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PUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 25-1575
THE SUSTAINABILITY INSTITUTE; AGRARIAN TRUST; ALLIANCE FOR
AGRICULTURE; ALLIANCE FOR THE SHENANDOAH VALLEY; BRONX
RIVER ALLIANCE; CLEANAIRE NC; LEADERSHIP COUNSEL FOR JUSTICE
AND ACCOUNTABILITY; MARBLESEED; PENNSYLVANIA ASSOCIATION
FOR SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE; RURAL ADVANCEMENT
FOUNDATION INTERNATIONAL-USA; ORGANIC ASSOCIATION OF
KENTUCKY; EARTH ISLAND INSTITUTE,
and
BALTIMORE, MARYLAND; COLUMBUS, OHIO; MADISON, WISCONSIN;
NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE; NEW HAVEN, CONNECTICUT; SAN DIEGO,
CALIFORNIA,
Plaintiffs – Appellees,
and
CONSERVATION INNOVATION FUND,
Plaintiff,
v.
DONALD J. TRUMP, in his official capacity as President of the United States;
KEVIN HASSETT, in his official capacity as Assistant to the President for
Economic Policy and Director of the National Economic Council; UNITED
STATES OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET; RUSSELL VOUGHT, in
his official capacity as Director of the United States Office of Management and
Budget; UNITED STATES ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY; LEE
ZELDIN, in his official capacity as Administrator of the United States
Environmental Protection Agency; UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF
AGRICULTURE; BROOKE ROLLINS, in her official capacity as Secretary of
Agriculture; UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION; SEAN
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DUFFY, in his official capacity as the Secretary of the United States Department of
Transportation; UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF GOVERNMENTAL
EFFICIENCY SERVICE; AMY GLEASON, in her official capacity as Acting
Administrator of the United States DOGE Service; ELON MUSK, in his official
capacity as Senior Advisor of the United States DOGE Service; UNITED STATES
DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY; CHRIS WRIGHT, in his official capacity as the
Secretary of the United States Department of Energy,
Defendants – Appellants.
-----------------------------CONSTITUTIONAL ACCOUNTABILITY CENTER; PROFESSOR TOBIAS
BARRINGTON WOLFF,
Amici Supporting Appellee,
and
U.S. SENATOR SHELDON WHITEHOUSE,
Amicus Supporting Rehearing Petition.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of South Carolina, at
Charleston. Richard Mark Gergel, District Judge. (2:25-cv-02152-RMG)
Argued: October 23, 2025 Decided: January 21, 2026
Before NIEMEYER, RUSHING, and HEYTENS, Circuit Judges.
Vacated and remanded by published opinion. Judge Rushing wrote the opinion, in which
Judge Niemeyer and Judge Heytens joined.
ARGUED: Sean R. Janda, UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE,
Washington, D.C., for Appellants. Kimberley Hunter, SOUTHERN ENVIRONMENTAL
LAW CENTER, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, for Appellees. ON BRIEF: Brett A.
Shumate, Assistant Attorney General, Daniel Tenny, Civil Division, UNITED STATES
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DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, Washington, D.C.; Bryan P. Stirling, United States
Attorney, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Charleston, South Carolina,
for Appellants. Irena Como, Nicholas S. Torrey, Carl T. Brzorad, Spencer Gall,
SOUTHERN ENVIRONMENTAL LAW CENTER, Chapel Hill, North Carolina; Graham
Provost, Elaine Poon, Jonathan Miller, PUBLIC RIGHTS PROJECT, Oakland, California;
Mark Ankcorn, Senior Chief Deputy City Attorney, CITY OF SAN DIEGO, San Diego,
California, for Appellees. Gerson Smoger, SMOGER & ASSOCIATES, P.C., Dallas,
Texas; Robert S. Peck, CENTER FOR CONSTITUTIONAL LITIGATION, P.C.,
Washington, D.C., for Amicus Supporting Petition for Initial Hearing En Banc United
States Senator Sheldon Whitehouse. Elizabeth B. Wydra, Brianne J. Gorod, Brian R.
Frazelle, Miriam Becker-Cohen, Nina Henry, CONSTITUTIONAL ACCOUNTABILITY
CENTER, Washington, D.C., for Amicus Constitutional Accountability Center. Adriana
S. Kosovych, New York, New York, Paul DeCamp, Kathleen Barrett, EPSTEIN, BECKER
& GREEN, P.C., Washington, D.C., for Amicus Professor Tobias Barrington Wolff.
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RUSHING, Circuit Judge:
In early 2025, the federal government suspended or terminated environmental and
agricultural grants it had previously awarded to several nonprofit organizations and local
governments. The grantees sued, alleging that the President of the United States and
various federal agencies and officials (collectively, the Government) violated the
Administrative Procedure Act (APA), certain appropriations statutes, and the Constitution
by terminating or suspending their grants.
The district court issued a permanent injunction on Plaintiffs’ APA claims,
“[s]et[ting] aside the freeze and/or termination” of Plaintiffs’ grants and directing the
Government to “restore Plaintiffs[’] access to grant funds immediately.” Sustainability
Inst. v. Trump, 784 F. Supp. 3d 861, 871 (D.S.C. 2025). The court also issued a preliminary
injunction on Plaintiffs’ ultra vires and nonstatutory review claims, enjoining the
Government “from freezing and/or terminating” Plaintiffs’ grants and again “direct[ing]
that Plaintiffs[’] access to funding for these grants be immediately restored.” Id. at 878.
The Government appealed, and we stayed the district court’s injunctions pending
appeal. See Sustainability Inst. v. Trump, No. 25-1575, 2025 WL 1587100 (4th Cir. June
5, 2025). Now, after briefing and oral argument, we conclude that the district court abused
its discretion in issuing both injunctions. We therefore vacate the district court’s order and
remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
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I.
A.
Plaintiffs are nonprofit organizations and local governments that were awarded or
were subrecipients on 38 federal grants across various funding programs administered by
the Department of Energy, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of
Agriculture, and the Department of Transportation. In the grant agreements, the
administering agencies “agreed to provide funding up to a specified dollar amount, over a
specified time period, for specified work advancing Congress’s objectives.” J.A. 115. In
exchange, the grantees “agreed to use grant funds to complete their agency-approved
project on an agency-approved timeline.” J.A. 115–116.
