Nonprofits Sue to Block New USDA Rules That Force Them to Change or Abandon Food-Access Work

Five nonprofit organizations working to build a more just food system filed suit today in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington against the U.S. Department of Agriculture, to challenge unlawful terms and conditions that USDA is imposing on new grants. These terms and conditions substantially restrict grantees’ speech and programming in support of diversity and equity, bar using grant funding on whatever the administration says is “promoting gender ideology,” and limit grantees’ work in support of immigrants.

The plaintiffs - Agroecology Commons, Oregon Farm Corps, Syracuse-Onondaga Food Systems Alliance (SOFSA), Third Sector New England, and the Washington Farmland Trust - are represented by Public Citizen Litigation Group, Earthjustice, and FarmSTAND.

The new terms and conditions require USDA grantees to agree that they will not promote “unlawful DEI” or “gender ideology,” or use grant funding to create “incentives for illegal immigration by demonstrating the availability of public benefits.” The terms even attempt to control the grantees’ work and speech unrelated to the grant, demanding they not “operate any programs that advance or promote Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.”

These terms put the plaintiffs in this case in a high-stakes bind: They either must agree to substantial restrictions on their speech and programing, or they must give up on the critical federal funding that has allowed them to effectively serve their communities. If the Trump Administration deems them to have violated the terms and conditions – despite the vagueness and otherwise unlawfulness of the terms – they will lose future payments of the grant. The new terms threaten civil and criminal liability for making supposed false claims.

These terms have already forced the plaintiff organizations to substantially reorient their work. Two of the plaintiffs have decided that they cannot accept any funds from USDA unless the court blocks these terms and conditions from being applied to them, as they fear serious consequences if the Trump Administration decides that they are not complying with grant terms. The effects of that decision are substantial: Plaintiff Washington Farmland Trust, for instance, will have to decline $676,000 in funding that could be going to critical support for farmers unless the court blocks these terms and conditions from being applied to them.

“Farmers need land in order to grow and raise our food. Washington Farmland Trust's Farm to Farmer program helps farmers access the land, resources, and capital they need to be successful,” said Melissa Campbell, Executive Director of Washington Farmland Trust. “This grant would have allowed us to grow the infrastructure of this critical program to serve more farmers. Instead, we’re faced with the impossible choice of pulling back from our mission-critical work or losing out on catalytic funding that would help us better serve our communities. If the court blocks the USDA's problematic terms, farmers will be able to receive the essential support they need to continue to grow food for us all.”

“Organizations like the plaintiffs do essential work to fight hunger, protect the environment, and ensure that communities across the country have access to healthy, local food,” said Stephanie Garlock, attorney at Public Citizen Litigation Group and lead counsel for the plaintiffs. “They should not have to choose between continuing that work and submitting to the Trump Administration's ideological speech code on issues of public policy."

“The First Amendment rights of these plaintiffs are at stake in this case, and so is the future of critical work to build a fair food system that works for everyone,” said David Muraskin, Managing Director of Litigation at FarmSTAND. “The court must block these unlawful, unprecedented terms and conditions. If it doesn’t, the Trump Administration’s enforcement of them will force USDA grantees to abandon important work in support of the next generation of farmers, for fear of serious consequences for violating the new terms.”

“USDA’s new terms and conditions for grants are yet another example of this administration’s unlawful politicization of programs designed by Congress to support farmers and rural communities,” said Carrie Apfel, Deputy Managing Attorney of the Sustainable Food and Farming Program at Earthjustice. “USDA should stop claiming to help farmers when instead it is undermining the very food and farming communities these programs were created to serve. This sort of illegal gamesmanship should not be tolerated.”