration’s tactics, saying they are prime examples of using claims of antisemitism to justify “aggressive” executive overreach.

    “What we’re seeing is an attempt to weaponize federal funding to punish schools that don’t align with their political views,” said Wesley Whistle, a project director at New America, a left-leaning think tank. “That kind of pressure stifles the free exchange of ideas—and that’s the whole point of higher education.”

    Meanwhile, Education Secretary Linda McMahon said the university’s “failure to protect students on campus from antisemitic discrimination—all while promoting divisive ideologies over free inquiry—has put its reputation in serious jeopardy.

    “Harvard can right these wrongs and restore itself to a campus dedicated to academic excellence and truth-seeking, where all students feel safe on its campus,” she said.

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  • VICTORY: Federal court blocks Texas A&M’s unconstitutional drag ban

    VICTORY: Federal court blocks Texas A&M’s unconstitutional drag ban

    HOUSTON, March 24, 2025 —  A federal judge today upheld the First Amendment rights of a Texas A&M student group by blocking an attempt by officials to prohibit the group’s upcoming drag show on the College Station campus.

    In her ruling, Judge Lee H. Rosenthal of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas held that a student organization, the Texas A&M Queer Empowerment Council, was likely to succeed in showing the drag ban violated the First Amendment. The court held that drag is theatrical expression protected by the First Amendment and that the university’s justifications for prohibiting the student-funded, student-organized “Draggieland” performance fell short. Draggieland will now take place as planned on Thursday evening.

    “In recent years, the commitment to free speech on campuses has been both challenging and challenged,” ruled Judge Rosenthal. “There have been efforts from all sides of the political spectrum to disrupt or prevent students, faculty, and others from expressing opinions and speech that are deemed, or actually are, offensive or wrong. But the law requires the recognition and application of speech rights and guardrails that preserve and protect all our treasured First Amendment rights.”

    “Today is a resounding victory for the First Amendment at public universities in Texas,” said Adam Steinbaugh, an attorney with the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, who argued last week at the district court. “The court reaffirmed that state university officials cannot block student expression they claim is offensive. State officials should stop trying to score political points at the expense of students’ First Amendment rights.”

    Every year since 2020, students at Texas A&M University-College Station have held “Draggieland” (a combination of “Drag” and “Aggieland”) on campus. But in February, citing a recent executive order issued by President Donald Trump on “gender ideology,” the Texas A&M University System Board of Regents abruptly voted to ban drag performances across all 11 campuses, claiming drag was “offensive” and “inconsistent with” the “core values of its universities, including the value of respect for others.”

    That vote canceled Draggieland’s March 27 performance, which the Queer Empowerment Council plans and hosts in a campus theatre open to all student groups. But the regents’ edict clearly violated the First Amendment, which does not allow public university officials to censor student performances based on nothing more than their personal dislike of its content or perceived ideology. 

    FIRE sued on the Queer Empowerment Council’s behalf earlier this month seeking to have the ban overturned on First Amendment grounds, and filed a motion for an injunction that would allow the show to go on while the case made its way through the courts.

    “We’re overjoyed with today’s decision,” said the Queer Empowerment Council. “This is another display of the resilience of queer joy, as that is an unstoppable force despite those that wish to see it destroyed. While this fight isn’t over, we are going to appreciate the joy we get to bring by putting on the best show that we can do.”

    “Texas A&M, like any public university, has the utmost duty to respect the First Amendment rights of students,” said FIRE Supervising Senior Attorney JT Morris. “As public officials, they can’t banish speech from campus just because it offends them, any more than they could shut down a political rally or a Christmas pageant.” 

     

     

    The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to defending and sustaining the individual rights of all Americans to free speech and free thought—the most essential qualities of liberty. FIRE recognizes that colleges and universities play a vital role in preserving free thought within a free society. To this end, we place a special emphasis on defending the individual rights of students and faculty members on our nation’s campuses, including freedom of speech, freedom of association, due process, legal equality, religious liberty, and sanctity of conscience.

    CONTACT:

    Alex Griswold, Communications Campaign Manager, FIRE: 215-717-3473; media@thefire.org

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  • Bunker Hill Cancels Study Abroad Amid Federal Policy Shifts

    Bunker Hill Cancels Study Abroad Amid Federal Policy Shifts

    Bunker Hill Community College is canceling its summer study abroad programs in response to Trump administration immigration policies, WBUR reported.

