Some arts and cultural groups across the United States that were previously awarded federal grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities have received letters informing them that their funding has been canceled by the Trump administration.
Rumors swirled earlier this week that Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) was recommending extreme cuts to NEH staff by as much as 70 to 80 percent. There was also talk of the possible cancelation of all outstanding grants made under the Biden administration.
State humanities councils and other grant recipients started receiving “Notice of Grant Termination” emails informing them that their funding would stop, effective immediately, on Wednesday evening.
The letter explains, “Your grant no longer effectuates the agency’s needs and priorities and conditions of the Grant Agreement and is subject to termination.” It went on, “Your grant’s immediate termination is necessary to safeguard the interests of the federal government, including its fiscal priorities.” Instead, the NEH would be “repurposing its funding allocations in a new direction in furtherance of the president’s agenda.”
The humanities “preserve community history and identity,” said Stephen Kidd, executive director of the organization National Humanities Alliance, in an interview with NPR. His nonprofit is collecting information on those whose NEH grants were pulled.
While the extent of federal grant and staff cuts remains unclear, Kidd said, “We do know that it is affecting the state humanities councils which are crucial to the vitality of humanities across the country. This is funding that was appropriated by Congress to the state affiliates of the NEH. This is funding that has been promised to the states that is now being withdrawn.”
The cancelations impact humanities councils across 56 states and jurisdictions, which collectively expected to receive about $65 million from the NEH out of its approximately $210 million annual budget.
Some, like Mary C. Henry, associate professor of geography at Miami University in Ohio, took to social media to express their frustration: “Just got word that a ‘$500,000 NEH Challenge Grant for the construction of a new #Humanities Center and humanities hub in Bachelor Hall was terminated last night by #NEH Acting Chairman Michael McDonald’ here at Miami University.”
Already, some politicians have denounced the cancelation of NEH grants. “Let’s be clear: These grants were already awarded and use funds already appropriated by Congress on a bipartisan basis,” Chellie Pingree, a Maine Democrat and a ranking minority member on the House Appropriations subcommittee overseeing the endowment, told the New York Times. “The notion that these terminations are justified by a sudden shift in ‘federal priorities’ is nonsense. This is ideological targeting—pure and simple. And it is happening with no input from Congress or the public.”
Many state councils depend on funding from NEH grants to support museums, historical sites, and community projects. The allocation is based on population size, with Texas receiving roughly $3.4 million and North Dakota about $900,000, for example.
