Judge blocks additional federal agencies from terminating UC research grants

SAN FRANCISCO (CN) — A federal judge Monday blocked three additional federal agencies from terminating University of California research grants without any specific explanation.

U.S. District Judge Rita Lin granted a preliminary injunction to a group of researchers whose grants from the Department of Defense, the Department of Transportation or the Department of Health and Human Services, through the National Institutes of Health, were terminated by a “form termination notice” that did not provide a specific explanation for the termination.

However, the Barack Obama appointee opted to extend the injunction covering grants that were terminated due to researching blacklisted diversity, equity and inclusion topics, only to those terminated by the Department of Transportation.

“DOT’s public statements and termination letters indicate that it terminated grants … for the purpose of implementing the Equity Termination Orders, in a way that constitutes viewpoint discrimination,” Lin said in her order.

The plaintiffs are six UC researchers who sued after losing their multi-year grants from the Environmental Protection Agency, National Endowment for the Humanities and National Science Foundation. Their projects addressed issues like wildfire smoke-related health risks in marginalized communities, landfill methane emissions and racial equity in STEM education.

On June 23, Lin previously ruled the federal government’s cancellation of research grants for reasons related to diversity, equity, and inclusion likely violated the First Amendment and granted a preliminary injunction vacating the federal agencies’ terminations of the class members’ grants.

The judge also provisionally certified two classes of UC researchers: one consisting of researchers whose grants were terminated without any specific explanation, and one whose grants were terminated due to researching blacklisted DEI topics.

In a hearing last Thursday to add the DOD, DOT and NIH to the preliminary injunction, Lin said that the plaintiffs were asking for “essentially the same” injunction that she previously issued.

“Although there are some differences in the form letters, they all suffer from the same, fundamental sin: they were done through unreasoned, mass terminations through letters that don’t go through,” she said.

In her Monday order, Lin ruled that researchers are likely to succeed on their claims that the Trump administration’s mass termination of research grants involving certain blacklisted topics by DOD, DOT and NIH was arbitrary and capricious.

However, she declined to rule whether the defense department’s or NIH’s terminations were contrary to law, finding that the “record as to HHS-NIH and DOD is less developed and would benefit from further fact development.” Additionally, she found that the plaintiffs were not likely to succeed on their First Amendment claim against the two agencies.

“Much like DOD, the record suggests that HHS and NIH have likely engaged in viewpoint discrimination against UC researchers by terminating grants, pursuant to Equity Termination Orders, based on disfavored speech contained in the grant applications,” she said. “However, no named plaintiff can presently assert a claim based on these facts.”

Lin noted her ruling was without prejudice, leaving the door open for plaintiffs to amend their ruling “if supported by good cause, as the record in this case develops.”

Lin also pushed back at the government’s jurisdictional arguments to the suit, claiming that the claims should be heard in the Court of Federal Claims as breach-of-contract claims and that the plaintiffs lack standing, because they are not parties to the grant agreements.

“The district courts are the only forum where the UC researchers could defend their constitutional and statutory rights, and the Ninth Circuit has already determined that they may bring their claims here. This court will not shut its doors to them,” she said.

The injunction vacates all three agencies’ terminations of the class members’ grants that did not provide a grant-specific explanation and reinstates the terminated grants. The injunction also vacates all grants terminated by the transportation department due to DEI and reinstates those terminated grants.

It additionally blocks the agencies from future grant terminations that meet the same qualifications as the order.

Attorneys for both parties did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Separately, a coalition of University of California labor groups is suing the Trump administration, claiming they are using the threat of federal funding cuts to “coerce” the university system into implementing ideological policies that infringe on the free speech and academic freedom of UC faculty, students and staff.

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