Michigan Humanities had $900,000 of its $1.4 million budget put on hold by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) in April. A federal judge has now ruled that the cuts were “unconstitutional” and has put a pause on any future cuts to humanities grants.
Michigan Humanities President Jennifer Rupp says this is a step in the right direction, but funding is still frozen.
“We're really looking to show that the freezing of that funding was unlawful and we were successful in doing that,” Rupp said. “It does not restore any of our funding. It does not open any new lines of funding for us, but it does take us in a step in the right direction.”
Michigan Humanities is one of thousands of groups that received funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities.
In his ruling, U.S. District Judge Michael H. Simon said that councils like Michigan Humanities were "likely to succeed on their claim that the withholding of the funds at issue in this case is unconstitutional."
Rupp said she is glad the case is moving forward.
“We hope that down the road (the lawsuit) will lead to a restoration of funding,” Rupp said.
Over the past few months, the organization has had to rely on donations. The sudden halt of funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities has resulted in cuts to staffing and various programs.
One program Michigan Humanities offers is the Great Michigan Read tour, which aims to bring communities together by reading a selected book. The organization went from giving out 10,000 books to 3,500 books.
“We used to grant over $600,000 a year to hundreds of organizations in all 83 counties across the state,” Rupp said. “We've had to make some really tough decisions the last couple of months.”
Rupp said that despite the funding cuts, Michigan Humanities will still try to bring programs to counties across the country.
“We're looking at programs that we can do within some of the private fundraising,” Rupp said. “We are accepting individual donations and trying to diversify our funding stream, kind of during this roller coaster of a time."
