Update: The Trump administration announced the day after the funding freeze spurred alarm that it had been “rescinded.”
Jewish organizations that deliver a wide array of social services are scrambling to make sense of President Donald Trump’s unprecedented freeze on many forms of federal funding.
“This has a massive, widespread impact,” said Reuben Rotman, president and CEO of the Network of Jewish Human Service Agencies, a coalition of about 170 Jewish nonprofits and agencies. He added, “We are incredibly concerned about the impact here.”
The Trump administration said the freeze, announced late Monday just 24 hours before it was to go into effect, was meant to ensure that government spending aligns with Trump’s views on gender, class and the environment.
“The use of Federal resources to advance Marxist equity, transgenderism, and green new deal social engineering policies is a waste of taxpayer dollars that does not improve the day-to-day lives of those we serve,” Matthew Vaeth, the acting director of Trump’s budget office, wrote in a memo announcing the freeze.
A federal judge temporarily stopped the freeze on Tuesday afternoon in response to a lawsuit charging that it violated the First Amendment as well as laws about how presidential decrees must be enacted.
The rapid back and forth on Tuesday — as well as continued uncertainty about the freeze’s future — represents the first concrete consequence of the new administration for many groups, including a wide array of Jewish organizations that provide direct assistance to the needy and deliver safety protections to communities.
Rotman’s organization has roughly 170 members, including social services agencies, kosher food banks, domestic violence programs, elder care providers and refugee support groups. He said many of them depended on federal funding that arrives on an ongoing basis.
“If it gets extended past two weeks … what will happen to programs that are deemed not to be in keeping with the administration’s priorities?” Rotman asked before the judge’s ruling.
Some Jewish organizations, such as those that serve refugees, knew the Trump administration would complicate or undercut their work. Trump ran on an anti-immigrant platform and has already launched raids to arrest undocumented immigrants and issued a “stop work” order against organizations that seek to resettle refugees.
But others appeared to have been blindsided by realizing that their work had been ensnared in a funding freeze.
“We are actively monitoring the situation and assessing what it means for the communities we serve and the issues we value,” Jewish Federations of North America said in a statement. “Since such a pause has not occurred in over 50 years, the implications are currently unclear, and we are working to clarify the situation and update our community with recommendations as the situation comes into focus.”
JFNA has seen its funding from the federal government increase in recent years and is slated to receive $8.4 million during the current year, according to a government website that tracks federal spending.
Also potentially affected by the freeze is the Nonprofit Security Grant Program, which funds security enhancements at houses of worship and religious institutions. More than $450 million is allocated through the program this year, up roughly 50% over the previous year.
“By halting funds for vital measures like the Nonprofit Security Grant Program during a time of heightened antisemitism, while simultaneously suspending essential social safety net services, this action undermines our ability to protect religious institutions and support our most vulnerable neighbors,” said Mark Treyger, CEO of the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York.
Other Jewish groups cited similarly high stakes for the freeze. Jewish Women International, for example, called federal grants “the lifeblood” of efforts to combat violence against women.
“These programs save lives, empower individuals to rebuild after experiencing trauma, and hold people who perpetrate violence accountable,” the group added. “Without immediate action, victim service organizations across the country may have to cut services, lay off staff, or even close entirely, denying critical services to their communities.”
Issued with little detail, the funding freeze wreaked havoc across the United States on Tuesday, as local and state officials were left without information about how they would be affected and the Medicaid health care reimbursements system crashed in an outage whose ties to the freeze remained unclear. With the pause in place at least until Monday, lawmakers on both sides of the aisle say they are asking for more information, including about the freeze’s legality.
While some Jewish leaders were focused on figuring out whether expected federal funds would continue to flow, others were raising the alarm about what the freeze signaled about Trump’s authoritarian goals.
“There is a world in which blanket cuts to federal grants and programs, while potentially illegal, are not intended to police or punish,” Sofi Hersher Andorsky, vice president at A More Perfect Union: The Jewish Partnership for Democracy, said in an email to supporters. “In this case, however, the Trump Administration clearly noted the pause is intended to enforce ideological conformity — loudly making clear that this is about falling in line.”
Andorsky encouraged recipients of her email to call their representatives in Congress to oppose the funding freeze. She also urged a practical step to counteract any potential cuts.
“Many organizations that you value may be facing a massive and unexpected budget shortfall as the details of this freeze continue to be hashed out. That deficit will have to be made up somehow,” she wrote. “Watch for emails from these groups and consider proactively making donations if you can.”
Rotman said he expected to make a new ask of his organization’s supporters. But he said there’s only so much that donors can do in the face of sweeping government cuts.
“If we need to, we will be elevating the impact with our funders, which I believe we’ll need to,” he said. But he also said, “We know also, definitively, that philanthropy and fundraising can absolutely not make up the impact here.”
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