Three major scholarly groups have sued the National Endowment for the Humanities and Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, arguing that the recent mass cancellation of virtually all the agency’s grants violates the law and must be reversed.
The suit, filed on Thursday, was brought by the American Council of Learned Societies, the American Historical Association and the Modern Language Association and offers new details about how DOGE conducted its work at the humanities endowment.
The endowment’s fate has been in question since March 12, when the former chairwoman, Shelly C. Lowe, a Biden appointee, resigned “at the direction of President Trump” and was replaced by Michael McDonald, a longtime employee and the agency’s general counsel.
Employees from the Department of Government Efficiency started visiting the office soon after, according to the lawsuit. Citing accounts by former or current staff members at the endowment, the lawsuit says that two DOGE employees, Nate Cavanaugh and Justin Fox, asked for a list of all current grants and then “indiscriminately terminated the vast majority” on April 2. Nearly 1,500 grant recipients received cancellation letters that suggested their projects were not in keeping with “the president’s agenda.”
Three weeks later, the agency announced it would be redirecting $17 million of its funding to create the National Garden of American Heroes, a patriotic statuary park that Mr. Trump has made central to his plans for commemorating the 250th anniversary of American independence in 2026.
The cancellation letters were not sent from the usual email account used for all the agency’s grant-making activity but from a newly created one on a different server. The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, claims that although the letters were signed by Mr. McDonald, they were written by Department of Government Efficiency employees.
At a meeting the next day, according to the lawsuit, Mr. McDonald told staff membersthat he had not been aware of the full scope of the grant terminations. The suit also says it was Mr. Cavanaugh and Mr. Fox who demanded mass reductions of the 180-person staff; more than two-thirds have since been let go.
The lawsuit contends that those moves violate the Constitution, which reserves the power of the purse for Congress, and also the Administrative Procedure Act.
“These actions were taken or directed by DOGE, a body not created or authorized by statute,” according to the lawsuit, which also names Mr. McDonald, Mr. Cavanaugh and Mr. Fox as defendants. “DOGE has no lawful authority to carry out the work of another agency, let alone to dismantle it.”
The humanities endowment and the White House did not respond to requests for comment.
The endowment, the largest federal funder for the humanities, has provided more than $6 billion in grants to museums, historical sites, libraries, research facilities and community projects since its founding in 1965. It has continued to receive congressional support during this administration, including a $207 million appropriation in March.
But it is unclear whether that support will continue. The White House’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2026, released on Friday, lists the National Endowment for the Humanities among a dozen small agencies that are targeted for elimination.
In a news conference on Thursday, leaders of the three scholarly associations that sued the government emphasized they were doing so on behalf of the many small groups and projects across the country, some of which may not survive without the funding.
“We are not talking about the ivory tower,” said Joy Connolly, the president of the American Council of Learned Societies. “We’re talking about the needs of community colleges and public libraries and high school students and K-12.”
James Grossman, the executive director of the American Historical Association, said presidents have always appointed endowment chairs who emphasized their own priorities. What was new, he said, was the insistence that the agency should support only Mr. Trump’s priorities and gut many longstanding programs.
According to the plaintiffs, the unspent money from the canceled grants totals about $154 million. Only 54 grants remain intact, many of them, Mr. Grossman said, relating to the American Revolution, the nation’s founders and the 250th anniversary of independence.
“The projects that remain are good projects,” Mr. Grossman said. “The problem is they’re the only universe of projects. The letters of termination say ‘your project is not within the realm of what the president thinks is important.’ That’s what has never happened before.”
Jennifer Schuessler is a reporter for the Culture section of The Times who covers intellectual life and the world of ideas.
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