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Judge rules to lift federal funding freeze, some USDA grants in limbo

A lead attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center says the federal government has been ordered to release frozen grant funds.

“Those grants should start flowing again immediately.”

Kym Meyer tells Brownfield President Trump’s executive order to freeze and terminate 32 Inflation Reduction Act and Inflation Investment and Jobs Act grants violated the Administrative Procedures Act.

“It’s our understanding that they are working to comply with the order, which means releasing funds and getting grant funds back up and up and running,” she says. “A the same time, the government has filed an appeal a couple of days ago, and then yesterday they moved for a stay.”

As part of the decision, the U.S. District Court judge said it’s hard to believe that numerous active federal grants, some totaling millions of dollars, were summarily terminated by a high-ranking government official without the production of a single document to detail the review and decision-making process.

Meyer says agencies, including the EPA, USDA, DOE, and DOT, have to show that they are in compliance in the next week and are releasing funding.

Six USDA grants funded by the Commodity Credit Corporation, including the Climate-Smart Commodity Program, were not granted a preliminary injunction.

“There’s going to be additional litigation required to get some clarification on the future of those grants,” Meyer says.

Defendants claim appropriations were not part of any mandatory legislation, and terminations are an effort to reduce administrative costs so that producers receive a greater share of the benefits of the federal funds

Meyer says the case has the potential to move to the U.S. Supreme Court before the end of the summer.