The funds for Plaintiffs’ grants were appropriated primarily through the Inflation
Reduction Act (IRA), Pub. L. No. 117-169, 136 Stat. 1818 (2022), the Infrastructure
Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), Pub. L. No. 117-58, 135 Stat. 429 (2021), and the
American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, Pub. L. No. 117-2, 135 Stat. 4. Each statutory scheme
follows a similar pattern: Congress appropriated large sums of money to establish certain
programs or achieve certain goals, while leaving it to the administering agencies to
determine how, and to whom, to allocate funds.
For example, several Plaintiffs received Environmental and Climate Justice block
grants. The IRA appropriated $2.8 billion toward that end, stating that the EPA
Administrator “shall use” the funding to award grants to eligible entities to “carry out”
listed activities that “benefit disadvantaged communities, as defined by the Administrator.”
42 U.S.C. § 7438(a)(1), (b)(1). Another part of the IRA appropriated over $8 billion for
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the Department of Agriculture “to carry out . . . the environmental quality incentives
program” by funding “agricultural conservation practices or enhancements.” IRA
§ 21001(a)(1)(A), (B)(iii), 136 Stat. at 2015–2016. One Plaintiff received a grant funded
by these provisions. The rest of Plaintiffs’ grants were funded by similar statutes. See,
e.g., IIJA § 601(1)(B), 135 Stat. at 1396 (appropriating approximately $1.96 billion for
“‘Environmental Programs and Management’” and directing that $238 million “shall be
for Chesapeake Bay”); American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 § 1006(b)(1), 135 Stat. at 13
(appropriating funds that the Secretary of Agriculture “shall use” to benefit “socially
disadvantaged farmers, ranchers, or forest landowners, or other members of socially
disadvantaged groups”). 1
B.
In January and February 2025, President Donald Trump issued three executive
orders touching on federal grant funding. The first required, as relevant here, that “[a]ll
agencies shall immediately pause the disbursement of funds appropriated through the
Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 . . . or the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.”
Unleashing American Energy, Exec. Order No. 14,154, 90 Fed. Reg. 8353, 8357 (Jan. 20,
2025). The President further ordered agencies to “review their processes, policies, and
programs for issuing grants, loans, contracts, or any other financial disbursements of such
appropriated funds for consistency with the law and the policy outlined” elsewhere in the
Executive Order. Id. The second order directed federal agencies to “terminate, to the
1
The joint appendix filed by the parties in this appeal contains a complete list of
Plaintiffs’ grants and the corresponding appropriations provisions. See J.A. 2125–2139.
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maximum extent allowed by law, all . . . ‘environmental justice’ offices and positions” and
“all . . . ‘equity-related’ grants or contracts.” Ending Radical and Wasteful Government
DEI Programs and Preferencing, Exec. Order No. 14,151, 90 Fed. Reg. 8339, 8339 (Jan.
20, 2025). And the third instructed agencies to “review all existing covered contracts and
grants and . . . terminate or modify . . . such covered contracts and grants to reduce overall
Federal spending or reallocate spending to promote efficiency and advance the policies of
[the President’s] Administration.” Implementing the President’s “Department of
Government Efficiency” Cost Efficiency Initiative, Exec. Order No. 14,222, 90 Fed. Reg.
11095, 11095–11096 (Feb. 26, 2025).
Following the Executive Orders, agencies began suspending and then terminating
covered grants. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) issued guidance
memoranda directing agencies to review their funding programs for compliance with
presidential priorities and to pause relevant funding pending review. The agencies funding
Plaintiffs’ grants also issued directives pausing grant payments. After the initial
suspension, some of Plaintiffs’ grants were terminated, some were restored, and, at the time
of the district court’s order, some remained paused pending termination.
C.
Plaintiffs sued in the U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina. Their
amended complaint asserted six counts. Count I alleged that the three Executive Orders
issued by President Trump and “Program Freezing Actions” taken by other Defendants
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violated the constitutional “separation of powers.” 2 J.A. 137 (capitalization omitted).
According to Plaintiffs, the Government’s actions “contravene[d] Congress’s directives in
the IRA, IIJA, and other statutes to carry out and fund the statutory programs at issue in
this case” and thereby violated not only the statutes but also the Constitution. J.A. 139.
Count II similarly alleged that the Executive Orders and Program Freezing Actions violated
the Constitution’s Presentment Clauses because those actions sought “to terminate or
modify parts of the IRA or IIJA and other relevant statutes after they were passed by
Congress and signed by the President.” J.A. 140 (internal quotation marks and brackets
omitted). Plaintiffs pled Counts I and II as “nonstatutory review and ultra vires” claims.
J.A. 137, 140 (capitalization omitted).
Counts III and IV focused on the Program Freezing Actions and alleged violations
of the APA. Count III alleged that the Program Freezing Actions were arbitrary and
capricious. And Count IV alleged, generally, that the Program Freezing Actions were not
in accordance with law and without statutory authority because no statute authorized the
Government to freeze Plaintiffs’ grants and the actions were “contrary to the IRA, the IIJA
and other statutes creating and appropriat[ing] money to the programs for which Plaintiffs
receive grants.” J.A. 144.
2
Plaintiffs loosely defined “Program Freezing Actions” as the OMB memoranda,
the grant-freezing directives (as well as other directives) issued by the agencies funding
Plaintiffs’ grants, and “various actions that prevent Plaintiffs from accessing grant funds to
proceed with the congressionally mandated programs entrusted to them.” J.A. 63–64. The
“various actions” taken by the agencies include, inter alia, the agencies’ decisions to
“block[] Plaintiffs’ access to the websites and portals needed to access funds,” the labeling
of Plaintiffs’ accounts as “‘suspended,’” and oral communications between the agencies
and Plaintiffs. J.A. 64.
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Lastly, Count V alleged that the Executive Orders and the Program Freezing Actions
violated the First Amendment, and Count VI alleged that the Executive Orders and
Program Freezing Actions “violate[d] the IRA and the IIJA and other relevant statutes.”
J.A. 147 (capitalization omitted). Plaintiffs pled Count VI as a “nonstatutory review and
ultra vires” claim. J.A. 147 (capitalization omitted).
The complaint requested various forms of relief. Plaintiffs asked the district court
to declare that certain sections of the Executive Orders were unlawful. They also asked
the court to declare that “executive actions taken to freeze or terminate [Plaintiffs’]
awarded federal grants . . . violate the United States Constitution, the statutory provisions
enacting and appropriating funds to these programs, and the APA.” J.A. 149–150. Most
relevant here, Plaintiffs requested that the district court “hold unlawful and set aside any
actions taken . . . to freeze or terminate [their] federal grants”; “[p]reliminarily and
permanently enjoin Defendants from continuing to freeze or terminating [their] grants or
effectuating any termination”; and “[p]rohibit Defendants from otherwise impeding,
blocking, cancelling, or terminating Plaintiffs’ access to their funds.” J.A. 150–151.
