Trump’s “opening salvo” in his war against criminal justice reform starts with this nonprofit

Earlier this month, the Vera Institute of Justice, a national criminal justice reform nonprofit, was notified that all five of its federal grants had been abruptly canceled by the Department of Justice. The lost funding, totaling approximately $5 million, had supported ongoing programs to improve prison conditions and mental health crisis response, as well as training law enforcement to better serve deaf survivors of domestic violence—all of which, the nonprofit says, have bolstered public safety across the country.

“It is just an opening salvo,” Insha Rahman, Vera’s vice president for advocacy and partnerships, told me. “Vera might be the first organization to lose its federal funding, but I am certain we will not be the last in the criminal justice field.” 

Since taking office in February, Attorney General Pam Bondi has made sweeping moves to align the Department of Justice with President Donald Trump’s policy priorities. The day she was sworn in, Bondi directed the department’s Civil Rights Division to investigate what she described as “illegal DEI and DEIA discrimination and preferences.” Under her leadership, the department has dropped criminal cases against the president’s allies and removed top career officials from their posts. On Fox News, Bondi promised to “root out” DOJ and FBI employees who “despise” Trump. 

Coupled with the Department of Government Efficiency‘s cost-cutting rampage, it may have been inevitable that officials would take a closer look at the DOJ’s largest grantmaking entity, the Office of Justice Programs. That office distributes more than $4 billion in funding for law enforcement training, violence prevention, victim services, and criminal justice research. Some of the grants are awarded to city and county governments, while others go to local and national nonprofits. Before leaving office earlier this year, two Biden-era officials said the office had expanded access to grants for communities most affected by violence, writing that “those partnerships significantly contributed to the recent downward trajectory of violence in a majority of our cities and communities throughout our country.”

The Vera Institute, established in 1961, is among the oldest, largest, and most prominent criminal justice nonprofits in the country. In the 2023 fiscal year, its total revenue was $263 million, according to its public tax filings. The organization’s president, Nick Turner, said the affected programs would continue operating while it formally appeals the funding termination.

Given the Trump administration’s unprecedented cuts to federal spending, Rahman said she wasn’t surprised when the Vera Institute received the termination letter April 4. In it, the DOJ wrote that the Vera Institute’s work “no longer effectuate[s] the program goals or agency priorities.” What was unusual, Rahman said, was that Vera was alone in having its funding cut.

“It leads us to believe that the only reason our funding was cut is that we have been singularly vocal in our opposition to this administration’s actions,” Rahman said. The Vera Institute has condemned the Trump administration’s mass deportation agenda and detention of pro-Palestine student protesters. 

The Department of Justice did not immediately respond to requests for comment. 

Other criminal justice reform and direct service organizations are far more reliant on federal funding and so far have been able to continue operating. But Rahman said what happened to the Vera Institute will make it far more difficult for those groups to speak out, given widespread fear that it will draw unwanted attention from the Trump administration.

“So we think it’s important to stand up and call this out publicly,” Rahman said. “We are doing so because we have to look back at this moment in history and know that we have done the right and principled thing.”