Higher Ed Alarmed by Trump’s Plan to Freeze Federal Grants

President Trump’s plan to temporarily freeze federal grants and loans set off a wave of confusion and concerns across higher ed Tuesday. But just minutes before it was set to take effect, a federal judge blocked the order.

It is now on hold until next Monday, at least.

College leaders worried they would lose access to a wide variety of federal funds, though the specific programs affected by the pause remained in flux throughout the day. Education Department officials said Pell Grants, student loans and Federal Work-Study would not be subject to the pause. But critical STEM research and student success initiatives were among the thousands of programs whose funding would have been paused until at least Feb. 10, according to the original White House directive released late Monday night.

University lobbyists and administrators predicted earlier Tuesday that the president’s unprecedented action would be blocked in the courts, but they warned of significant consequences as they worked to gather more information about the order. Comparable to a government shutdown, they said, the impact of a freeze, if it ever comes to pass, would largely depend on how long it lasts. 

“Obviously it’s of great concern,” said Patricia McGuire, president of Trinity Washington University in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday morning. “Most of us are finding the memo to be so broad and so incomprehensible that we don’t even quite know what the long-term impact is … But it makes no sense. Rather than helping ‘make America great again,’ it absolutely debilitates America.”

Conservative policy experts say Trump’s actions are necessary to combat years of misguided spending and argue that institutions shouldn’t run budgets so razor-thin that a short-term loss of federal funds empties their coffers. But McGuire and other higher ed representatives say the proposed freeze along with other executive actions raises questions about whether they can count on stable federal funding in the long run.

Universities have already seen some disruptions to research funding since Trump took office eight days ago, as the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation canceled meetings to review grant applications last week. Before the federal court released its ruling, the proposed extension of that freeze had only further fueled academics’ initial concerns.

The White House Office of Management and Budget had directed all federal agencies to pause any grants and loans they supervised in order to ensure that federal spending aligns with the president’s priorities, such as cracking down on diversity, equity and inclusion programs and illegal immigration. OMB specifically said it is aiming to cease any funding to activities that “may be implicated by the executive orders, including but not limited to, financial assistance for foreign aid, nongovernmental organizations, DEI, woke gender ideology, and the green new deal,” according to the memo.

The two-page directive specifically exempted Social Security, Medicare and other programs that provide direct financial assistance to individuals. But colleges and universities would still lose access to grants that are targeted at minority-serving institutions, college preparation programs, childcare for student parents, food banks, student retention and graduation initiatives, campus hospital systems, and more. Over all, more than 2,600 grant programs are up for consideration across dozens of agencies, Bloomberg reported.

A follow-up memo was published Tuesday in an attempt to help clarify the president’s orders, but higher ed stakeholders said much uncertainty remains.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said early Tuesday afternoon that the freeze would not be “a blanket pause on federal assistance and grant programs,” and she repeatedly said that direct federal assistance to individuals wouldn’t be affected. But she didn’t have a clear answer about what would happen to federal money that goes to states, organizations or colleges that support individuals. She also pushed back on questions about the legality of the pause and said the move was aimed at ensuring that federal spending aligns with the president’s priorities.

“No more funding for illegal DEI programs,” she said. “No more funding for transgenderism and wokeness.”

Leavitt was asked about funding for minority-serving institutions and said she hadn’t “seen the entire list” of programs either affected or exempted from the pause.

Sarah Spreitzer, vice president and chief of staff for government relations at the American Council on Education, said concerns remain despite the legal injunction.

In the initial memo, OMB instructed agencies to conduct a comprehensive review by Feb. 7 of federal programs to ensure they comply with Trump’s executive orders. White House officials offered more guidance Tuesday about what that would entail. Agencies will have to answer a series of questions for each program listed on the 52-page document by Feb. 7. Those questions include whether the programs fund DEI or support “illegal aliens,” the promotion of “gender ideology” or “activities overseas.”

It’s just going to cause a lot of chaos when it comes to planning. It is definitely a developing story.”

—Sarah Spreitzer, American Council on Education

It’s unclear whether the judge’s order affects the broader review.

To Spreitzer and others, that broader review could threaten more federal programs, as those considered unaligned with the president’s agenda could be altered or cut back entirely.

“If there’s an injunction within a week and everything can start up again, I think that the impact is minimal,” Spreitzer said. But “there’s so much in that [memo] about the examination of all grants going forward … that go beyond just the pause that I think I’d have to see the further implementation instructions to understand the complete impact on the scientific and education enterprise.”

