Preliminary injunction granted in lawsuit against USDA ordering restoration of wrongfully terminated grants and funding that support tree planting, growing food in underserved communities, training new farmers, and helping farmers adopt climate-friendly practices
Today, the United States District Court for the District of Columbia issued an order, following a motion for preliminary injunction, granting the restoration of six USDA grants for farmers and communities. As the June 5, 2025 demanda alleges, following several Trump administration Executive Orders, and at the direction of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), “Defendants began engaging in a policy, pattern, and practice of unlawfully terminating federal grant awards,” including those awarded to the Plaintiffs.
The Plaintiffs, Comunidades de Agroecología, Cooperativa de Bluegrass de Oakville, Providence Farm Collective Corp. Instituto de Agricultura y Política Comercial, y el Urban Sustainability Directors Network (USDN) alleged that USDA’s grant terminations were arbitrary and capricious, and for some terminations, also contrary to law, all in violation of the Administrative Procedures Act (APA), among other claims. The plaintiff groups are represented by Earthjustice, Farmers Justice Center, and FarmSTAND in this action.
“The Court’s granting of the plaintiffs’ motion for a preliminary injunction is the only appropriate response to DOGE and USDA’s illegal and destructive grant cancelation,” said David Muraskin, who is Managing Director for Litigation at FarmSTAND and argued for the motion in court. “As a result of today’s ruling, the plaintiffs in this case will be able to support a habitable climate, fair food system, and healthy nation for all again.”
The DOGE website lists a total of approximately 600 USDA grant funding “terminations,” and suggests the money allocated by Congress for these grants are now “savings,” that the Administration has no intention to spend unless forced to by the courts.
“In the wake of this ruling, we hope the USDA stops arbitrarily cancelling grants and contracts without an understanding of the work being done,” said Erin McKee, Community Food Systems Program Director at the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy. “We’re glad this preliminary finding confirms that cancellation of our grant was unjust and are thrilled to be able to continue doing the important work of ensuring Minnesota farmers understand how decisions that will impact them are made and how they can get involved.”
“The Court agreed with us that the USDA’s termination of the plaintiffs’ grants was likely illegal and must be vacated,” said Carrie Apfel, Deputy Managing Attorney of the Sustainable Food and Farming Program at Earthjustice. “Critically, the Court recognized that the plaintiff organizations suffer irremediable harm from this abrupt and unjustified cancellation of their funding – harm including layoffs and abandoning programs, which in turn irremediably harms the farmers and communities the plaintiffs serve.”
The Court acknowledged that “Defendants have complete discretion to choose what grants to award, and defendants also have broad authority to terminate grants.” However, the Court rejected the defendants’ argument that it had the unfettered discretion to revoke funding for projects that explicitly fulfill Congressional mandates: “Defendants flout Congress’s mandates, however, when they terminate grants for the very reason that the grants further the aims Congress explicitly instructed defendants to pursue.”
Specifically, the Court found that “Congress identified tree planting and protection of tree coverage as a climate change initiative in [the Cooperative Forestry Act]. That is precisely USDN’s project. Defendants cannot terminate a grant for filling the express statutory aim described and enacted by Congress.” Similarly, the Court found that Defendants “terminat[ed] [Agroecology Commons’] grant because the grant supported specific groups, like racial minorities, that have historically faced discrimination—despite Congress’s explicit instruction for funding to be used to support such “underserved” groups.”
The Court further held that “plaintiffs have demonstrated a likelihood of success in showing that all five of their already terminated grants were terminated arbitrarily and capriciously” in violation of the APA. The Court determined that these “grant terminations clearly lacked sufficient explanation. The termination letters offered only vague and conclusory reasoning with no consideration of reliance interests, dispelling any assumption that the agency conducted an individualized review.”
Additionally, the Court examined and found that Plaintiffs would suffer irremediable harm absent the injunction restoring the funding: Plaintiffs had had to terminate programs, leave land fallow, lay off staff, curtail education efforts, and more. It held, “[t]he complete termination of the organizations’ programming, impairing their central missions and damaging their reputations and relationships, and the existential threat to the ongoing operation of the organizations constitute irreparable harms justifying preliminary injunctive relief.”
The Court finally found that the balance of the equities and the public interest favor the Plaintiffs and granting the injunction, without any bond.
While the Court found there was not sufficient evidence in the record before it of a policy of en masse terminations of these grants, it noted that documents in the administrative record – still to be produced by the USDA – could support such a finding. And while the relief granted is limited to the plaintiffs in the case, the ruling sets a strong precedent that could allow hundreds of other grants to be challenged and reinstated. The USDA will be required to provide the administrative record in the case by the end of September and, based on that record, there may be further proceedings regarding the policy or the grants of other organizations.