Trump set up path to cut grants years in advance
Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. President Trump is using regulatory language crafted by his administration in his first term to cut hundreds of millions of dollars in grants for programs ranging from vaccine research to teacher training.
In 2020, after the administration tried and failed to stop money going to projects it opposed, the Office of Management and Budget adjusted the language of the regulation governing federal grants to allow the termination of projects “if an award no longer effectuates the program goals or agency priorities." Federal agencies have the right to terminate grants they issue, but historically this has happened only rarely, when a grantee flouted the terms and conditions of an award. Now, in the president’s second term, the administration is terminating hundreds of grants, according to news releases issued by the agencies.
It isn’t clear how many of the termination letters reference the OMB’s 2020 language, but examples of letters across government agencies examined by The Wall Street Journal or sources interviewed for this article refer to the text. At least one agency, the National Institutes of Health, issued internal instructions this week stating that termination letters for grants on “DEI," “transgender issues" and “vaccine hesitancy" use the language “it is the policy of NIH not to give priority to" such research.
“This change in priorities is absolutely across every agency that I’ve been dealing with grants from," said Dismas Locaria, a lawyer in government contracts and grant law at Venable LLP in Washington, D.C. Locaria said he has seen the language in termination letters issued by the NIH, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Department of Housing and Urban Development,
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