    “Our first priority in any Study Abroad experience is the safety of our students and staff,” read a statement from the community college to WBUR. “With the changes in national immigration policy and enforcement that have emerged over the last several weeks, including the prospect of renewed travel restrictions, the College will redirect this year’s exploration and learning to U.S.-based sites.”

    The community college planned to send about 60 students to Costa Rica, Ghana, Japan, Kenya and Panama for two-week educational programs between May and July. The decision to cancel the trips came after news reports that the Trump administration is considering a travel ban on dozens of countries.

    Biology professor Scott Benjamin, who’s led the Costa Rica trip since 2002, told WBUR that college leaders were concerned for international students who planned to go on these trips. International students make up 7 percent of the college’s student body.

    “The school was just very worried about the probably remote, but still potential possibility that we could go away and come back, and a student couldn’t come back into the country,” Benjamin told the news outlet.

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  • Federal Appeals Court Lifts Bar on DEI Executive Orders

    Federal Appeals Court Lifts Bar on DEI Executive Orders

    by CUPA-HR | March 17, 2025

    On March 14, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit issued a decision allowing the Trump administration to enforce Executive Orders 14151 and 14173, both of which target “illegal … DEI preferences, mandates, policies, programs, and activities” in the public and private sectors and in federal contracts. The 4th Circuit’s decision effectively overrules a February 21 preliminary injunction issued in a U.S. District Court in Maryland that had blocked the administration from enforcing some provisions in the orders.

    As a reminder, orders 14151 and 14173 revoke prior executive orders, including Executive Order 11246, which required federal contractors to maintain affirmative action plans. Among other things, orders 14151 and 14173 also mandate that:

    • federal agencies include provisions in federal contracts requiring that contractors agree to comply with nondiscrimination laws and certify they do not operate any DEI programs that violate discrimination laws;
    • the Office of Management and Budget terminate all “‘diversity,’ ‘equity,’ ‘equitable decision-making,’ ‘equitable deployment of financial and technical assistance,’ ‘advancing equity,’ and like mandates, requirements, programs, or activities, as appropriate;” and
    • each agency “identify up to nine potential civil compliance investigations of publicly traded corporations, large non-profit corporations or associations, foundations with assets of 500 million dollars or more, State and local bar and medical associations, and institutions of higher education with endowments over 1 billion dollars.”

    CUPA-HR will continue to share further developments regarding the lawsuits challenging orders 14151 and 14173.

     



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  • Donors Support Grad Students Lacking Federal Research Funds

    Donors Support Grad Students Lacking Federal Research Funds

    Recent federal executive orders from President Donald Trump have put a halt to some university operations, including hiring and large swaths of academic research. The National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation, among others, have paused grant-review panels to comply with the orders and cut funding, leaving researchers in limbo.

    Graduate students often receive educational stipends from federal agencies for their research, putting their work—and their own degree attainment—at risk.

    To alleviate some hardships, the University of Hawaiʻi’s UH Foundation launched a Graduate Student Success Fund, which will provide direct relief for learners who have lost funding.

    Fewer than a dozen graduate students in the system have been impacted to various degrees to date, but “like most institutions, the extent of the possible impact is unknown,” a UH spokesperson said.

    On the ground: Michael Fernandez, a first-year UH Mānoa doctoral student in the botany program, is a participant in the National Science Foundation’s Graduate Research Fellowship Program, which supports learners pursuing research-based master’s or doctoral degrees in STEM education fields. The five-year fellowship includes three years of financial aid for tuition and fees and an annual stipend.

    “I and other fellows in the program feel uncertain about future funding from the fellowship,” Fernandez said in a press release. “This is especially concerning for me, as the NSF-GRFP is currently my primary and sole source of funding for my graduate studies.”

    University of Hawaiʻi president Wendy Hensel spurred the creation of the Graduate Student Success Fund for grad students at UH Mānoa and UH Hilo. The fund, supported by private donations, mirrors an undergraduate student success fund available to bachelor’s degree seekers who need help paying for tuition, books and fees.

    The UH Foundation will also support undergraduate researchers who may have had their work interrupted due to federal freezes.

    The Graduate Student Success Fund is designed to aid student retention and financial wellness and also support career development and future talent in Hawaiʻi.

    “It is critical that we do all we can to ensure that our university graduates, the next generation of talent, desperately needed for Hawaiʻi’s workforce,” Hensel said. “These graduate students are our scientists, doctors, nurses, psychologists, social workers, engineers, educators and leaders of tomorrow.”

    Details as to how funds will be distributed, including amounts and number of recipients, are still being determined, the spokesperson said.