Plaintiffs moved for a preliminary injunction, which the Government opposed.
Regarding Plaintiffs’ APA claims, the Government primarily contended that the Tucker
Act stripped the district court of jurisdiction, which belonged exclusively to the Court of
Federal Claims. Rejecting that argument, the district court concluded that it had
jurisdiction to resolve Plaintiffs’ APA claims because they did “not turn on the terms of a
contract between the parties” and sought “equitable, not monetary, relief.” Sustainability
Inst. v. Trump, No. 2:25-cv-2152, 2025 WL 1486978, at *3–4 (D.S.C. Apr. 29, 2025).
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After the court’s jurisdictional ruling, the Government consented to the entry of judgment
on Plaintiffs’ APA claims as to 32 of the grants at issue. The district court then declared
“the freeze and/or termination” of the 32 grants unlawful, permanently “[s]et[] aside the
freeze and/or termination” of those grants, and directed the Government to “restore
Plaintiffs[’] access to grant funds immediately.” Sustainability Inst., 784 F. Supp. 3d at
871; see also id. at 880 (“Plaintiffs are provided declaratory and permanent injunctive
relief.”). 3
As for Plaintiffs’ non-APA claims, the district court determined that “Plaintiffs’
Separation of Powers and ultra vires claims (Counts I and II) plainly state a claim for
nonstatutory review” over which the court possessed jurisdiction. Id. at 873. Moving to
Plaintiffs’ likelihood of success on the merits, the court found that the Government “failed
to produce a single document showing any individualized review of Plaintiffs’ grants or
discussion of any basis for freezing or terminating the grants other than disapproval of the
purposes of the funding.” Id. at 875. The court considered this “strong support for
Plaintiffs’ claim that the freezing and/or termination of the 32 grants constituted a violation
of [the agencies’] duty to ‘faithfully execute[]’ the laws of the United States.” Id. (quoting
U.S. Const. art. II, § 3). In addition, the district court “note[d] that Plaintiffs’ nonstatutory
review claims and Plaintiffs’ APA claims which Defendants have elected not to contest
are, for all practical purposes, mirror images of each other.” Id. Finding the remaining
3
The district court denied injunctive relief as to six grants. Sustainability Inst., 784
F. Supp. 3d at 879–880 (denying preliminary injunction as to “Grants 27–32”). Those six
grants are not before us on appeal.
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preliminary injunction elements satisfied, id. at 875–878, the district court preliminarily
“enjoin[ed]” the Government “from freezing and/or terminating” the 32 contested grants
and again “direct[ed] that Plaintiffs[’] access to funding for these grants be immediately
restored,” id. at 878.
The Government timely appealed, and 28 U.S.C. § 1292(a)(1) authorizes our
review.
II.
“We review an order granting an injunction for abuse of discretion.” PBM Prods.,
LLC v. Mead Johnson & Co., 639 F.3d 111, 125 (4th Cir. 2011); MicroStrategy Inc. v.
Motorola, Inc., 245 F.3d 335, 339 (4th Cir. 2001). We “review[] factual findings for clear
error and legal conclusions de novo.” PBM Prods., 639 F.3d at 125.
III.
To obtain a preliminary injunction, plaintiffs must “show (1) that they are likely to
succeed on the merits, (2) that they are likely to suffer irreparable harm in the absence of
preliminary [injunctive] relief, (3) that the balance of equities tips in their favor, and
(4) that the injunction is in the public interest.” Am. Fed’n of Tchrs. v. Bessent, 152 F.4th
162, 168–169 (4th Cir. 2025) (footnote omitted). The standard for a permanent injunction
is “essentially the same” as the standard for a preliminary injunction, except that plaintiffs
must show “actual success” on the merits rather than just a “likelihood.” Amoco Prod. Co.
v. Vill. of Gambell, 480 U.S. 531, 546 n.12 (1987). As used in these standards, the term
“merits” includes jurisdictional issues. See Bessent, 152 F.4th at 168 n.3.
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The Government advances two primary reasons why the district court erred in
issuing the injunctions here. First, the Government argues that the district court lacked
jurisdiction over Plaintiffs’ APA claims because those claims are essentially contractual
and therefore belong in the Court of Federal Claims. Second, the Government argues that
Plaintiffs’ nonstatutory review claims exceed the strictly limited boundaries of such
review. We address each issue in turn. 4
A.
The Government contends that Plaintiffs’ APA claims are essentially contractual
and therefore belong in the Court of Federal Claims. Plaintiffs, in turn, insist that their
APA claims arise “not from contracts,” but from “the Constitution and federal statute.”
Resp. Br. 35. Limiting our review to the injunction the district court entered on Plaintiffs’
APA claims, we conclude the district court lacked jurisdiction to order that relief, which
was designed to enforce obligations to pay money pursuant to Plaintiffs’ grants.
“It is axiomatic that the United States may not be sued without its consent and the
existence of consent is a prerequisite for jurisdiction.” Randall v. United States, 95 F.3d
339, 345 (4th Cir. 1996) (internal quotation marks omitted). The APA waives the federal
government’s sovereign immunity from suits “seeking relief other than money damages
and stating a claim that an agency or an officer or employee thereof acted or failed to act
in an official capacity or under color of legal authority.” 5 U.S.C. § 702. However, “[t]he
4
Because we vacate the injunctions on these two bases, we do not address the
Government’s additional arguments that the challenged actions are committed to agency
discretion by law under the APA or that the equities do not support the district court’s
injunctions.
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waiver does not apply ‘if any other statute that grants consent to suit expressly or impliedly
forbids the relief which is sought.’” Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Band of Pottawatomi
Indians v. Patchak, 567 U.S. 209, 215 (2012) (quoting 5 U.S.C. § 702).
The Tucker Act gives the Court of Federal Claims jurisdiction over “any claim
against the United States founded . . . upon any express or implied contract with the United
States.” 28 U.S.C. § 1491(a)(1). When it applies, the Tucker Act “vest[s] subject matter
jurisdiction exclusively in” the Court of Federal Claims. 5 Portsmouth Redevelopment &
Hous. Auth. v. Pierce, 706 F.2d 471, 473 (4th Cir. 1983); see also Dep’t of Educ. v.
