Supreme Court allows Trump to terminate teacher training grants as part of anti-DEI policy

The Supreme Court on Friday allowed the Trump administration to terminate Education Department grants for teacher training that officials deemed to violate their new policy opposing diversity, equity and inclusion efforts.

The 5-4 decision blocks a Massachusetts-based judge’s ruling that said the administration had failed to follow the correct legal process in terminating the grants. About $65 million in grant payments are outstanding.

The decision is the first win for President Donald Trump at the Supreme Court in his second term.

Five of the court's conservatives were in the majority, while Chief Justice John Roberts joined the three liberals in dissent.

The unsigned decision said that the district court judge did not have authority to order that the funds be paid under a federal law called the Administrative Procedure Act.

The administration "compellingly argues" that the entities receiving the funds will not suffer irreparable harm as a result of the funds being withheld, the decision said.

In a dissenting opinion, liberal Justice Elena Kagan disputed that conclusion, saying that the grant recipients had said they would be forced to cancel some of their programs.

"Nowhere in its papers does the government defend the legality of canceling the education grants at issue here," she added.

"It is beyond puzzling that a majority of justices conceive of the government’s application as an emergency," liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said in a separate opinion.