Federal agencies that stripped more than a thousand research grants from the University of California last year have now admitted, in sworn court filings, that they relied on keyword searches — terms tied to diversity, gender, vaccine hesitancy and COVID-19 — to flag projects that clashed with the Trump administration’s political priorities.
Attorneys representing the affected UC researchers say the admission amounts to hard evidence that nearly $2 billion in canceled grants were pulled illegally. The disclosure marks a significant turn in an ongoing lawsuit, Thakur v. Trump, in which UC scientists are suing the administration to have their funding permanently reinstated. Their legal team is now urging the presiding judge to bypass a full trial and rule outright that the White House violated the Constitution — including the First Amendment — in how it targeted the grants. A hearing on that request is set for Oct. 20.
The keyword admission surfaced in signed stipulations filed last week in federal court, part of a case that has been working through the system since last spring. According to those filings, the agencies acknowledged they did not terminate grants because of any specific violation of grant terms. Instead, they applied broad screening criteria rather than evaluating each award individually for compliance or performance, according to the plaintiffs’ attorneys.
Lawyers for the UC professors argue the admission points to three separate constitutional violations. First, by using keyword sweeps to mass-terminate grants instead of reviewing them case by case, the administration effectively targeted research based on its political content — a First Amendment issue. Second, the Department of Energy canceled 283 grants overwhelmingly concentrated in states that voted for Kamala Harris in 2024, while leaving similar grants in Republican-leaning states untouched, which the attorneys say improperly punished researchers based on where they live. Third, by canceling billions in awarded funding without redirecting it to other approved research purposes, the administration allegedly failed to spend money the way Congress had legally mandated.
CalMatters reached out to the U.S. Department of Justice, which represents the federal agencies in court, asking whether officials agree that the stipulations reflect constitutional violations. As of publication, the department had not responded.
**A case with a history of setbacks for the administration**
U.S. District Judge Rita F. Lin, who is overseeing the case, has repeatedly ruled in favor of the UC researchers, issuing a series of preliminary injunctions ordering federal agencies to restore grants while the broader legal questions are resolved. That includes hundreds of grants at UCLA that the administration had tried to suspend over accusations that the university failed to adequately address antisemitism and allowed transgender athletes to compete in women’s sports.
Those same allegations were central to a separate demand from the White House that UCLA pay $1.2 billion or face further funding freezes. But months before that ultimatum, UCLA had already taken steps to respond to concerns about campus antisemitism, including forming a task force focused on improving conditions for Jewish students.
Lin, appointed by President Biden, criticized the administration for ignoring those efforts when she issued an injunction in a related case, noting that the government’s justification for pulling the grants failed to even mention the corrective steps UCLA had already taken.
Now, attorneys for the professors in the Thakur case are asking Lin to issue a final ruling — not just another temporary injunction — ordering the grants restored. Even if she does, the federal government could still appeal to a higher court.
The researchers’ legal team describes the stakes as severe. If the funding freeze is allowed to stand, they argue, scientists, graduate students and support staff who built their careers around this research will suffer lasting professional and reputational harm. They also warn of broader consequences: potential medical breakthroughs that never happen, diseases that go unstudied, and a decline in the United States’ global leadership in publicly funded research.
**How the keyword system worked**
A CalMatters review of the new court filings shows the agencies used keyword-based screening in several different ways.
The Department of Transportation, for example, identified six grants worth roughly $42 million for termination because the projects referenced “transportation equity,” focused on “disadvantaged communities,” or aimed at “diversifying the transportation workforce.” Three of those grants were led by a UC Davis researcher, and their cancellation forced 77 researchers to abandon 79 ongoing projects. According to the plaintiffs’ attorneys, the affected project leaders also had to lay off — or scramble to find new funding for — more than 40 graduate and undergraduate research assistants.
The National Institutes of Health acknowledged using an internal search tool to flag UC grants containing terms such as “health equity,” “workforce diversity,” “structural racism” and “sexual orientation.” The agency alone suspended or terminated more than 1,000 UC grants — including nearly 700 at UCLA — covering vaccine research, cancer studies and work on health disparities. That total is newly revealed in court records; UCLA had previously estimated closer to 500 canceled NIH grants. The agency also acknowledged that DOGE, the short-lived federal cost-cutting office once led by Elon Musk, may have used artificial intelligence tools to help identify grants for elimination.
Attorneys for the plaintiffs argue these disclosures show a clear pattern: the agencies identified viewpoints they wanted to suppress, searched their own grant databases for language reflecting those viewpoints, and terminated the funding accordingly — a direct violation of researchers’ First Amendment rights, they contend.
The Environmental Protection Agency, also named in the lawsuit, is reportedly working toward a settlement with the plaintiffs’ legal team to avoid further courtroom battles.
Meanwhile, a federal judge in Massachusetts dealt a separate setback to the administration last week in a related legal fight over funding cancellations. That case centered on a phrase the administration used repeatedly to justify pulling federal dollars — that funding no longer “effectuates agency priorities.” California, joined by 22 other states, argued there is no legal basis for canceling already-awarded federal funding simply because the White House’s goals had shifted. The judge agreed, siding with the states.
Original source: CalMatters