    The bigger picture: Federally funded research projects that address diversity, equity, inclusion, gender, green energy or other alleged “far-left ideologies” have come under fire in recent weeks.

    In January Trump signed an executive order halting federal grant spending, which was later rescinded, but some organizations have halted funding regardless.

    Trump Administration Weaponizes Funding Against Institutions

    On March 7, the Trump administration announced it had canceled $400 million in federal grants and contracts to Columbia University for “the school’s continued inaction in the face of persistent harassment of Jewish students.” The federal government has also threatened to pull funding from any educational institution that invests in diversity, equity and inclusion programs.

    In February, the National Institutes of Health announced it would cut funding for indirect costs of conducting medical research, including hazardous waste disposal, utilities and patient safety. In 2024, the agency sent around $26 billion to over 500 grant recipients connected to institutions.

    Hensel published a memo in February opposing the cuts for reimbursement of facilities and administrative costs.

    “For UH, the impact of this decision cannot be overstated,” Hensel wrote. “The university is supported by 175 awards and subawards from the NIH with a current value of $211 million. NIH’s reduction of UH’s current negotiated [indirect compensation] rate of 56.5 percent at the JABSOM [UH Mānoa John A. Burns School of Medicine] and the [UH] Cancer Center alone will eliminate approximately $15 million in funding that UH uses to support its research programs, including ongoing clinical trials and debt service payments.”

    How is your college or university supporting students affected by federal action? Tell us more.

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  • Federal Cuts Deepen Tennessee State U’s Budget Woes

    Federal Cuts Deepen Tennessee State U’s Budget Woes

    President Trump’s assault on federal grants is making Tennessee State University’s ongoing financial troubles even worse.

    The Tennessean reported last week that the chronically underfunded historically Black university in Nashville is preparing to lose $14.4 million, the remainder of an $18 million grant it received from the National Institute of Food and Agriculture. It’s one of hundreds of colleges and universities across the country facing financial uncertainty as the Trump administration moves to cut trillions of dollars from the federal budget.

    “This is going to impact our people,” Jim Grady, TSU’s chief financial officer, said at a finance committee meeting Wednesday evening. “We’ll continue to evaluate the volatility … and the potential impact to employees, students and university operations.”

    Grady said nothing would change for at least 90 days after receiving notice of the grant cancellation, and it’s not yet clear how many jobs will be eliminated as a result. And that’s not the only federal grant in question, according to The Tennessean.

    In February, the U.S. Department of Agriculture—which includes the National Institute of Food and Agriculture—canceled $45 million in federal grants to the cash-strapped university, which eliminated 114 positions last fall amid a looming budget shortfall.

    Earlier this month, the USDA restored about $23 million of those grants, though another $115 million could be suspended or frozen. TSU’s federal grants fully fund 62 employees and partially fund another 112.

    In the midst of the financial uncertainty, TSU has suspended its search for a permanent president, WKRN reported.

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  • Columbia University faces ultimatum from Trump administration to keep federal funding

    Columbia University faces ultimatum from Trump administration to keep federal funding

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    Columbia University received a daunting laundry list of tasks Thursday from the Trump administration: Suspend or expel protesters. Enact a mask ban. Give university security “full law enforcement authority.”

    The Ivy League institution must comply with these and other demands by March 20 or further endanger its “continued financial relationship with the United States government,” according to a copy of the letter obtained by multiple news sources. 

    Last week, the Trump administration’s newly created Joint Task Force to Combat Anti-Semitism canceled $400 million of Columbia’s federal grants and contracts, alleging the university had failed to take action “in the face of persistent harassment of Jewish students.” It also noted that Columbia has $5 billion in federal grant commitments at stake.

    The stunning move came only four days after the task force opened an antisemitism investigation into the university.

    On Monday, the U.S. Department of Education also sent warnings to 60 colleges — including Columbia — that it could take punitive action if it determines they aren’t sufficiently protecting Jewish students from discrimination or harassment.

    In Thursday’s letter, Trump administration officials said they expected Columbia’s “immediate compliance” after which they hope to “open a conversation about immediate and long-term structural reforms that will return Columbia to its original mission of innovative research and academic excellence.” 

    The letter’s edicts are just the latest in a series of decisions made by the Trump administration and Columbia officials that have put the well-known New York institution into a tailspin.

    Strong language, few details

    Officials at the Education Department, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and U.S. General Services Administration sent Columbia Interim President Dr. Katrina Armstrong nine policy changes the Trump administration expects the university to make to retain federal funding.

