By Molly Claire Goddard
2:54am PDT, Jun 18, 2025
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One federal judge is appalled by
Donald Trump and his administration's Diversity, Equity and Inclusion-driven health cuts.
On Monday, June 16, Massachusetts United States District Judge
William Young ordered the restoration of the National Institutes of Health grants stripped away by the current president, labeling the move "illegal" and "void."
Keep reading to learn why the legal authority is stunned by the discrimination within the proposed defunding…MORE:
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While striking down the controversial cuts, Massachusetts U.S. District Judge William Young — who was appointed during Ronald Reagan's presidency — accused Donald Trump and his administration of racial discrimination.
"I am hesitant to draw this conclusion, but I have an unflinching obligation to draw it — that this represents racial discrimination," the judge said in his ruling. "And discrimination against America's LGBTQ community. That's what this is. I would be blind not to call it out. My duty is to call it out."
"It is palpably clear that these directives and the set of terminated grants here also are designed to frustrate, to stop, research that may bear on the health — we're talking about health here, the health of Americans, of our LGBTQ community. That's appalling," Young added.
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Judge William Young did not mince words when he claimed he had "never seen government racial discrimination like this" until he looked over Donald Trump's DEI-centered health cuts.
'I've never seen a record where racial discrimination was so palpable," he emphasized. "I've sat on this bench now for 40 years. I've never seen government racial discrimination like this. I ask myself, 'How can this be?'"
Young continued his scathing takedown of the right-wing administration and their lack of empathy showcased in the cuts by citing what America was originally founded on.
"I have the protection that the founders wrote into the Constitution, along with imposing upon me a duty to speak the truth in every case. I try to do that. What if I didn't have those protections?" he questioned. "What if my job was on the line, my profession. Would I have stood up against all this? Would I have said, 'You can't do this?' You are bearing down on people of color because of their color. The Constitution will not permit that. Have we fallen so low? Have we no shame?"
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Since Donald Trump returned to the White House in January, he's made it one of his top missions to do away with and defund DEI in all sectors of American life.
"We have ended the tyranny of so-called diversity, equity and inclusion policies all across the entire federal government and, indeed, the private sector and our military," the right-wing leader said during a Tuesday, March 3, address to a joint session of Congress. "And our country will be woke no longer."
