The federal judge said Thursday she “inclined to expand” the earlier ruling and ordered the Trump administration to restore another $500 million in UCLA’s medical research grants that were frozen in response to the university’s so-called campus anti-Semitism violations.
Although she did not issue a formal ruling late Thursday, U.S. District Court Judge Rita F. Lin said she tends to reverse — currently — the vast majority of funds that the University of California leaders say are frozen, jeopardizing the future of 10 campuses, multiple hospitals.
Lin, a judge in the North District of California, said she was preparing to add UCLA’s National Institutes of Health grant recipients to an ongoing class action lawsuit, which has led to the National Science Foundation, the National Science Foundation for the Environmental Protection Foundation, the National Science Foundation for Humanity and other federal agencies, the National Science Foundation for the National Science Foundation.
Judge’s reasoning: UCLA grants were suspended through the research-inappropriate form, which may violate the Administrative Procedure Act, which regulates the rulemaking of the executive branch.
Although Lin said she had a lot of “homework to do” about the matter, she said the cut to withdraw the grants was “where I might land” and she would give orders “soon.”
Lin said the Trump administration took a “basic crime” in the “uninvestigated mass termination” of its grants, using “letters that did not experience the required factors the agency should consider.”
As the case goes through the court, a possible preliminary injunction may be enacted. But saying she tends to expand the case, Lin suggests that if the suspension does not reverse immediately, it will cause irreparable damage.
The lawsuit was filed in June by professors at the University of California, San Francisco, UC California and UC Berkeley, fighting another round of Trump administration Grant Callbacks. In this case, the University of California is not a political party.
The federal district court lawsuit filed with the professor replaced the federal claims court filed by the University of California, U.S. Department of Justice attorney Jason Altabet said Thursday. Altabet upheld a ruling based on a recent Supreme Court ruling that a $783 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant (NIH) grant (nationally at universities and research centers) was upheld a ruling, partly because the Supreme Court said the issue was incorrect under the jurisdiction of the lower federal court.
Altabet said the government “fully embraces the principles in the Supreme Court’s recent view.”
Hundreds of NIH grants held by the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) examine the treatment of Parkinson’s disease, cancer recovery, cell regeneration of nerves, and cell regeneration in other fields that campus leaders believe are crucial to improving American health.
The Trump administration has filed a fine of about $1.2 billion and demanded campuses’ requirements for acceptance of recognition and protest rules for international students. Federal officials also called on UCLA to release detailed admission data, banning gender-affirming health care for minors, and giving the government deep access to UCLA’s internal campus data, among other requirements in exchange for a $584 million funding recovery to universities.
In addition to accusing the university of not seriously addressing complaints of anti-Semitism on campus, the government said it cut UCLA funds in response to its findings on campus illegally considering race in enrollment and recognizing “the identity of trans people”.
UCLA said it has made changes to improve the campus climate of the Jewish community and not use race in admissions. Its Prime Minister Julio Frenk said grants to medical research “to no avail” to resolve allegations of discrimination. The university demonstrates websites and policies to recognize gender identity and maintain LGBTQ+ community services.
UC leaders said they would not pay a $1.2 billion fine or negotiate with the Trump administration over their other requests. They have told the New York Times that many settlement proposals crossed the university’s red line.
“Recent federal cuts in research funding threaten biomedical research, the U.S. economic competitiveness, and harm the health of Americans who rely on cutting-edge medicine and innovation,” a UC spokesperson said in a statement Thursday. “While the University of California is not the party in the lawsuit, the UC system is engaging in funding for important research programs in the fields of humanities, social sciences and STEM.”
The ruling issued last month led to a $81 million NSF grant to UCLA restored. If UCLA’s NIH grant is restored, about $3 million (all energy grants) will remain in the July suspension (all energy grants) still frozen at UCLA.
Lin also said she tends to increase the Department of Transportation and Defense grants to the case, which runs for millions of dollars but is small compared to UC’s NIH grant.
Researchers on the Westwood campus watched the hearings closely, working less hours in the lab, reducing operations and considering layoffs as the UCLA crisis moved towards a two-month mark.
In the interview, they said they hoped the grants would be restored, but were still concerned about job instability under recent federal action.
Lydia Daboussi, assistant professor of neurobiology at UCLA, observed a $1 million grant online for researching nerve damage.
Daboussi said she was “cautiously optimistic” about the recovery grant.
“I really hope this is my lab needs to regain research relief,” said Daboussi, who works at David Geffen Medical School. “If a preliminary ban is approved, it is a wonderful step in the right direction.”
The grant funding is: “How we buy antibodies needed for the experiment, how we buy antibodies for reagents and consumables,” she said. The lab consists of nine other people, including two PhD students and a senior scientist.
So far, none of Daboussi’s lab members have left. But, she said, if “it’s been too long, at some point people’s time will have to be reduced.”
“I do find myself having to pay more attention to fluctuations outside the lab space,” she said. “I am now familiar with our legal system at work that I don’t know.”
Elle Rathbun, a sixth-year neuroscience doctoral candidate at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), lost approximately $160,000 in NIH grants, which funded her research on stroke recovery treatment.
“If it is possible to cancel these suspensions, it is amazing news,” Rasbon said.
“Cancelizing these suspensions will allow us to continue these very important projects that have been identified as important for the U.S. health and the future of U.S. health,” she said.
Rathbun’s research focuses on potential treatments that will be injected into the brain to help rebuild after stroke. Rathbun, who works in the UCLA Neurology Department’s lab has been seeking other sources of funding since her grant was suspended.
“It took a lot of time to apply for a grant,” she said. “So, it really slowed down my progress in the project.”
