Research grants at the University of Minnesota, which were terminated by the National Institutes of Health earlier this year, are in the process of being restored following recent court rulings.
Near the end of June, federal Judge William Young reinstated roughly 900 grants across the country. Young ruled the termination of research initiatives to be unlawful and discriminatory, according to the ACLU.
The ruling was in response to two lawsuits against the NIH for its cancellation of over $3 billion in research grants since January, according to an analysis by the Association of American Medical Colleges. One of the lawsuits was filed by researchers and the labor unions that represent them, and another by a coalition of Democratic-led states’ attorneys general, according to the analysis.
Of the reported NIH grants based in Minnesota, the University had more than 20 grants terminated in the spring, according to Grant Watch, a crowdsourced database. Grant Watch has been tracking both NIH and National Science Foundation grant terminations since March.
Nearly all reported grants at the University previously terminated by the NIH now indicate possible reinstatement, with some researchers already receiving notice of grants being restored in the past week, according to Grant Watch.
Although reinstatements are being issued, details surrounding reinstatements at the University remain unclear. The University did not respond to a request for comment on current NIH grant terminations and reinstatements.
Since President Donald Trump returned to office, nearly 2,700 NIH-reported awards have been terminated nationwide, according to Grant Watch. Recent reinstatements affected only grants identified in the lawsuits.
Many of the terminated grants have been on targeted topics like diversity, equity, inclusion and LGBTQ+ initiatives, but cancer, maternal mortality and internet freedom grant-funded research have been included in the cancellations, according to reports by Inside Higher Ed.
Grant Watch co-founder Scott Delaney combined efforts with computational researcher Noam Ross to start tracking terminated federal grants back in March.
Delaney said Grant Watch uses data from various sources, including federal datasets and crowdsourced information from affected scientists, to try and provide a list of terminations. He said this is due to the lack of a comprehensive, up-to-date list of terminated grants from the federal government.
When it comes to NIH data, Delaney added, they feel confident they have captured the majority of terminated grants, but they also acknowledge that Grant Watch is not a complete list.
“I feel fairly confident that we have 85% of the grants that have been terminated in our air table,” Delaney said. “Just from experience, over the last four and a half months, I can confidently say that we do not have every single grant that’s been terminated or frozen.”
Delaney said the data is updated twice a week, and Grant Watch works to include context that goes beyond the type of grant and institution. It has expanded to include institutional characteristics, financial breakdowns and congressional districts.
“A lot of congress members do not fully appreciate how much money their congressional districts are losing because of these terminations,” Delaney said. “There are a lot of grant terminations happening in the northeast and in the Ivy League schools, but grant terminations have hit virtually every state and every corner of the country.”
The reinstated NIH grant funding has been largely concentrated in Democratic congressional districts like Minnesota. An estimated $2.1 billion will be returning to these areas compared to $62 million in Republican districts, according to a report by STAT News.
As of late April, the University reported that 72 federal research awards had been terminated, totaling $22.3 million of grant funding lost and directly impacting over 200 employees, according to a statement released in May. A majority of the awards affected were from the NIH, NSF and the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
University biology professor David Greenstein said one of the two NIH-funded training research grants he runs, the Minnesota Institutional Research And Career Development Award Program, faced initial termination threats back in February.
Greenstein said he received notice of termination in early April by email, but never received an official termination letter like other grants at the University had. According to Greenstein, this left the program in a state of uncertainty for several months.
“We weren’t eligible for any bridging funding because we actually were never terminated,” Greenstein said. “We were told our program will be terminated, you will be terminated, but the letter never came.”
The program, which is in its ninth year supporting diverse postdoctoral students and community college co-teaching and mentoring, recently had its funding reinstated through 2027. Greenstein said he believes the recent court ruling led to this reinstatement.
“This is a good problem to have, the funding’s come back, but could it disappear again? You don’t know,” Greenstein said. “We still have contingency plans in place.”
Greenstein said, despite feeling like this is a precarious time for science, he is optimistic and intends to expand his program. He said he feels it is positioned to compete for other funding opportunities.
“I am thrilled that I get two more years, that gives me time,” Greenstein said. “The worst case scenario is people lose their jobs or stop their research and work on something else.”
Delaney said Grant Watch is currently tracking reinstatements, based on the lists of grants provided to the judge in both lawsuits. According to Delaney, they are still waiting for federal system updates and confirmation from Payment Management Services to indicate that grant funding has actually been restored.
“It’s important to make sure that not only is the grant active in the NIH system, but also the payment management system is allowing the money to flow out the door,” Delaney said. “We know right now that the payment management system is holding up tons of grants.”
Delaney said that as reinstatements move forward, it will be important to follow whether researchers are able to access funds or reimbursement.
Delaney added that new language included in notices of renewed grant funding to researchers is worrisome due to its implications for science and research.
“The NIH started inserting new language in the standard terms and conditions that they put into every single new notice of award,” Delaney said. “It’s language that requires compliance with the gender ideology executive order.”
The executive order issued in January by the Trump administration called for the limiting of federal funding for programs promoting gender identity. Delaney said this is another way the NIH could start to pull back funding from researchers, and that it contradicts the recent court order restoring terminated grants.
In notices provided to the Minnesota Daily from researchers, compliance with the Trump administration’s executive order are conditions of receiving federal funding.
“People should know about this, and yet it’s in a part of the notice of award that nobody reads, scientists aren’t going to read that,” Delaney said. “General counsel at universities absolutely should be aware of it, though.”
Marla Eisenberg said she received a termination letter for her research at the end of March, which halted the money her team had left from their four-year project that started in 2021.
The letter stated that her research, which studied the intersectional disparities among LGBTQ+ youth of color, no longer aligned with the federal government’s priorities.
Eisenberg said that since their team was utilizing residual funds, the termination came as a shock. Eisenberg added that, as a team composed of people of all levels of training, backgrounds and identities across the country, losing their funding was also an emotional blow.
“I thought we were safe from this,” Eisenberg said. “We couldn’t pay people, we couldn’t pay for conference travel to share findings, we couldn’t use the funds at all.”
Eisenberg said there was great administrative support from all levels of the University. Her team was given funding by the University to help cover salaries and other expenses in the months before their reinstatement in June, which will fund the program through the end of 2025.
Eisenberg had hoped to expand her research, but her five-year proposal submitted to the NIH was rejected.
“There is a lot more to do to really expand in lots of different directions, and that will not be funded in the current climate,” Eisenberg said. “I’m not putting in any grants to the NIH right now. It is not worth my time, because they will be rejected out of hand.”