    The agencies — all of which are part of the Trump administration’s antisemitism task force — accused Columbia of failing “to protect American students and faculty from antisemitic violence and harassment,” along with other alleged violations of civil rights laws. 

    But despite the high stakes, the task force’s demands are ambiguous. 

    For example, its letter orders the university to deliver a plan on “comprehensive admissions reform.”

    “The plan must include a strategy to reform undergraduate admissions, international recruiting, and graduate admissions practices to conform with federal law and policy,” it said.

    The task force’s letter offers no further insight into what it expects Columbia to change or how it believes the university is out of line with federal standards.

    The letter goes far beyond what is appropriate for the government to mandate and will chill campus discourse.

    The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression

    The GSA directed an emailed request for comment to the Education Department. Neither the Education Department nor HHS responded to inquiries Friday.

    The task force also ordered the university to ban masks that “are intended to conceal identity or intimidate others,” while offering exceptions for religious and health reasons. But it did not give criteria to determine why someone is wearing a mask.

    “We are reviewing the letter from the Department of Education, Department of Health and Human Services, and General Services Administration,” a spokesperson for Columbia said Friday. “We are committed at all times to advancing our mission, supporting our students, and addressing all forms of discrimination and hatred on our campus.”

    The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, a civil rights watchdog, criticized the federal officials’ demands Friday. 

    While the group has been critical of Columbia’s handling of student protesters, it said the letter does not follow “the normal procedure for revocation of federal financial assistance for violations of Title VI.” Title VI refers to the law barring discrimination on race, color and national origin at federally funded educational institutions. 

    “While these include some policy steps that Columbia should already have taken, the letter goes far beyond what is appropriate for the government to mandate and will chill campus discourse,” FIRE said in a statement.

    A change in due process

    The Trump administration’s task force is demanding Columbia complete ongoing disciplinary proceedings against pro-Palestinian protesters who occupied campus buildings and organized encampments last year. The university must dole out meaningful discipline — meaning expulsions or multi-year suspensions — the letter said.

    The same day the task force’s letter is dated, Columbia announced it had issued “multi-year suspensions, temporary degree revocations, and expulsions” related to the occupation of Hamilton Hall.

    In April 2024, pro-Palestinian protesters occupied the university’s Hamilton Hall after then-President Minouche Shafik announced Columbia would not divest from companies with ties to Israel. 

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  • UPDATE: Another federal appeals court backs academic free speech for public employees

    UPDATE: Another federal appeals court backs academic free speech for public employees

    The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit just sided with free speech, joining five of its sister circuits in holding the First Amendment protects academic research, writing, and teaching at public colleges and universities. This carves out an important exception to the Supreme Court’s 2006 decision in Garcetti v. Ceballos holding that public employees’ speech pursuant to their official duties is not protected.

    This is a big deal. Just ask Jason Kilborn, a law professor at the University of Illinois Chicago suspended in late 2021 for using a redacted racial slur “n___” on a final exam question about employment discrimination. He also used the redacted term “b___” in the same question.

    UIC suspended Kilborn and launched an investigation into his (non-)use of the terms. That’s when FIRE stepped in — defending Kilborn, writing to UIC administrators, and securing him a lawyer through our Faculty Legal Defense Fund. With help from that lawyer, UIC briefly reached a resolution with Kilborn but it later reneged on that agreement and forced him to write reflection papers and participate in months-long training sessions before he could return to teaching.

    Kilborn sued, alleging administrators violated his constitutional right to academic freedom — and while the district court had dismissed the case, on Wednesday, the Chicago-based Seventh Circuit agreed the First Amendment protected Kilborn’s speech. That court rejected UIC’s “invitation to extend Garcetti to speech involving university teaching and scholarship when the Supreme Court was unwilling to do so,” and sent the case back to the district court. 

    With the rejection of that application of Garcetti, the district court will analyze this case using the balancing test from Pickering v. Board of Education, which directs courts to weigh “the interests of the [employee] in commenting upon matters of public concern” against “the interest of the state, as an employer, in promoting the efficiency of the public services it performs through its employees.” 

    This is now the sixth federal appeals court to establish this exception to Garcetti, extending academic freedom protections to public university faculty throughout Illinois, Indiana, and Wisconsin. FIRE is currently awaiting a decision from the Atlanta-based Eleventh Circuit, where we’ve asked that court to do the same with respect to the Garcetti exception. Stay tuned for more as we continue to press and follow this issue closely. 

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