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White House used keywords to cancel California research grants, AP says

generalJul 22, 202629453

Federal agencies acknowledged in signed court stipulations that they used keyword searches referencing diversity, gender, vaccine hesitancy and COVID-19 to screen and terminate more than 1,000 University of California research grants last year. Lawyers for the UC researchers say the admission shows the agencies “did not terminate any grants based on alleged noncompliance with the terms of the grant” and instead applied broad, non, grant-specific criteria to cancel nearly $2 billion in awards. The plaintiffs in Thakur v. Trump now ask U.S. District Judge Rita F. Lin to skip a trial and formally declare the administration violated the Constitution, including the First Amendment. The filings also say the Department of Energy lost 283 grants in states that voted for Kamala Harris in 2024 while grants in many Republican-leaning states were left intact, which the researchers contend amounts to punished speech and residency. Judge Lin has already issued preliminary injunctions restoring hundreds of grants, including at UCLA, where the White House had also demanded a $1.2 billion payment or faced further research freezes. A hearing on whether the court will enter judgment without a trial is scheduled for Oct. 20. The Justice Department had not responded to a request for comment by publication time.

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