Nonprofits sue over Trump executive orders on gender, diversity

Nina Heller, CQ-Roll Call on Feb 20, 2025

By clicking submit, I authorize Arcamax and its affiliates to: (1) use, sell, and share my information for marketing purposes, including cross-context behavioral advertising, as described in our Privacy Policy , (2) add to information that I provide with other information like interests inferred from web page views, or data lawfully obtained from data brokers, such as past purchase or location data, or publicly available data, (3) contact me or enable others to contact me by email or other means with offers for different types of goods and services, and (4) retain my information while I am engaging with marketing messages that I receive and for a reasonable amount of time thereafter. I understand I can opt out at any time through an email that I receive, or by clicking here

WASHINGTON — A lawsuit filed Wednesday on behalf of three nonprofit advocacy organizations argues that a trio of executive orders from President Donald Trump limit the ability to provide health and social services and violate the First Amendment rights of federal grant recipients.

The lawsuit, which was filed in the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia, was brought by the Legal Defense Fund and Lambda Legal on behalf of the AIDS Foundation of Chicago, the National Urban League and the National Fair Housing Alliance. The lawsuit seeks declaratory and injunctive relief and a jury trial for the three executive orders.

The executive orders target diversity, equity and inclusion programs and would only recognize biological definitions of sex, or the label assigned by medical professionals at birth.

The organizations suing say that because of Trump’s executive orders, they are unable to access funding to provide health and social services, such as HIV and AIDS prevention and care services. According to the lawsuit, 83.4 percent of AIDS Foundation of Chicago’s funding is from the federal government and is now at risk.

John Peller, the president and CEO of the AIDS Foundation of Chicago, said Trump’s executive orders could jeopardize decades of progress in combating HIV and AIDS and specifically harm minority communities.

“The bipartisan progress we’ve been making in fighting the HIV epidemic could be set back by decades, leading to increased transmission and preventable deaths,” Peller said on a press call Wednesday.

According to data from health care think tank KFF, Black Americans account for 39 percent of HIV diagnoses, 40 percent of people living with HIV and 43 percent of deaths among people with HIV, despite making up only 12 percent of the U.S. population. This share is larger than any other racial or ethnic group in the U.S.

“How could the AIDS Foundation of Chicago continue to exist without specifically serving communities of color, without specifically serving transgender people who are disproportionately affected by HIV? It’s essentially like asking a surgeon to conduct surgery with a blindfold on,” said Jose Abrigo, the director of Lambda Legal’s HIV Project and the lead counsel on the case.

The 101-page complaint named Trump, the Office of Management and Budget and most federal government agencies as defendants. It also includes officials such as director of the Office of Management and Budget, Russell Vought; Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and several other cabinet members and acting leaders of federal agencies.

“While the President may have his viewpoint, as flawed and discriminatory as it may be, the First Amendment bars him from unduly imposing his viewpoint on federal contractors and grantees so that Plaintiffs are forced to either violate their organizational missions or risk losing the federal funding that is vitally necessary, and even sometimes lifesaving, for the communities they serve,” the lawsuit said.

Also on Wednesday, HHS’ Office of Women’s Health published a web page with “sex-based definitions and other resources on efforts to protect women and children.”

“A person’s sex is unchangeable and determined by objective biology. The use of hormones or surgical interventions do not change a person’s sex because such actions do not change the type of gamete that the person’s reproductive system has the biological function to produce,” the HHS definition of sex said.

Some of the HIV and AIDS-related services that the AIDS Foundation of Chicago provides include helping people get access to pre-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, a prescription drug that can reduce an individual’s chances of getting HIV from sex or injection drug use.

Kevin Jennings, the CEO of Lambda Legal, said that the consequences of Trump’s executive orders on HIV and AIDS will have a serious impact.

“These are life-saving treatments that the AIDS Foundation of Chicago is able to connect people to. Without that support, many people will not be able to access these treatments. There will be a greater rate of HIV transmission, a greater rate of HIV transitioning into AIDS, and a greater rate of death,” he said.