# NIH v. American Public Health Association **NIH v. American Public Health Association** (No. 25A103) is the Supreme Court's emergency-docket order of **August 21, 2025** that let the National Institutes of Health end about **$783 million** in research grants, largely those flagged as tied to DEI. It sent grantees' claims to the [[Court of Federal Claims]]. It split down the middle in both directions, with Justice [[Amy Coney Barrett]] in both majorities. ## The order The district court (Judge William Young, D. Mass.) had vacated two things: the individual grant terminations, and the NIH guidance directing them. The Court "granted in part and denied in part": | Question | Result | Majority | |---|---|---| | The **grant terminations** | Stayed. Challenges are claims for money under a contract and belong in the Court of Federal Claims under the [[Tucker Act]] | Thomas, Alito, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, **Barrett** | | The **guidance** | Vacatur left in place. A challenge to agency policy stays in district court under the [[Administrative Procedure Act]] | Roberts, Sotomayor, Kagan, Jackson, **Barrett** | Barrett wrote the controlling concurrence. Roberts, joined by the three liberal justices, dissented in part. Gorsuch, joined by Kavanaugh, would have stayed everything, and warned lower courts that they "are never free to defy" the Court's rulings. **"Calvinball."** Justice [[Ketanji Brown Jackson]]'s dissent became the case's best-known line: "This is Calvinball jurisprudence with a twist. Calvinball has only one rule: There are no fixed rules. We seem to have two: that one, and this administration always wins." The ABA Journal later named "Calvinball" its legal term of the year. ## Why it matters It extended [[Department of Education v. California]] (April 4, 2025, 5–4), which first routed grant-termination fights to the claims court. The effect is a split forum. A grantee can win a ruling that the policy is unlawful in district court, but must seek its money in a court that can award only damages, never restored funding. For a research lab, damages years later are not a remedy. See [[How a Federal Agency Is Dismantled]]. ## Aftermath - **First Circuit.** The appeal on the merits was argued on January 6, 2026; no decision had been reported as of late August 2026 (one source). - **Workarounds.** In *Thakur v. Trump* (N.D. Cal.), Judge Rita Lin on September 22, 2025 extended her order restoring terminated grants. She distinguished *APHA* because University of California researchers are not parties to the grant agreements, and because the claims court cannot hear First Amendment claims (one source). - No claims-court ruling on the NIH terminations was found. ## See also - [[Department of Education v. California]] · [[Tucker Act]] · [[Court of Federal Claims]] · [[NIH]] - [[How a Federal Agency Is Dismantled]] · [[Administrative Procedure Act]]