A federal judge on Friday blocked the Trump administration from terminating federal grants and contracts related to DEI as called for in executive orders signed by President Donald Trump.
The ruling bars the administration from requiring federal contractors and grant recipients to certify that they do not engage in any “equity-related” programs, a term the court found too vague to be enforced.
“Plaintiffs have amply established a likelihood that they will succeed in proving that the Termination Provision invites arbitrary and discriminatory enforcement over billions of dollars in government funding,” U.S. District Judge Adam Abelson in Maryland ruled.
“The possibilities are almost endless, and many are pernicious,” Abelson continued. “If an elementary school receives Department of Education funding for technology access, and a teacher uses a computer to teach the history of Jim Crow laws, does that risk the grant being deemed ‘equity-related’ and the school being stripped of funding?”
The court ruling also prohibits the Justice Department from bringing any enforcement actions against contractors and grant recipients that have such programs.
“According to a recent case, ‘approximately 20% of the nation’s labor force works for a federal contractor,'” Abelson wrote. “The Termination Provision leaves those contractors and their employees, plus any other recipients of federal grants, with no idea whether the administration will deem their contracts or grants, or work they are doing, or speech they are engaged in, to be ‘equity related.'”
The White House did not immediately return a request for comment on Friday night.
Following his inauguration, Trump ordered federal officials to terminate all programs and activities related to diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility in the federal government.
To adhere to that directive, executive agencies were told to “terminate” all “equity-related” grants or contracts, as well as equity action plans, initiatives and programs.
The National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education, alongside several other nonprofit groups and the mayor of Baltimore, sued Trump to block the order from going into effect, arguing that he was “seizing” Congress’ power of the purse by ordering a halt to the funding, and that his failure to define DEI gave the attorney general “carte blanche authority to implement the order discriminatorily.”
“In the United States, there is no king,” the organization wrote in its suit. “In his crusade to erase diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility from our country, President Trump cannot usurp Congress’s exclusive power of the purse, nor can he silence those who disagree with him by threatening them with the loss of federal funds and other enforcement actions.”
In another executive order challenged by the groups, Trump threatened to withhold funding from educational agencies and institutions that receive federal grants or provide federal loans if they do not comply with his anti-DEI measures.
The Department of Education said in a release following the order that it has since put employees charged with leading DEI initiatives on paid administrative leave and canceled $2.6 million worth of DEI training and service contracts. It also removed or archived hundreds of guidance documents, reports, and training materials that include mentions of DEI from its outward facing communication channels.
