Attorneys for the plaintiff nonprofit organizations in USDN v. USDA, a suit to stop illegal grant terminations by the Trump Administration, filed a First Amended Complaint late yesterday adding new plaintiffs, defendants, and allegations to the suit.
The amended complaint adds the Department of Government Efficiency and more USDA staff in their official capacity as defendants, and adds two grantee plaintiffs whose grants the defendants terminated specifically because they were supposedly doing ‘DEI’ work. Comment from new plaintiffs on the impact of the terminations is below.
The amended complaint also makes reference to Secretary Rollins’s stated intention to terminate a grant that resembles a grant that plaintiff Agroecology Commons has, and argues that officially terminating such a grant would be unlawful in the way that other terminations at issue in the suit are.
New plaintiff Providence Farm Collective’s comment on the meaning and impact of their termination:
“Providence Farm Collective’s Incubator Farm Program is the only new entry farmer training program providing farmland access, farming and business education, shared equipment, resources, and markets access in Western New York, that has a goal of launching participants to viable farm businesses,” said Kristin Heltman-Weiss, Executive Director at PFC.
“The USDA termination disrupts PFC’s efforts to innovate solutions to work for the transition and protection of farmland and to build the skills of 21 aspiring farm entrepreneurs. Technical assistance through the Beginning Farmer and Rancher Development Program (BFRDP) has supported PFC farmers in increasing yields by over 400% and farm sales by over 400% – with the loss of funding directly impacting farmers’ yields and profits. This funding loss multiplies harms across our region’s economy, its farmers, and its food system.”
New plaintiff The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy’s comment on the meaning and impact of their termination:
“The purpose of this grant is to get essential resources and information to community members who are deeply connected to Minnesota’s farm and food system but often are shut out of the development of farm programs — that includes farmers, producers, food service directors, food shelf operators, conservation program directors and more. We spent the first part of our grant term gathering input on what resources and information they most needed, building a framework and drafting content with the help of our partners. The abrupt and unexpected cancellation of our grant comes at a critical juncture just before we were planning to finalize and publish our ‘Farm and Food Systems 101’ resources to make this information available to all, negating all the work we have put in over the last year and a half.”
-Erin McKee, Community Food Systems Program Director, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy
All plaintiffs in the suit are represented by FarmSTAND, Earthjustice, and Farmers Justice Center. More information about the legal arguments in this case can be found in the press release for the filing of the initial complaint.