California, 145 S. Ct. 966, 968 (2025) (per curiam). “[A] plaintiff whose claims against
the United States are essentially contractual [is] not . . . allowed to avoid the jurisdictional
(and hence remedial) restrictions of the Tucker Act by casting its pleadings in terms that
would enable a district court to exercise jurisdiction under a separate statute and enlarged
waivers of sovereign immunity, as under the APA.” Megapulse, Inc. v. Lewis, 672 F.2d
959, 967 (D.C. Cir. 1982); see also Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish, 567 U.S. at 215
(explaining that Section 702 of the APA “prevents plaintiffs from exploiting the APA’s
waiver to evade limitations on suit contained in other statutes”).
The question here is whether Plaintiffs’ APA claims for injunctive relief are
“founded . . . upon any express or implied contract with the United States.” 28 U.S.C.
§ 1491(a)(1). If so, the district court lacked jurisdiction over the claims. To determine
5
There is one exception not relevant here: District courts and the Court of Federal
Claims have concurrent jurisdiction over certain damages claims not exceeding $10,000.
See 28 U.S.C. § 1346(a)(2); Randall, 95 F.3d at 347.
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whether a claim is “at its essence a contract claim,” courts examine “the source of the rights
upon which the plaintiff[s] base[] [their] claims” and “the type of relief sought (or
appropriate).” Megapulse, 672 F.2d at 968; see United States v. J & E Salvage Co., 55
F.3d 985, 988–989 (4th Cir. 1995) (applying Megapulse).
The Supreme Court’s recent decisions in Department of Education v. California and
National Institutes of Health v. American Public Health Association are instructive. See
Nat’l Insts. of Health v. Am. Pub. Health Ass’n, 145 S. Ct. 2658, 2664 (2025) (Gorsuch, J.,
concurring part and dissenting in part) (emphasizing that the “reasoning” of Supreme Court
decisions regarding interim relief “binds lower courts as a matter of vertical stare decisis”);
see also Trump v. Boyle, 145 S. Ct. 2653, 2654 (2025) (explaining that the Supreme Court’s
“interim orders . . . inform how a court should exercise its equitable discretion in like
cases”). In California, the district court entered an order on the plaintiffs’ APA claims
“enjoining the Government from terminating various education-related grants” and
“requir[ing] the Government to pay out past-due grant obligations and to continue paying
obligations as they accrue[d].” 145 S. Ct. at 968. The Supreme Court stayed the district
court’s order pending appeal, finding that “the Government [was] likely to succeed in
showing that the District Court lacked jurisdiction” to issue the order. Id. The Court
explained that “the APA’s limited waiver of immunity does not extend to orders ‘to enforce
a contractual obligation to pay money’ along the lines of what the District Court ordered”
in that case. Id. (quoting Great-West Life & Annuity Ins. Co. v. Knudson, 534 U.S. 204,
212 (2002)). “Instead, the Tucker Act grants the Court of Federal Claims jurisdiction over
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suits based on ‘any express or implied contract with the United States.’” Id. (quoting 28
U.S.C. § 1491(a)(1)).
In National Institutes of Health, the district court “vacat[ed] the Government’s
termination of various research-related grants.” 145 S. Ct. at 2659. The Supreme Court
again stayed the district court’s order. See id. The Court explained that “[t]he
Administrative Procedure Act’s limited waiver of sovereign immunity does not provide the
District Court with jurisdiction to adjudicate claims based on the research-related grants or
to order relief designed to enforce any obligation to pay money pursuant to those grants.”
Id. (internal quotation marks and brackets omitted). The Government was therefore likely
to succeed in showing that the district court lacked jurisdiction to enter the order vacating
the grant terminations. See id.
There is no meaningful difference between the district court’s order here and the
district court’s order in California. Like in California, the Government here froze or
terminated grants en masse, allegedly without individualized analysis. See Sustainability
Inst., 784 F. Supp. 3d at 870; California v. Dep’t of Educ., 769 F. Supp. 3d 72, 77 (D. Mass.
2025) (“The record reflects that there was no individualized analysis of any of the programs
. . . .”). Like in California, Plaintiffs here sought restoration of their specific grants under
the APA. See, e.g., J.A. 150–151 (asking the district court to “[p]reliminarily and
permanently enjoin Defendants from continuing to freeze or terminating grants or
effectuating any termination” and “[p]rohibit Defendants from otherwise impeding,
blocking, cancelling, or terminating Plaintiffs’ access to their funds”); see California, 769
F. Supp. 3d at 80. And like in California, that relief is exactly what the district court
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awarded. See Sustainability Inst., 784 F. Supp. 3d at 871 (“set[ting] aside the freeze and/or
termination of Grants 1–26 and 33–38” and “direct[ing] [the Government] to restore
Plaintiffs[’] access to grant funds immediately”); California, 145 S. Ct. at 968 (explaining
that the California district court “enjoin[ed] the Government from terminating various
education-related grants” and “require[d] the Government to pay out past-due grant
obligations and to continue paying obligations as they accrue[d]”). If the California district
court lacked jurisdiction to issue its order, it follows that the district court here did as well.
And our conclusion is further confirmed by the Supreme Court’s subsequent decision in
National Institutes of Health. See 145 S. Ct. at 2659 (explaining that the APA “does not
provide the District Court with jurisdiction to adjudicate claims based on the researchrelated grants or to order relief designed to enforce any obligation to pay money pursuant
to those grants” (internal quotation marks omitted)).
Plaintiffs offer several arguments to try to circumvent California and National
Institutes of Health. We find none of them persuasive. To begin, Plaintiffs insist that their
APA claims “arise from the Constitution and federal statute, not from contracts.” Resp.
Br. 35; see Megapulse, Inc., 672 F.2d at 968 (examining the “the source of the rights upon
which the plaintiff[s] base[] [their] claims” to determine whether a claim is essentially
contractual). Thus, they argue, their claims are not essentially contractual.
The Supreme Court, however, considered and rejected the same argument in
California and National Institutes of Health. In California, the plaintiffs argued that the
district court had jurisdiction over their APA claims because they alleged that the grant
terminations were “contrary to the Department’s regulations and arbitrary and capricious
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when viewed in light of the statutes authorizing those grants.” See Opposition to Stay
Application at 22, Dep’t of Educ. v. California, 145 S. Ct. 966 (2025) (No. 24A910), 2025
WL 963588; see also id. (“The controversy thus centers around federal statutes and
regulations.”). Yet the Supreme Court still found that the Government was likely to
succeed in showing that the claims belonged in the Court of Federal Claims under the
Tucker Act. California, 145 S. Ct. at 968. Likewise, in National Institutes of Health, the
plaintiffs argued that certain “agency-wide policies” were unlawful “because they
violate[d] various federal statutes and the Constitution . . . and that the [grant] terminations
flowed directly from those unlawful policies.” Am. Pub. Health Ass’n v. Nat’l Insts. of
Health, 145 F.4th 39, 51 (1st Cir. 2025). But again, the Supreme Court stayed “the District
Court’s judgments vacating the Government’s termination of various research-related
grants” because the APA did “not provide the District Court with jurisdiction” to order
such relief. Nat’l Insts. of Health, 145 S. Ct. at 2659.
