The humanities endowment and the White House did not respond to requests for comment.
The endowment, the largest federal funder for the humanities, has provided more than $6 billion in grants to museums, historical sites, libraries, research facilities and community projects since its founding in 1965. It has continued to receive congressional support during this administration, including a $207 million appropriation in March.
But it is unclear whether that support will continue. The White House’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2026, released on Friday, lists the National Endowment for the Humanities among a dozen small agencies that are targeted for elimination.
In a news conference on Thursday, leaders of the three scholarly associations that sued the government emphasized they were doing so on behalf of the many small groups and projects across the country, some of which may not survive without the funding.
“We are not talking about the ivory tower,” said Joy Connolly, the president of the American Council of Learned Societies. “We’re talking about the needs of community colleges and public libraries and high school students and K-12.”
James Grossman, the executive director of the American Historical Association, said presidents have always appointed endowment chairs who emphasized their own priorities. What was new, he said, was the insistence that the agency should support only Mr. Trump’s priorities and gut many longstanding programs.
According to the plaintiffs, the unspent money from the canceled grants totals about $154 million. Only 54 grants remain intact, many of them, Mr. Grossman said, relating to the American Revolution, the nation’s founders and the 250th anniversary of independence.
“The projects that remain are good projects,” Mr. Grossman said. “The problem is they’re the only universe of projects. The letters of termination say ‘your project is not within the realm of what the president thinks is important.’ That’s what has never happened before.”
