Trump budget cuts in CT: What’s still cut, restored or in court

In the early months of President Donald Trump’s second term, a flurry of budget cuts, proposed cuts and temporary cuts sent Connecticut spinning.

Funds for nonprofits were frozen, then released. Grants never arrived. Contracts were canceled. Sweeping cuts to education and public health were blocked in court before they could be implemented.

Now, a year and a half into Trump’s term, the flurry has slowed, the courts have ruled on many of the legal challenges, and state lawmakers have sought to replace lost federal money in some cases through nearly $300 million in disbursements from a special fund set up for that purpose.

Still, the impacts continue. Nonprofits that had grants canceled have moved on without federal funding, while state agencies wait to see if funds for certain programs will be released. A spokesperson for the University of Connecticut said Tuesday the school “is still experiencing significant delays in funding from federal agencies.”

As part of its whirlwind effort to slash the federal bureaucracy, the since-disbanded Department of Government Efficiency sought to cut not only grants and funding but also employees, real estate leases and government contracts.

Though it’s difficult to say how many federal employees in the state lost their jobs in the early days of the Trump administration, at least some left.

Trump administration officials have generally explained cuts either as intended to shrink the federal government or to root out ideologies they don’t agree with. The White House this week referred a request for comment to the Office of Management and Budget, who did not respond.

Here are just a few examples of where Trump administration cuts to Connecticut have ultimately landed.

While an across-the-board pause on all grants to nonprofits in the early days of the Trump administration was quickly revoked, plenty of Connecticut organizations lost funding in the months that followed.

Gian-Carl Casa, president of the of the CT Community Nonprofit Alliance, said Tuesday that 40% of the group’s 300 or so members have reported seeing federal money withheld or reduced.

It’s difficult to quantify the full extent of these lapsed or revoked grants, but they have touched numerous sectors. The Connecticut Humanities Council, for instance, lost $3 million meant to fund grants for libraries, museums, and historical and cultural societies. Connecticut Foodshare, like other food banks, never recovered federal funding that helped it purchase fresh produce from local farmers.

In another, smaller example, the Stamford-based nonprofit Intempo hosted its annual concert last year, only to find out afterward it wouldn’t get the $10,000 federal grant it expected to help fund it. This year, Intempo CEO Lou Chen said the group didn’t bother applying for the grant because it didn’t expect to be approved for it.

Integrated Refugee and Immigrant Services, based in New Haven, had to lay off staff and close an office after the administration restricted refugees from entering the country and cut aid for those already here.

Today, the cuts have not been restored, and IRIS stands to lose another $2 million in October when support ends for Afghans resettled in Connecticut, executive director Maggie Mitchell Salem said in an email.

DOGE cuts last year included real estate leases for six buildings in Connecticut, including a space in New London occupied by the Office of Administrative Law Judges, an Environmental Protection Agency office in Stamford, and an Animal and Plant Inspection Service location in Wallingford. The six leases totaled about $1 million, DOGE has said.

The federal government also terminated at least 37 contracts with Connecticut-based vendors valued at about $181 million. CeLeen, LLC and Gartner Inc. were two Connecticut companies who lost tens of millions in contracts.

Maybe the most consequential cuts of the first year of the second Trump administration were changes to eligibility for Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, as well as the lapsing of Affordable Care Act subsidies, all of which resulted in tens of thousands of people in Connecticut losing benefits.

These weren’t unilateral Trump administration cuts but rather new policies set forth in the spending legislation officially titled the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

The state government mitigated the effects somewhat through the emergency fund lawmakers established to address federal funding cuts, increasing funds to food banks and pantries to help people cut off from SNAP and offsetting the loss of enhanced federal tax credits under the ACA. Still, that money cannot fully replace the lost federal benefits.  

At various times, the Trump administration has sought to cut or freeze an array of education funds but have often been thwarted in the courts.

Nearly $50 million in funding for teacher training and student support, for example, were frozen last summer, then released weeks later amid legal challenges. An additional $6 million in pandemic-era relief funds the administration sought to pull back was similarly released after a lawsuit from a coalition of states.

Similarly, the administration sought to cancel more than $150 million in public health grants to Connecticut, including for disease outbreak surveillance, testing for viruses, newborn screenings and childhood immunizations.

A judge blocked these cuts as well, allowing the funds to be released.

The administration has sought several ways to cut research funds to universities, including in Connecticut, with little success.

Judges blocked an attempt to reduce grants from the National Institute of Health to researchers, as well as an effort to cap NIH funding for “indirect costs,” which researchers said would have devastated their field. Early this year, the NIH reached a settlement with a collection of states in which it agreed not to withhold funds over concerns that a project promotes diversity, equity and inclusion.

The administration has continued to try to shape research at universities, pledging increased scrutiny of grants relating to gender, race and climate change or that are otherwise inconsistent with their goals.

The Trump administration initially paused the distribution of funds to states through the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Program but ultimately reopened the program months later amid legal challenges and political pressure.

Connecticut has moved ahead with plans for the $52.5 million it was set to receive, which state officials say will help expand the high-speed charging network for electric vehicles in the state.

For most of the past year, Planned Parenthood was unable to bill Medicaid, effectively defunding the organization, including the branch operating in Connecticut.

The state boosted Planned Parenthood of Southern New England with more than $10 million from its emergency fund, and earlier this month federal funding to the organization resumed.

The Trump administration has attempted repeatedly to redirect funding for homelessness response nationwide away from the “Housing First” model and toward substance abuse and mental health treatment, to the consternation of advocates in Connecticut and elsewhere. 

Judges have repeatedly blocked these proposals from taking effect, though the administration could try again with a new version of the policy.

Late last year, a judge blocked the Trump administration from cutting funds for school-based mental health programs, including several in Connecticut.

Now, the administration is back with another proposal to do the same, which Attorney General William Tong says could cost the state $3 million benefiting schools in Hartford, New Britain, Vernon and Waterbury. 

Earlier this month, Tong joined colleagues from 14 other states in another lawsuit seeking to block the cancellation of these funds.

Trump paused all funding for Solar for All, a program created under President Joe Biden that seeks to distribute solar energy to low-income and disadvantaged households. 

Connecticut’s Department of Energy and Environmental Protection had been set to receive $62 million, to be distributed to customers last year.

Legal efforts to restore the funds remain pending.