ABA Lays Off 300 Employees, Blaming Trump Grant Funding Cuts

 

The American Bar Association laid off more than 300 employees after the Trump administration slashed $69 million of its grant funding, the organization said in a court filing.

The ABA disclosed the cuts—covering about a third of its workforce—Wednesday in a lawsuit filed against the Justice Department, which the organization says terminated grants funding work for domestic violence victims. The group is under fire from the Trump administration over diversity initiatives and other moves seen as leaning left. The ABA has publicly denounced the administration’s actions against law firms and threats against federal judges.

“This lawsuit is necessitated by DOJ’s undisguised efforts to retaliate against the ABA for taking positions the current Administration disfavors,” the group said in the new complaint.

The ABA was set to receive $3.2 million through five active grants for training civil attorneys representing victims of gender-based violence. DOJ terminated the grants one day after the department said it would limit its attorneys’ participation in ABA events, according to the complaint.

The organization has become more dependent on grants in the face of declining membership. The ABA and other nonprofit groups in February won a court order directing the Trump administration to unfreeze separate grant funding from the State Department’s USAID, a decision currently on appeal.

The layoffs include about 100 employees working on the ABA’s rule of law initiative, funded largely by USAID grants, said a person familiar with the situation. The initiative, which spans 100 countries and includes a program in Ukraine, is designed “to strengthen legal institutions, to support legal professionals, to foster respect for human rights and to advance public understanding of the law and of citizen rights,” according to the ABA’s website.

Roughly 200 employees were let go from the ABA’s ProBar program, which provided legal aid to immigrants in South Texas, the person said.

Attorney General Pam Bondi in February threatened the ABA’s law school accreditation powers over the accrediting body’s diversity mandate for law schools. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche this month sent a memo barred DOJ employees from participating in the professional organization’s events in their official capacities or on official time.

Blanche and Bondi are also named as defendants in the complaint. Democracy Forward is representing the ABA.

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