NEW YORK (AP) — A new coalition of nonprofits came together overnight to challenge a seemingly sweeping order from the Trump administration last week pausing trillions of dollars in federal funding. They succeeded in blocking that order, at least for now.
It’s the start of what nonprofits expect will be a deluge of court actions, as civil litigation promises to be a powerful tool civil society groups plan to use to push back on President Donald Trump’s policies.
“There will be an avalanche of litigation to stop unlawful activity,” said Skye Perryman, the president and CEO of Democracy Forward, which brought the nonprofit coalition’s suit against the federal funding freeze. A judge ruled Monday to allow their lawsuit, one of many filed in the first weeks of the new administration, to move forward and extended a temporary restraining order.
More than a dozen federal lawsuits have already been filed against President Trump and his administration by a wide range of nonprofits, from several Quaker organizations to the consumer rights group Public Citizen to New Hampshire Indonesian Community Support.
Many considered policy changes under the new administration, but few contemplated the total suspension of foreign aid or a widespread pause of federal funding. The federal funding freeze was a moment widely viewed by the nonprofit sector as an existential crisis. And organizations took a range of approaches from keeping their heads down, to organizing community forums, to firing up supporters to contact Congress.
Diane Yentel, the president and CEO the National Council of Nonprofits, moved quickly to take action. She had already been tracking the impact of President Donald Trump’s initial executive orders on nonprofits when she saw the memo in the evening on Jan. 27.
The Office of Management and Budget order said: “Federal agencies must temporarily pause all activities related to obligation or disbursement of all Federal financial assistance.”
Posting to LinkedIn that night, Yentel wrote, the OMB memo was, “a potential 5-alarm fire for nonprofits and the people and communities they serve,” adding, “We won’t stand by and let it happen.”
Within hours, the National Council of Nonprofits, Democracy Forward, and several other groups joined forces and hammered out a legal strategy.
