The Trump administration scheduled a grant freeze for Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2025, that would cut trillions of dollars in funding for research in higher education, non-profits, tribal nations and more.
Despite the recension of the memo and the blocking of the freeze the following day, many organizations are still experiencing a freeze on funding and are uncertain of how to proceed.
Effects on the indigenous community in Idaho
Yamni Chandler, a member of the Intertribal Native Council at Boise State shared some of the conversations Shoshone Bannock tribe members have been having regarding the federal funding freeze.
Chandler highlighted Donna Thompson, vice-chair for Fort Hall Business Council of the Shoshone-Bannock Tribes as just one of the tribal leaders who have spoken out against the freeze.
“Right now there’s … the coalition of large tribes, and they established [it] in about 2011, and our tribe is a part of that coalition,” Chandler said. “But they recently sent out a resolution arguing that tribes should be excluded right from that federal fee freeze. A lot of the tribal leaders have been making trips to Washington to go speak on behalf [and] to argue this and to express the importance of this federal funding because we’re a tribal government, so a lot of our federal programs — all that is federally funded.”
Chandler described his conversation with Jessica James, a Haskell Board of Regions member and Shoshone Bannock Tribal member who teaches at Haskell University — an Indigenous tribal school in Kansas that has been greatly impacted by the funding freeze.
“There has been a lot of direct impact with the federal freeze and federal workers being fired,” Chandler said. “Because a lot of staff, faculty, they’ve all been fired — so they’ve been dealing with sizing issues, and there’s a lot of classes that can’t be taught, a lot of activities being canceled.”
Chandler followed up via email and spoke on the importance of federally funded educational opportunities.
“If there was a potential withhold of funding for our education department we would lose that [Shoshone Bannock] scholarship. That scholarship promotes our native students to explore and get their education. It also promotes students to maintain good grades, as there are case workers that regularly check up each semester of college,” Chandler said.
“This type of stuff is specifically important to indigenous communities, because there is a stereotype that says we can’t go to college. Back then people doubted indigenous people and were nothing more than a bunch of savages because of our cultural practices,” Chandler said.
“To our communities, college seemed to be a rather out of reach idea. Now as past generations have fought to break that idea, and create new opportunities. We see that taking effect, as more indigenous people are attending college,” Chandler said. “Even a lot of our older generations are pursuing college (my grandma is attending college). This is one of the reasons why we will fight hard to protect these programs, as our older generations did for us. This is how we continue to stay resilient as indigenous people!”
Environmental research at Boise State
“My research team lost over $1.5 million in research funding from The USDA,” Jennifer Pierce, a professor in the Geoscience department said. “That funding was specifically to help promote healthy soils.”
Pierce explained that two PhD-certified soil scientists and one student soil technician lost their funding immediately. About a year and a half of planning and research had gone into the project before the freeze.
“We’re no longer able to help farmers in the entire Western U.S. The scope of this project was the entire western U.S. and Hawaii and Alaska — we’re no longer able to help those producers measure soil health,” Pierce said. “And [help farmers] better understand how improved soil health through storage of soil carbon can help them economically because healthier soils are more productive soils.”
A portion of the funding the research team received would have gone directly to the farmers to compensate for the soil samples the scientists collected.
Pierce described the feelings of uncertainty the scientists on the research team were feeling after funding was pulled.
“They are scared. We are barely putting together a paycheck for them,” Pierce said. “I don’t know if my student is going to be able to pay rent. Not only have they lost all this time in this really important project, but they’re just really scrambling to make ends meet.”
Idaho nonprofits
Jodi Peterson-Stigers, executive director of Interfaith Sanctuary, a nonprofit that provides barrier-free housing in the Boise community, explained that while Interfaith is not federally funded the freeze greatly affects additional resources the shelter provides.
“There was some concern about our hotel shelter, which is a partnership with the city of Boise, historically, that has been funded through all different kinds of government funds,” Peterson said. “We worry mostly about our partners who are able to deliver resources and services to our guests based on their funding. Head Start is a perfect example, and what was going to happen with food stamps and things like that. All the services that we provide to lift people up, many of those are possible because of federal funding.”
Head Start is a program that aims to support low-income families in education, nutrition and more.
“Our job as a shelter is to utilize our case management team to connect our guests to the resources they need,” Peterson said. “That can be Medicaid, food stamps, housing opportunities … all of these different types of programs that are part of our continuum of care. All of these partners play a dramatic piece and [are] how we’re lifting people out of homelessness, and if they lose their funding if they lose their ability to deliver their services to this vulnerable population, where do they go? What happens? It’s devastating.”
Boise State’s response
In an email interview with The Arbiter, Galbreaith stated the importance of research in higher education.
“Research fuels Idaho’s economy by creating jobs, supporting local businesses, and helping industries innovate and grow. Cutting funding makes it harder for students to get hands-on experience, for businesses to benefit from university-led research and impacts the lives of Idahoans who benefit from research,” Galbreaith said.
Galbreaith said scholarships and financial aid are not being affected at the university at this time and when asked what Boise State is doing to support students during this time, directed The Arbiter to the “Federal Funding Updates 2025” page.
While many aspects of the federal grant freeze remain unclear, nonprofits and research teams are still experiencing the effects.
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You voted for him. Get over it.