‘Unnecessary and Damaging’

Higher ed officials and student advocacy groups warned throughout the day that the pause, in addition to a recent flurry of executive orders, would cause unnecessary disruption to the primary goals and functions of American colleges and universities and could jeopardize crucial scientific research. The National Association of College and University Business Officers said in a statement that the pause could cause “unnecessary disruption to the lives of tens of thousands of students and families at colleges and universities across the country.”

“The overall impact to programs … could be both significant and chaotic,” NACUBO president Kara D. Freeman said. “College and university chief business officers will be front and center with their presidents, boards, and executive leadership in developing plans to mitigate immediate exposure and impacts. We urge the Trump administration to reconsider and rescind this misguided policy.”

Mark Becker, president of the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities, called the memo’s orders “unnecessary and damaging.”

“While we understand the Trump administration wants to review programs to ensure consistency with its priorities, it is imperative that the reviews not interfere with American innovation and competitiveness,” Becker said. “It will have far-reaching impacts in every corner of the country and hamper American innovation at a moment when it’s being fiercely challenged on a global stage.”

Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, said in a statement that she hopes Trump and Republicans on Capitol Hill will see how the pause could hurt American citizens and address the gap by resuming grant distribution.

“Federal programs need to be more efficient, but no one voted for a president to halt their services—services that were appropriated, authorized and extended by Congress,” she said in a statement. “Americans need a federal government that works for them, not against them.”

Democratic lawmakers have also raised the red flag, responding with outrage and “extreme alarm,” warning that the pause would undermine Congress’s authority and have “devastating consequences across the country.”

Reactions from professors and student advocacy groups were swift late Monday and early Tuesday.

“I don’t see how any Democrat can get away with voting to confirm Linda McMahon after this memo. The entire hearing should be focused on how the U.S. government is tearing apart everyday life for regular people,” Mike Pierce, executive director of the Student Borrower Protection Center, wrote on X.

Jody Freedman, a professor at Harvard Law School, took to BlueSky. “What is going on here?” she wrote. “I think what’s going on here is that Russell Vought (perhaps others in the administration too, but certainly him) … are testing the Republicans in Congress on this issue to see if they spring to life.”

“It’s like Hey, the door’s open, no one’s home, let’s rob the place. And by rob I mean, let’s take all the power Congress thinks it has over the appropriations,” she added.

‘Extremely Widespread’ Abuse

Congressional Republicans have said little in response to the pause, and conservative policy experts say the freeze is a necessary step to address years of “illegal spending” by Democrats to advance their political motives.

Inside Higher Ed reached out to both Senator Dr. Bill Cassidy and Representative Tim Walberg, chairs of the congressional committees that handle education policy, but neither responded with comment.

Michael Brickman, an adjunct fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a right-leaning think tank, said that the Trump administration’s actions—though “aggressive”—are justified decisions aimed to restore the rule of law and ensure that government money “isn’t being set on fire at every turn.”

“What you’re seeing overall across the administration is an attempt to get a handle on the waste and the abuse of taxpayer dollars,” Brickman said.

He went on to say that though it would be ideal to only freeze certain programs and limit the consequences of stalled grants, breadth was a necessity in this scenario.

“We saw during the Biden administration, brazen attempts again and again to ignore the law” when utilizing federal funds, Brickman said. “Why let good money continue to go out the door when we know for the last four years that so much of it has been wasted … I wish it were narrow and targeted, but unfortunately, the abuse is extremely widespread.”

And if colleges don’t have a contingency plan in place for any kind of budgetary disruption, “that’s malpractice on their part,” he added.

‘Plan for the Worst’

McGuire, from Trinity, said the pause would likely affect grants for predominantly Black institutions, which her university uses to provide student advising, new lab materials and certification programs in high-demand areas of the workforce.

Trinity has already received its $250,000 in such grants for the current academic year, so no programs will have to shut down immediately if the freeze is reinstated, she said. But she worries about the reliability of federal funds moving forward. She explained that uncertainty about grants could mean cuts and amendments to the budget for fiscal year 2026. 

“We hope for the best but plan for the worst,” she said. “We’re going into budget season right now, so we will probably have to plan alternative support for the programs funded through the PBI [grants].”

Spreitzer, from ACE, echoed the future impact but also noted that certain colleges could pay the price more immediately. Many large research universities require billions of dollars in federal grants to keep their labs and hospitals running every day, she said, and there’s variation in when grant funds are dispersed, so many may have yet to receive the dollars needed to keep the lights on.

“It’s going to depend on whether institutions have existing grants and whether they’re waiting for disbursements. It’s just going to cause a lot of chaos when it comes to planning,” she said. “It is definitely a developing story.”