The upshot is that the alleged statutory and constitutional violations do not alter the
essentially contractual nature of Plaintiffs’ APA claims before us on appeal. “The core of
[P]laintiffs’ suit alleges that the Government unlawfully terminated their grants.” Id. at
2665 (Kavanaugh, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part). And Plaintiffs identify no
source of law, besides their grant agreements, guaranteeing them the relief they seek:
continued payments on those grants. At bottom, Plaintiffs’ “injury and alleged right to
payment stem from the government’s refusal to pay promised grants according to the terms
and conditions that accompany them.” Id. at 2664 (Gorsuch, J., concurring in part and
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dissenting in part). 6 Under the Supreme Court’s recent decisions, “the source of the rights
upon which the plaintiff[s] base[] [their] claims” is thus contractual. Megapulse, 672 F.2d
at 968.
Next, Plaintiffs argue that their APA claims are not essentially contractual because
they seek “forward-looking injunctive and declaratory relief.” Resp. Br. 41 (capitalization
omitted); see Megapulse, 672 F.2d at 968 (evaluating relief requested to determine whether
a plaintiff’s claim is essentially contractual). Once again, we disagree. To start, as
discussed above, the relief ordered by the district court here and the relief ordered by the
district courts in California and National Institutes of Health are substantially the same.
Here, the district court declared “the freeze and/or termination” of Plaintiffs’ grants
unlawful, “[s]et[] aside the freeze and/or termination” of Plaintiffs’ grants, “direct[ed]” the
Government to “restore Plaintiffs[’] access to [their] grant funds immediately,” and
prohibited the Government “from freezing, terminating or otherwise interfering with the
funding . . . without written authorization.” Sustainability Inst., 784 F. Supp. 3d at 871. In
California, the district court “enjoin[ed] the Government from terminating” the grants and
“requir[ed] the Government to pay out past-due grant obligations and to continue paying
obligations as they accrue[d].” 145 S. Ct. at 968. And in National Institutes of Health, the
district court “vacate[d] the Government’s termination of various research-related grants.”
145 S. Ct. at 2659.
6
Plaintiffs do not dispute that their grants are contracts under the Tucker Act.
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We see no meaningful distinction between the relief ordered here and the relief
ordered in those cases, which the Supreme Court determined was sufficiently contractual
to trigger the Tucker Act. The relief Plaintiffs sought and the relief the district court gave
them was the reinstatement of their grants. That is “the classic contractual remedy of
specific performance.” Spectrum Leasing Corp. v. United States, 764 F.2d 891, 894 (D.C.
Cir. 1985) (emphasis added); cf. Nat’l Insts. of Health, 145 S. Ct. at 2664 (Gorsuch, J.,
concurring in part and dissenting in part) (“An order vacating the government’s decision
to terminate grants under the APA is in every meaningful sense an order requiring the
government to pay those grants.”). So contrary to Plaintiffs’ assertions, the relief they
sought and the district court ordered is contractual in nature. See Ingersoll-Rand Co. v.
United States, 780 F.2d 74, 80 (D.C. Cir. 1985) (holding that “a request for specific
performance must be resolved by” the Court of Federal Claims). 7
7
Plaintiffs retort that “the Court of Federal Claims cannot provide the forwardlooking relief Plaintiffs seek.” Resp. Br. 43. But the fact that the Tucker Act does not
allow the specific relief Plaintiffs seek does not mean that their claims must proceed under
the APA; rather, it shows that Congress made the dispositive choice for contract claims
against the United States to be limited to certain money damages. See 5 U.S.C. § 702
(“Nothing herein . . . confers authority to grant relief if any other statute that grants consent
to suit expressly or impliedly forbids the relief which is sought.”); Match-E-Be-Nash-SheWish, 567 U.S. at 216 (“[W]hen Congress has dealt in particularity with a claim and [has]
intended a specified remedy—including its exceptions—to be exclusive, that is the end of
the matter; the APA does not undo that judgment.” (internal quotation marks omitted));
Spectrum Leasing, 764 F.2d at 894–895 (holding that “Congress intended the jurisdiction
and remedies of the Tucker Act to be exclusive in cases based on government contracts”
and holding that an essentially contractual claim belonged in the Court of Federal Claims
even though the claim sought specific performance (emphasis added)); Megapulse, 672
F.2d at 967 (explaining that “a plaintiff whose claims against the United States are
essentially contractual should not be allowed to avoid the jurisdictional (and hence
remedial) restrictions of the Tucker Act” by requesting injunctive relief in district court).
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Contrary to Plaintiffs’ suggestions, the Supreme Court’s decision in Bowen v.
Massachusetts, 487 U.S. 879 (1988), cannot help them. In California, the Court
acknowledged Bowen’s general rule that “a district court’s jurisdiction ‘is not barred by the
possibility’ that an order setting aside an agency’s action may result in the disbursement of
funds.” 145 S. Ct. at 968 (quoting Bowen, 487 U.S. at 910). But the Court went on to
distinguish Bowen, explaining that the APA does not authorize a district court to issue an
“order[] ‘to enforce a contractual obligation to pay money’ along the lines of what the
District Court” ordered in California because “the Tucker Act grants the Court of Federal
Claims jurisdiction over suits based on ‘any express or implied contract with the United
States.’” Id. (first quoting Great-West Life & Annuity Ins., 534 U.S. at 212; then quoting
28 U.S.C. § 1491(a)(1)). The same reasoning applies here. As discussed above, there is
no meaningful difference between the district court’s order restoring Plaintiffs’ grants and
the order issued in California. Therefore California, not Bowen, controls here.
For these reasons, we conclude that the district court lacked jurisdiction to
adjudicate Plaintiffs’ APA claims challenging the freezing or termination of their grants
and to order enforcement of those grants. See Sustainability Inst., 784 F. Supp. 3d at 871.
