In Thursday’s (3/6) New York Times, Michael Paulson writes, “Several arts organizations sued the National Endowment for the Arts on Thursday, challenging its new requirement that grant applicants agree to comply with President Trump’s executive orders by promising not to promote ‘gender ideology.’ The groups that filed the suit have made or supported art about transgender and nonbinary people, and have received N.E.A. funding in the past. They say the new requirement unconstitutionally threatens their eligibility for future grants…. The groups are being represented in the litigation by the American Civil Liberties Union … After Mr. Trump began his second term, the N.E.A. said it would require grant applicants to agree ‘that federal funds shall not be used to promote gender ideology,’ which Mr. Trump said in an executive order includes ‘the false claim that males can identify as and thus become women and vice versa.’ The N.E.A. did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The suit was filed in a federal court in Rhode Island on behalf of Rhode Island Latino Arts, which promotes art made by Latinos; the Theater Offensive, an organization in Boston that presents work ‘by, for and about queer and trans people of color’; and National Queer Theater, a New York company … which presents the work of international artists with roots in countries where their sexuality is criminalized or censored…. Theater Communications Group, a national organization … with 650 member theaters and affiliated organizations, is also among the plaintiffs.”
