In April 2025, the Department of Justice’s Office of Justice Programs (OJP) suddenly canceled more than $800 million in hundreds of existing community violence intervention, victim services, youth, and criminal justice grants for nonprofit community organizations and local governments through a form letter that offered a generic and inadequate justification for the disruptive decision. 

The terminated grant awards provided federal support for evidence-based programs that save lives, reduce violence, protect crime victims, and keep communities safe across the United States.

On May 21, 2025, a coalition of five nonprofit and community organizations from several cities across the country, represented by Democracy Forward and Perry Law, sued to stop these unlawful grant terminations. 

The lawsuit argues that these cancellations threaten federal support for programs proven to keep communities across the United States safe. The organizations are asking a federal court to halt OJP’s unlawful termination of these grants. 

The administration’s form letter has already been disruptive to local organizations and the communities they serve. The declarations filed with the case are revealing stories from groups that spent much time and money building the infrastructure necessary to earn the trust of the communities in which they operated, only for these efforts to be rapidly dismantled as a result of the letter. 

On May 22, 2025, the coalition filed a motion for preliminary injunction, asking the court to block the grant terminations at least until the case has been decided.

The plaintiffs for this case are the Children and Youth Justice Center d/b/a Center for Children & Youth Justice, Chinese for Affirmative Action d/b/a Stop AAPI Hate, FORCE Detroit, Health Resources in Action, and the Vera Institute of Justice.

On July 7, the court denied the motion for a preliminary injunction and granted OJP’s motion to dismiss.

The case is Vera Institute of Justice, et al. v. United States Department of Justice, et al.