Sent to PIs and Co-PIs on federal grants, academic leaders, and RIO staff and forwarded to the Grants Management User Network, UMN associate deans for research, Sponsored Financial Reporting, Sponsored Projects Administration staff, and the UMN Certified Approvers group by the Research and Innovation Office.
Dear Research Colleagues,
We wanted to update you on four recent developments related to federal sponsored projects and some of the actions we are taking to support our research community.
Recent Developments
Executive Order Issued on “Implementing DOGE’s Cost Efficiency Initiative”
A new Executive Order was issued on February 26, 2025 that requires agencies to “review all existing covered contracts and grants and, where appropriate and consistent with applicable law, terminate or modify (including through renegotiation) such covered contracts and grants to reduce overall Federal spending or reallocate spending to promote efficiency and advance the policies of my Administration. This process shall commence immediately and shall prioritize the review of funds disbursed under covered contracts and grants to educational institutions (emphasis added) and foreign entities for waste, fraud, and abuse. Each Agency Head shall complete this review within 30 days of the date of this order."
NIH Rate Cut Continues To Be Blocked
On Friday, February 21, the US District Court in Massachusetts extended the temporary restraining order (TRO) that prevents NIH from implementing the 15% F&A rate that NIH announced earlier in the month. At this time, no further date for a legal decision has been set. For the University of Minnesota, this means we will continue to use our federally negotiated rates (e.g., 54% MTDC for on-campus research) in all proposals and awards, as well as continue to accept federally negotiated rates from our subrecipients.
Court Action Relative to the Executive Orders on DEIA
On Friday, February 21, the US District Court in Maryland issued a preliminary injunction that prevents federal agencies from implementing the Termination, Certification, and Enforcement Threat Provisions of the Executive Orders (EOs) related to DEIA. This means that the University will not be signing any certifications on DEIA that are derived from the EO certification provision and will be pushing back on requests for submission of such certifications. In addition, the preliminary injunction prevents the federal agencies from pausing, freezing, impeding, blocking, cancelling or terminating any awards, contracts, or obligations based on the EO referenced in the order. SPA is currently examining whether it may be possible to push back on any stop work orders previously received related to DEIA activities covered in the EOs.
The federal defendants filed an appeal to the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals on February 24, and on February 25, the federal defendants filed a motion in the US District Court in Maryland to stay (pause) the preliminary injunction pending the appeal. We will actively monitor the two courts for continued developments.
Court Action Relative to a Freeze on Disbursement of Funds on Open Awards
On Tuesday, February 25, the US District Court in Washington DC issued a preliminary injunction that indefinitely prevents agencies from implementing a broad freeze or other unilateral directive that freezes disbursement of funds on open awards, and requires release of funds that were paused due to OMB Memorandum M-25-13.
Taken together, these recent developments give us some hope for the release of current grants and for more clarity around the administration’s executive orders, but we know that there’s still a great deal of uncertainty—about the future of sponsored programs at federal agencies and for the fate of individual grants that our UMN research community relies on to advance our academic enterprise. We recognize the stress that this imposes on our researchers and as described below, please know that we are advocating as actively as we can for positive outcomes.
What We Are Doing
The University continues to advocate strongly on your behalf and remains committed to supporting researchers. Here are a few examples of actions we have recently taken:
- NIH officials have apparently been barred from posting planned study section meeting dates in the Federal Register, a required step for study sections to be able to meet. As a result, many NIH study sections have been cancelled. Our federal relations officer has brought this issue to Minnesota’s congressional delegation to make them aware of this additional obstacle to the important work that UMN researchers do.
- A declaration from UMN Vice President for Research and Innovation Shashank Priya about the harms our institution will suffer under an NIH rate cut was attached to the plaintiffs’ reply brief in one of the consolidated cases in the US District Court in Massachusetts.
- Two US senators visited our Cancer and Cardiovascular Research Building a week-and-a-half ago, where they learned of the key role that F&A recovery has for our work.
We will share further updates as more information becomes available. Please continue to visit our SPA Federal Executive Orders and Other Policy Directives website for the most up-to-date guidance.
Sincerely,
Pamela Webb, Associate Vice President for Research and Innovation
April Coon, Director, Sponsored Projects Administration