The permanent injunction is therefore vacated.8
8
We recognize that Plaintiffs challenged not only their individual grant terminations
but also the Executive Orders and various directives issued by the agencies funding their
grants. The district court, however, did not purport to vacate any of these actions; instead,
the court homed in on the individual grant terminations. See Sustainability Inst., 784 F.
Supp. 3d at 871. We therefore express no opinion on whether the district court had
jurisdiction to review these high-level actions under the APA, nor what the appropriate
remedy would be in the event of an APA violation. See Nat’l Insts. of Health, 145 S. Ct.
at 2660–2662 (Barrett, J., concurring).
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B.
Turning to the preliminary injunction the district court entered on “Plaintiffs’
Separation of Powers and ultra vires claims,” Sustainability Inst., 784 F. Supp. 3d at 873,
the Government argues that Plaintiffs’ claims exceed the limited bounds of nonstatutory
review. We agree. Plaintiffs’ attempt to cast their claims as constitutional, and not
statutory, fails under Supreme Court precedent. And when viewed in the proper light,
Plaintiffs’ claims for restoration of their grants likely cannot satisfy the strict limitations
on ultra vires review.
1.
As previously explained, “[t]he general rule is that the sovereign, i.e., the United
States, may not be sued without its consent.” Strickland v. United States, 32 F.4th 311,
363 (4th Cir. 2022). But “[t]he Supreme Court has recognized, in what is sometimes
referred to as the Larson-Dugan exception to sovereign immunity, that a plaintiff can
obtain injunctive relief against an individual officer or agent of the United States in his
official capacity for acts beyond his statutory or constitutional authority because such
actions ‘are considered individual and not sovereign actions.’” Id. (quoting Larson v.
Domestic & Foreign Com. Corp., 337 U.S. 682, 689 (1949)). “These types of claims are
generally referred to as nonstatutory review claims.” Id.
The availability of nonstatutory review depends largely on whether the claimed
violation is statutory or constitutional. The implied nonstatutory exception for claims
alleging that a federal actor has violated a federal statute—often called ultra vires claims—
is “necessarily narrow.” Ancient Coin Collectors Guild v. U.S. Customs & Border Prot.,
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698 F.3d 171, 179 (4th Cir. 2012); see also Long Term Care Partners, LLC v. United
States, 516 F.3d 225, 234 (4th Cir. 2008). As the Supreme Court recently explained,
“[b]ecause ultra vires review could become an easy end-run around” limitations imposed
by statutes, the Court’s “cases have strictly limited nonstatutory ultra vires review.”
Nuclear Regul. Comm’n v. Texas, 145 S. Ct. 1762, 1775 (2025). It is not available “simply
because an agency has arguably reached ‘a conclusion which does not comport with the
law.’” Id. at 1776 (quoting Boire v. Greyhound Corp., 376 U.S. 473, 481 (1964)). Rather,
ultra vires review “applies only when an agency has taken action entirely ‘in excess of its
delegated powers and contrary to a specific prohibition’ in a statute.” Id. (quoting Ry.
Clerks v. Ass’n for Benefit of Non-contract Emps., 380 U.S. 650, 660 (1965)); see Long
Term Care Partners, 516 F.3d at 234 (explaining that ultra vires review is “appropriate
only where there is a ‘strong and clear demonstration that a clear, specific and mandatory
statutory provision has been violated’” (brackets omitted) (quoting Newport News
Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Co. v. NLRB, 633 F.2d 1079, 1081 (4th Cir. 1980))). A plaintiff
invoking ultra vires review also must demonstrate that no other “statutory scheme provides
aggrieved persons ‘with a meaningful and adequate opportunity for judicial review,’” and
that no statute “forecloses all other forms of judicial review.” Nuclear Regul. Comm’n,
145 S. Ct. at 1776 (quoting Bd. of Governors of Fed. Reserve Sys. v. MCorp Fin., Inc., 502
U.S. 32, 43 (1991)). An ultra vires claim is “essentially a Hail Mary pass—and in court as
in football, the attempt rarely succeeds.” Id. (internal quotation marks omitted).
Nonstatutory review claims alleging a constitutional violation, however, are not
subject to the same restrictions. The Supreme Court has held that “where Congress intends
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to preclude judicial review of constitutional claims its intent to do so must be clear.”
Webster v. Doe, 486 U.S. 592, 603 (1988). The Court has “require[d] this heightened
showing in part to avoid the serious constitutional question that would arise if a federal
statute were construed to deny any judicial forum for a colorable constitutional claim.” Id.
(internal quotation marks omitted).
Here, Plaintiffs contend that the Government’s freeze and termination of their grants
violated the Constitution’s “separation of powers” and the Presentment Clauses. 9 That is,
they attempt to assert constitutional, not statutory, claims. And because their claims are
allegedly constitutional, they argue that the “heightened standard of review for ultra vires
claims based on statutory violations” does not apply. Resp. Br. 32.
We disagree. Though Plaintiffs style their claims as constitutional, the Supreme
Court has foreclosed efforts to recast statutory claims as constitutional ones, and that
precedent applies here. In Dalton v. Specter, the Supreme Court considered and rejected
the argument that “whenever the President acts in excess of his statutory authority, he also
violates the constitutional separation-of-powers doctrine” and therefore “judicial review
must be available to determine whether the President has statutory authority for whatever
9
The district court granted Plaintiffs’ “motion for preliminary injunction on Claims
I and II,” which alleged a violation of the separation of powers and a violation of the
Presentment Clauses, respectively. Sustainability Inst., 784 F. Supp. 3d at 878; see also
id. at 873 (concluding that “Plaintiffs’ Separation of Powers and ultra vires claims (Counts
I and II) plainly state a claim for nonstatutory review”). The court, however, never
discussed or even mentioned the Presentment Clauses in its opinion, including when
assessing Plaintiffs’ likelihood of success on the merits. We note that Plaintiffs did not
advance their Presentment Clauses claim in their motion for a preliminary injunction, and
they do not mention it on appeal. But because it appears that the district court granted
relief on that claim, we address it.
