“Like turning around an ocean liner”: Nonprofits reel from federal funding freeze

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4.5 • 1.4K Ratings

🗓️ 6 February 2025

⏱️ 7 minutes

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Summary

Let’s review recent news about federal funding: Much of U.S. foreign aid is on hold. Federal grants and funding streams were frozen last week, but that was blocked by two different courts, and then rolled back by the White House. Still, some nonprofits have had to furlough workers and put projects on hold. Also: zooming in on the importance of 10-year treasury note yields and celebrating 25 years of The Sims.

Transcript

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0:00.0	On this Thursday morning, we need to check up on federal funding.
0:05.3	I'm David Brancaccio in Los Angeles.
0:07.3	At the moment, much of U.S. foreign aid is on hold amid a spending review.
0:11.6	Funding for federal grants got frozen by the Trump administration, then unfrozen after court said no.
0:17.8	All this is taking a toll on nonprofits.
0:20.0	Marketplace's Kimberly Adams reports. Despite the court rulings, for, all this is taking a toll on nonprofits. Marketplace's Kimberly Adams reports.
0:22.5	Despite the court rulings, for much of this week, many groups were still scrambling to get
0:27.0	promised funds. People just think that the funding is a light switch, right? It's on and it's off
0:32.3	and now it's on again, but it's more like turning around an ocean liner. Blake Hamilton is interim CEO at the International Institute of St. Louis.
0:41.3	His group relies on federal grants for...
0:44.3	Our job placement services, our English classes, our health and mental health services for new arrivals.
0:49.9	He furloughed about 90 staff because of the freeze.
0:53.0	And even though some funds started coming
0:54.7	through again on Wednesday, he's still working on a plan to bring them back.
0:59.1	Jana Davis is president of the Chesapeake Bay Trust in Maryland, which provides grants,
1:04.1	mostly funded by the federal government, for clean water projects and environmental education.
1:08.8	We did have to let our grantees know that we couldn't pay them
1:14.2	and that they had to pause their projects. One of those grantees was the Arundel Rivers Federation in
1:20.3	Maryland, which helps clean up local rivers and streams. Matt Johnston is the group's executive
1:25.6	director. We had to make that decision earlier this week and notify the contractors that we could do this much work, but we couldn't do work beyond that.
1:34.1	Funding started flowing again Wednesday morning, so those jobs are on again, at least for now.
1:40.4	In Washington, I'm Kimberly Adams for Marketplace.
	...

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