This afternoon, the Authors Guild filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration. Plaintiffs, which include the guild and an independent group of scholars and writers, are protesting the sudden termination of millions of dollars in individual and institutional humanities grants.
The perps on trial are the lately-compromised National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and several DOGE employees.
The suit is a direct response to mayhem caused this April, when the NEH sent abrupt termination notices to dozens of grantees in vague accordance with the administration’s new guidelines around arts and culture funding. The org, which is home to 47 grant programs, supports “museums, historic sites, colleges, universities, K-12 teachers, libraries, public television and radio stations, research institutions, independent scholars, and nonprofits nationwide.”
Just as happened last week with the NEA, the administration’s move left many grant recipients stranded mid-project, imperiling dozens of projects and livelihoods. Affected groups included Boston’s West End Museum, the Missouri Historical Society, and Enslaved.org, a digital academic project designed to preserve historical datasets related to enslaved people of African descent.
And though the termination notices claimed to have a consistent ideology, it’s hard to see what’s America-critical—or even particularly controversial—about most of the grant recipients. Like the team of John Prine fans out of Belmont University who hoped to use NEH funds to study “the sacred in Americana music.”
Grantees were given no opportunity to appeal the decisions, even though many individual grant recipients were required to forego other employment during the term of their NEH award.
The Guild suit aims to stop these mass terminations, restore funds to all grantees in limbo, “and require the government to operate the NEH in accordance with Congress’s intent” going forward.
As Francesca Aton reported today in ArtNews, the lawsuit specifically argues that the government’s sudden snatch-back is in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act, as well as even more basic Constitutional tenets respecting the separation of powers and the freedom of expression.
The Guild (via their reps at Fairmark Partners, LLP) notes that grant slicing is well beyond the authority of the agencies in question, whose mandates and scopes are all defined by congress. Because per its establishing legislation, the NEH exists “to honor and preserve its multicultural artistic heritage” and “support new ideas” with financial assistance.
Many great and important books would not have been written if not for NEH grants. Just as many great people would not exist without the influence of museums, libraries, research institutions, and public television shows. Snaps to the Guild for building the first of what we can hope will be many subsequent suits from arts and culture organizations against the Trump administration.
To keep following this story, find details and the full complaint here.