The Thriving Communities Grantmaking Program was part of a $2.8 billion tranche of funding under the Inflation Reduction Act intended for community groups to provide block grants to address environmental issues that take a disproportionately heavy toll on communities of color and low-income and rural areas. Announced in December 2023, EPA selected 11 groups to disburse the funds to subrecipients.

In February of 2025, EPA announced that “environmental justice” is no longer an agency “priority.” Based solely on that change in policy priority, EPA terminated all grants and retracted the Regional Grantmakers’ authority to fund statutorily designated activities.

In 2023, three organizations, the Green and Healthy Homes Initiative, which worked in the mid-Atlantic region; the Minneapolis Foundation, operating in the Midwest; and Philanthropy Northwest, which funded programs in the Pacific Northwest and Alaska, were selected by the EPA to administer a total of $180 million, distributed evenly between their three regions supporting 15 states and 315 federally recognized tribes. They jointly filed suit in April 2025 after the EPA issued boilerplate memoranda terminating the grants.

On June 17, a judge in U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland ruled that the EPA unlawfully terminated $180 million in congressionally authorized funding for environmental and public health projects supported by the three organizations that the EPA had previously designated as regional grantmakers under its Thriving Communities Grantmaking Program. The judge ruled that the EPA’s termination of these grants violated the Administrative Procedure Act, citing that, “Congress expressly required EPA to use the appropriated funds for “environmental justice” programs. By terminating Plaintiffs’ grants on the basis that current EPA leadership no longer wants to support “environmental justice” programs, EPA exceeded its authority under the Clean Air Act, and therefore was “in excess of statutory . . . authority, or limitations”.

EPA has said it is reviewing the decision.

Congressional leaders have also voiced their support for the TCGM Program. Senators Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), and Cory Booker (D-N.J.), issued the following statement applauding the U.S. District Court of Maryland’s decision:

“Wednesday’s court decision is vindication not just for environmental justice grantees, but for the communities they work with every day in pursuit of a livable future for all,” said the Senators. “Environmental justice grants, such as the TCGM Program, improve the health and well-being of communities in red and blue states that for generations have been last in line for federal investment. This administration’s vendetta against environmental justice, which Congressional Republicans have doubled down on in their Big Billionaire Boondoggle budget reconciliation bill, will only extend these legacies of harm and neglect. We urge Administrator Zeldin to follow the court’s order to reverse these grant terminations and resume funding reimbursements immediately.”

To read the ruling, please click here.