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action he takes.” 511 U.S. 462, 471 (1994) (internal quotation marks omitted). As the
Supreme Court explained, its “cases do not support the proposition that every action by the
President, or by another executive official, in excess of his statutory authority is ipso facto
in violation of the Constitution.” Id. at 472. “On the contrary, [the Court] ha[s] often
distinguished between claims of constitutional violations and claims that an official has
acted in excess of his statutory authority,” and its precedent repeatedly “specif[ies]
unconstitutional and ultra vires conduct as separate categories.” Id. “[I]f every claim
alleging that the President exceeded his statutory authority were considered a constitutional
claim,” that “distinction” would be “eviscerat[ed].” Id. at 474. Relevant here, the Court
ultimately held that “claims simply alleging that the President has exceeded his statutory
authority are not ‘constitutional’ claims” freely reviewable at equity but “statutory one[s]”
subject to ultra vires review. Id. at 473–474; cf. Armstrong v. Exceptional Child Ctr., Inc.,
575 U.S. 320, 324–329 (2015) (refusing to treat a claim that a State violated a federal
statute as a constitutional one arising under the Supremacy Clause and instead treating the
claim as statutory and finding that Congress foreclosed an implied equitable cause of
action).
Here, both of Plaintiffs’ constitutional claims assert that because executive officials
and agencies violated statutes, they also violated the Constitution. Plaintiffs’ separation of
powers claim turns on the allegation that the Government’s actions “directly contravene[d]
Congress’s directives in the IRA, IIJA, and other statutes to carry out and fund the statutory
programs at issue in this case.” J.A. 139 (emphasis added); see also Sustainability Inst.,
784 F. Supp. 3d at 875 (“Plaintiffs’ nonstatutory review claims are based on the argument
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that Defendants[] have failed to faithfully execute[] the laws . . . .” (internal quotation
marks omitted)). Similarly, Plaintiffs’ Presentment Clauses claim is premised on the idea
that the Government’s actions would “terminate or modify parts of the IRA or IIJA and
other relevant statutes after they were passed by Congress and signed by the President.”
J.A. 140 (emphasis added) (internal quotation marks and brackets omitted); see also
Sustainability Inst., 784 F. Supp. 3d at 875.
At their core, both claims “simply alleg[e] that the [Government] has exceeded [its]
statutory authority.” Dalton, 511 U.S. at 473. The claims are therefore “statutory one[s].”
Id. at 474; accord Glob. Health Council v. Trump, 153 F.4th 1, 13 (D.C. Cir. 2025) (“Here,
the grantees assert a non-statutory right to vindicate separation-of-powers principles but
they are foreclosed from doing so by Dalton v. Specter.” (citation omitted)).
Plaintiffs’ attempts to avoid Dalton are unavailing. First, Plaintiffs assert that they
raise “the type of constitutional claim specifically sanctioned by Dalton,” Resp. Br. 31, i.e.,
where the Executive acts in the “absence of any statutory authority” whatsoever, Dalton,
511 U.S. at 473 (discussing Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U.S. 579 (1952)).
That is demonstrably incorrect. Congress gave the Executive authority to issue grants
under the various statutes at issue here, and in their constitutional claims Plaintiffs
complain that the Executive “directly contravene[d] Congress’s directives in [those]
statutes” by freezing funds and cancelling grants. J.A. 139. Those alleged statutory
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violations are the predicate for Plaintiffs’ constitutional claims because without the
appropriations statutes there could be no improper withholding of funds. 10
Second, Plaintiffs contend that Dalton rested on the conclusion that the statute at
issue there committed the relevant decision to the President’s discretion. But Dalton
contained multiple distinct rulings, and Plaintiffs’ argument conflates them. See Dalton,
511 U.S. at 476–477 (summarizing the Court’s four holdings); Glob. Health Council, 153
F.4th at 16–17 (distinguishing between Dalton’s holdings). As explained above, the
Supreme Court first held that nonstatutory constitutional review was unavailable for the
plaintiffs’ claim that the President exceeded his statutory authority because the claim was
statutory, not constitutional. See Dalton, 511 U.S. at 472–474. The Court then separately
considered whether ultra vires review was available and concluded it was not because the
statute at issue did not limit the President’s discretion. See id. at 474–476; see Nuclear
Regul. Comm’n, 145 S. Ct. at 1776 (explaining the requirements of ultra vires review).
Plaintiffs focus on this second holding, but it is the first that is relevant here. And nothing
about the second holding narrowed the Court’s prior conclusion that plaintiffs cannot avoid
the limits of ultra vires review by arguing that executive officials’ statutory violations
implicate the separation of powers. We therefore reject Plaintiffs’ attempts to do so here.
10
This case is also unlike Free Enterprise Fund v. Public Company Accounting
Oversight Board, 561 U.S. 477 (2010), and Collins v. Yellen, 141 S. Ct. 1761 (2021), where
the plaintiffs challenged the constitutionality of federal statutes on separation-of-powers
grounds. Plaintiffs here do not contest the constitutionality of the relevant statutes; rather,
they seek to enforce them.
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2.
Because Plaintiffs’ claims are statutory, they must stay within “the painstakingly
delineated procedural boundaries” of “nonstatutory ultra vires review.” Nuclear Regul.
Comm’n, 145 S. Ct. at 1775–1776 (internal quotation marks omitted). As mentioned
above, one of these boundaries is that Plaintiffs must show that the Government “has taken
action entirely in excess of its delegated powers and contrary to a specific prohibition in a
statute.” Id. at 1776 (internal quotation marks omitted). Thus far, they have failed to do
so.
The district court construed Plaintiffs’ claims as “alleging that the freezing and/or
terminating of their grants violated their rights.” Sustainability Inst., 784 F. Supp. 3d at
868; see also id. at 875 (discussing “Plaintiffs’ claim that the freezing and/or termination
of the 32 grants constituted a violation of the . . . Defendants[’] duty to ‘faithfully
execute[]’ the laws of the United States” (quoting U.S. Const. art. II, § 3)). Accordingly,
the district court preliminarily enjoined the Government “from freezing and/or terminating
Grants 1–26 and 33–38 and direct[ed] that Plaintiffs[’] access to funding for these grants
be immediately restored.” Id. at 878. In ordering that Plaintiffs’ specific grants be restored,
the district court must have implicitly found that the IRA, IIJA, and other relevant statutes
mandated that Plaintiffs’ grants be funded.
The problem, however, is that Plaintiffs have identified no statute “specific[ally]
prohibit[ing]” the Government from freezing or terminating their grants. Nuclear Regul.
