Trump asks Supreme Court to let him cancel grants to teachers

WASHINGTON — The Trump administration on Wednesday asked the Supreme Court to let it cancel $65 million in teacher-training grants that it contends would promote diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.

The court indicated that it would act quickly on the government’s emergency application, ordering the challengers to respond by Friday.

The filing was the administration’s second emergency application this week objecting to a lower-court ruling against it, and the fifth since President Donald Trump took office.

The Education Department last month sent grant recipients boilerplate form letters ending the funding, saying the recipients were engaged in activities “that violate either the letter or purpose of federal civil rights law; that conflict with the department’s policy of prioritizing merit, fairness, and excellence in education; that are not free from fraud, abuse or duplication; or that otherwise fail to serve the best interests of the United States.”

Judge Myong J. Joun of the U.S. District Court in Massachusetts temporarily ordered the grants to remain available while he considered a suit brought by California and seven other states challenging the terminations.

On Friday, the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, in Boston, rejected a request from the Trump administration to pause Joun’s order, saying the government’s arguments were based on “speculation and hyperbole.”

In temporarily blocking the cancellation of the grants, Joun said he sought to maintain the status quo. He wrote that if he failed to do so, “dozens of programs upon which public schools, public universities, students, teachers and faculty rely will be gutted.” On the other hand, he reasoned, if he did pause the Trump administration action, the groups would merely continue to receive funds that had been appropriated by Congress.

In the administration’s emergency application in the Supreme Court, Sarah M. Harris, the acting solicitor general, said Joun’s order was one of many lower-court rulings thwarting government initiatives.

“The aim is clear: to stop the executive branch in its tracks and prevent the administration from changing direction on hundreds of billions of dollars of government largesse that the executive branch considers contrary to the United States’ interests and fiscal health,” she wrote.

She added, “Only this court can right the ship — and the time to do so is now.”

The case followed the Trump administration’s termination of more than $600 million in grants for teacher training in February, as part of its crackdown on efforts related to diversity and equity. The Education Department claimed the funding was being used “to train teachers and education agencies on divisive ideologies” like social justice activism and anti-racism.

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