The Office for Research Administration continues to receive a range of communications from federal funding agencies regarding recent executive orders and changes to federal agency operations. In all cases, the Office for Research Administration is forwarding notices to the Principal Investigator (PI) of any award for which a notice is received. So far, federal grant activity on active awards and proposal submissions has continued uninterrupted apart from a few isolated instances. If IU is notified of a requirement to cease active grant activity, the Office for Research Administration (ORA) will promptly and directly notify the principal investigator and their fiscal officer.
Federal agencies have been sending out notices to grant recipients related to recent Executive Orders and court orders that may impact active awards and are shared here for your awareness:
- The United States District Court of Rhode Island issued a temporary restraining order (Court’s Order) in the case of New York et al. v. Trump, No. 25-cv-39-JJM-PAS (D.R.I.), ECF No. 50 (Jan. 31, 2025).
- Federal funding agencies are sending out notifications to PI’s regarding immediate compliance to recent Executive Orders (EO's) related to certain DEI and Gender Ideology grant activities. Such notifications are related to the EO’s listed below yet may lack clarity in terms of the specific actions required. The prohibitions outlined by these EO’s apply to all federally funded sponsored projects. We encourage all PI’s with active federal awards to review the approved scope of work associated their federally funded projects to identify any activities which may be impacted by these new restrictions. If any such activities are identified, the PI should work directly with their program officer to clarify next steps.
Additional Resources:
- To help the IU Research community keep abreast of this rapidly evolving situation, IU Research has developed a website where notifications from agencies (except for project specific notifications) are available: https://research.iu.edu/news-events/federal-agency-communications/index.html.
- The Council on Government Relations (COGR) has created a website to track events related to recent federal actions that may impact federal grants and contracts: https://www.cogr.edu/2025-administration-transition-information-resources#Executive%20Orders.
- The IU Office of University Relations is hosting a university internal webinar via Zoom at 11:30 a.m. on Friday, February 7 where more updates will be discussed. Online registration is required.