In a fast reversal, the U.S. Division of Agriculture has restored funding to the College of Maine System after pausing it on Monday.
On Wednesday night, U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, a Maine Republican, introduced that USDA funding for UMS applications had resumed after she had consulted with the Trump administration.
“This USDA funding is critically essential not solely to the College of Maine, however to our farmers and loggers, in addition to to the many individuals who work in Maine’s agriculture, aquaculture, and forestry industries,” Collins mentioned in an announcement.
UMS leaders realized of the funding restoration from Collins. System Chancellor Dannel Malloy and College of Maine President Joan Ferrini-Mundy mentioned in a joint assertion late Wednesday that the shutoff was an “pointless distraction from our important training, analysis and extension actions.”
Altogether, UMS has $63 million in lively USDA grants — most of which works to the flagship College of Maine campus in Orono, the system mentioned. Of that, about $35 million is left to be paid out. The funding helps finance a big selection of applications, together with agricultural analysis, the youth agricultural engagement program 4-H, and plant and tick illness testing.
The funding freeze got here weeks after a tense public change between President Donald Trump and Maine Gov. Janet Mills, a Democrat. Trump threatened Mills on Feb. 21 with pulling all federal funding to the state if it didn’t comply along with his government order barring transgender ladies from Okay-12 and faculty sports activities groups aligning with their gender id.
The day after the change, USDA introduced a compliance evaluation of the College of Maine beneath Title IX, which bars sex-based discrimination at federally funded training establishments. In the meantime, the U.S. Division of Well being and Human Companies additionally introduced a civil rights investigation into the state on Feb. 21, discovering simply 4 days later that its training division had violated Title IX.
UMS mentioned it heard nothing from USDA between Feb. 26 and March 10, when the system realized through a forwarded e-mail that USDA had briefly reduce off all funding.
UMS maintains that it’s “absolutely compliant” with all state and federal legal guidelines in addition to with up to date NCAA guidelines. The faculty sports activities affiliation modified its guidelines to stick to Trump’s government order the day after it was signed.
“At no level since USDA introduced its Title IX compliance evaluation on Feb. 22 has that Division, or some other occasion, alleged any violation by Maine’s public universities of Title IX or some other federal or state regulation,” UMS mentioned in a launch Wednesday.