Comm’n, 145 S. Ct. at 1776 (internal quotation marks and emphasis omitted). The
appropriations statutes cited by Plaintiffs appropriate funds for particular programs and
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goals. 11 But none of them purport to tell the Government that it must contract specifically
with Plaintiffs. Cf. Lincoln v. Vigil, 508 U.S. 182, 192 (1993) (explaining that “the very
point of a lump-sum appropriation is to give an agency the capacity to adapt to changing
circumstances and meet its statutory responsibilities in what it sees as the most effective or
desirable way”). Absent a statute specifically prohibiting the Government from freezing
or terminating Plaintiffs’ grants, the district court erred in finding that the Government
likely acted ultra vires in freezing or terminating those grants. See Nuclear Regul. Comm’n,
145 S. Ct. at 1776. It follows that the court’s awarded remedy—“direct[ing] that
Plaintiffs[’] access to funding for [their] grants be immediately restored”—was also error.
Sustainability Inst., 784 F. Supp. 3d at 878.
Plaintiffs offer a couple of arguments in response, neither of which changes our
analysis. First, Plaintiffs stress that the Government terminated their grants precisely
because the Government disagreed with the goals set by the appropriations statutes funding
the grants. See id. at 875 (finding that Plaintiffs’ grants were frozen or terminated “because
they were funded by mandatory congressional legislation that [the Government] do[es] not
11
See, e.g., 42 U.S.C. § 7438(a)(1), (b)(1) (appropriating $2.8 billion that the EPA
Administrator “shall use” to “carry out” listed activities that “benefit disadvantaged
communities”); IRA § 21001(a)(1)(A), (B)(iii), 136 Stat. at 2015–2016 (appropriating over
$8 billion for the Department of Agriculture “to carry out . . . the environmental quality
incentives program,” which sought to fund “agricultural conservation practices or
enhancements” that the Secretary of Agriculture concluded would achieve certain results);
IIJA § 601(1)(B), 135 Stat. at 1396 (appropriating $1.96 billion for “‘Environmental
Programs and Management’” and directing that $238 million “shall be for Chesapeake
Bay”); American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 § 1006(b)(1), 135 Stat. at 13 (appropriating
funds that the Secretary of Agriculture “shall use” to benefit “socially disadvantaged
farmers, ranchers, or forest landowners, or other members of socially disadvantaged
groups”); see also J.A. 2125–2139.
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favor”). But even accepting that as true, Plaintiffs still fail to identify a statute that
specifically prohibits the Government from freezing or terminating their grants. At best,
the appropriations statutes may require that certain funding be available for obligation. The
statutes do not require, however, that Plaintiffs themselves receive any funds.
Second, and relatedly, Plaintiffs claim that the Government “cancel[led] entire grant
programs wholesale,” Resp. Br. 48, and confirmed that it “will not spend the money
Congress appropriated at all,” id. at 23. The theory seems to be that by appropriating funds
for certain programs, Congress specifically mandated—in a manner sufficient to trigger
ultra vires review—that those programs remain funded. Cf., e.g., In re Aiken Cnty., 725
F.3d 255, 260 (D.C. Cir. 2013) (“[W]here previously appropriated money is available for
an agency to perform a statutorily mandated activity, we see no basis for a court to excuse
the agency from that statutory mandate.”). And by declining to fund the specified
programs, Plaintiffs allege, the Government has violated a specific statutory prohibition.
See Nuclear Regul. Comm’n, 145 S. Ct. at 1776.
On this record, we express no view on Plaintiffs’ “program cancellation” theory.
Even assuming that the appropriation of funds for a certain program equates, for purposes
of ultra vires review, to a specific prohibition on terminating that program—a question the
district court should consider in the first instance on remand—the district court did not find
that the Government “cancel[led] entire grant programs wholesale,” Resp. Br. 48, with the
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intent never to re-obligate the funding, see Sustainability Inst., 784 F. Supp. 3d 861.12 And
we decline to make that finding in the first instance. See Core Commc’ns, Inc. v. Verizon
Md. LLC, 744 F.3d 310, 324 (4th Cir. 2014) (“[I]t is axiomatic that appellate courts do not
make factual findings.” (internal quotation marks and ellipsis omitted)). Further,
evaluating whether the cancellation of a specific program is subject to ultra vires review
requires first determining whether a statute mandates that specific program. See Nuclear
Regul. Comm’n, 145 S. Ct. at 1776; cf. Lincoln, 508 U.S. at 193–194. But the district court
did not undertake that program-by-program analysis here. See Sustainability Inst., 784 F.
Supp. 3d 861. At bottom, the district court focused on the freeze and termination of
Plaintiffs’ particular grants—not the termination of entire programs. We therefore decline
to pass on the merits of Plaintiffs’ “program cancellation” theory or what the appropriate
relief would be in the event that the Government did indeed cancel statutorily mandated
programs.
12
The district court noted that certain agencies “issued directives that all spending
of funds related to the IRA and IIJA be immediately paused.” Sustainability Inst., 784 F.
Supp. 3d at 869; see also id. (noting “mass freezing”); id. at 876 (mentioning, in passing,
“[i]ndefinitely pausing funding”). But pausing funding pending review is not the same as
the complete, permanent termination of grant programs that Plaintiffs claim violates a
specific statutory prohibition. Further, that Plaintiffs’ grants were frozen or terminated
cannot, without more, show that the Government cancelled entire programs. Nor can the
fact that “not one [document] show[ed] any individualized review of decisions to freeze or
terminate grants of the Plaintiffs in this action.” Id. at 870 (emphasis added). Lastly, we
note that the district court acknowledged the Government’s representation that it “had
resumed the funding for 14 of the 38 grants at issue in this litigation, terminated four grants,
and [was] processing the termination of six other grants.” Id. Given the varying statuses
of Plaintiffs’ grants, we are wary to conclude in the first instance that the Government
terminated entire grant programs.
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In sum, we find that Plaintiffs’ nonstatutory review claims—as the district court
understood them—likely do not overcome the “strict[] limit[ations]” imposed on such
claims. Nuclear Regul. Comm’n, 145 S. Ct. at 1775. The preliminary injunction based on
those claims is therefore vacated.
IV.
For these reasons, we vacate the district court’s permanent and preliminary
injunctions and remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.13
VACATED AND REMANDED
13
In its principal order, the district court noted that it had previously “entered an
order directing Defendants ‘not to subsequently freeze or terminate [certain] grants without
notice to the Court and authorization from the Court that the freezing and/or termination
may proceed.’” Sustainability Inst., 784 F. Supp. 3d at 868 n.2 (quoting Sustainability
Inst., 2025 WL 1486978, at *9). The district court then stated that the earlier order (from
April 29, 2025) would “remain[] in effect until modified or rescinded by this Court or an
appellate court.” Id. For the reasons given above, we also vacate the April 29 order to the
extent it enjoins the Government from freezing or terminating Plaintiffs’ grants.
31