Trump Budget Proposal Seeks to Eliminate the IMLS

For a fifth time, the Trump administration has proposed a federal budget that would permanently eliminate the federal Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), and with it virtually all federal funding for libraries.

After proposing the elimination of the IMLS in each of his four budget proposals during his first term, the second Trump Administration’s initial “skinny” budget for FY 2026 was released on May 2, and picks up where the administration left off in 2020, once again proposing that Congress appropriate only enough funds to IMLS to facilitate the agency’s orderly shutdown.

A more detailed budget proposal is expected from the administration later this month, but the broad strokes of the May 2 plan outline a draconian $163 billion reduction in discretionary spending, which the New York Times characterized as “a drastic retrenchment in the role and reach of government” that would “chop domestic spending to its lowest level in the modern era.”

The Trump Administration's 2026 budget blueprint also proposes to eliminate the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities (which Trump also proposed in each of his four first-term budget proposals), as well as the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

It also slashes funds from programs supporting education, the environment, science and health, and several vital programs that help the nation’s poor, including rental assistance, while pushing increases for several Trump priorities, including energy, transportation, veteran’s affairs, a 13% boost in defense spending and a whopping 65% increase for Homeland Security.

In a letter to Congress accompanying the proposal, Office of Management and Budget (OMB) director Russell Vought struck a harshly partisan tone.

“Over the last four years, Government spending aggressively turned against the American people and trillions of our dollars were used to fund cultural Marxism, radical Green New Scams, and even our own invasion,” Vought wrote. “No agency was spared in the Left’s taxpayer-funded cultural revolution.”

The proposed cuts come as no surprise. Vought is the architect of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, which has been cast as a governing blueprint for the second Trump administration. Furthermore, the proposal comes amid a slew of executive orders that seek to destroy several federal agencies—including the IMLS—and amid Elon’s Musk’s controversial DOGE efforts to dramatically slash the federal workforce.

Notably, the Trump budget proposal seems to undermine part of the administration’s legal defense in two current lawsuits that seek to blunt the administration's March 14 executive order calling for the IMLS and six other agencies to be wound down.

Both suits—one filed by the American Library Association, and another filed by 21 states—assert that the president overstepped his authority by taking steps to dismantle the IMLS, which was created by law and explicitly authorized by Congress through the Museum and Library Services Act. But in their defense briefs, DOJ lawyers suggested that the IMLS’s canceling of grants and its drastic staff reductions are not “final” actions, but rather part of a “re-structuring” by agency leadership. The release of this week's budget proposal, however, would seem to make explicit that a “wholesale shutdown” of IMLS is indeed the administration’s goal, not just a restructuring.

Furthermore, the budget proposal also serves as a tacit acknowledgment that the agency’s authorization and operation is in fact the domain of Congress, a key argument in both lawsuits.

The Trump budget release came just one day after federal judge Richard Leon in Washington D.C. granted a temporary restraining order in the ALA’s lawsuit, which blocks the further destruction of the IMLS by the administration. In his six-page ruling, Leon wrote that that the “wholesale termination of grants and services and the mass layoffs appear to violate the clear statutory mandates outlined in the MLSA," and "contravenes Congress's appropriation of almost $300 million to IMLS.”

A ruling is also expected any day now from Rhode Island, where federal judge John G. McConnell is considering whether to issue an injunction in the case filed by the states.

Congress to the Rescue?

On a positive note, library advocates were able to muster enough bipartisan support during Trump's first term not only to defeat the administration’s proposed shuttering of IMLS, but to win some $26 million in funding increases over four years. But library advocates acknowledge that this year's proposal comes at a far more fraught moment politically. In addition to the administration’s unprecedented effort to gut the federal workforce, Republicans are also said to be seeking trillions in offsets in a bid to make Trump’s 2017 tax cut permanent, a signature promise of the second Trump administration.

In their last budget request, IMLS officials had asked for a total of $280 million (yes, million, not billion) for FY 2025, which included just over $203 million for library grant programs authorized by the LSTA (Library Services and Technology Act). LSTA is the only federal program to provide funding exclusively for libraries, and is administered by the IMLS as grants to states.

Furthermore, even if IMLS is somehow saved, whether through Congress or the courts, it is unclear what the agency might look like going forward.

In a statement, Keith E. Sonderling, who was installed as IMLS Acting Director in March, vowed to “restore a focus on patriotism” to the agency and to steer IMLS “in lockstep” with the Trump Administration’s goals. Furthermore, in a social media post, IMLS declared that “the era of using your taxpayer dollars to fund DEI grants is OVER.”

Nevertheless, library advocates are seeking to marshal support from lawmakers and the public to include IMLS in the FY 2026 federal budget.

Even as its lawyers are in court seeking seeking to save the IMLS from the DOGE chainsaw, the American Library Association last month began its annual “Dear Appropriator” campaign to advocate for library funding in the FY2026 federal budget. “Dear Appropriator” letters are an important tool in the budget process, and getting legislators to sign on to the letters is an important marker of support.

“There is one final wall of defense against the destruction of federal funding for libraries, constituents who tell elected leaders to continue providing libraries the federal resources that bring opportunity to millions of Americans," ALA president Cindy Hohl said, in a statement last week.

This year's "Dear Appropriator" letter calls on Congress to provide "robust funding for the Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA) in the Institute for Museum and Library Services," as well as for $50 million for the Innovative Approaches to Literacy program, which is administered by the Department of Education, which has also been singled out for elimination by Trump.

EveryLibrary, the national political action committee supporting libraries, also urged library advocates to step up.

"At EveryLibrary, we are both realistic and hopeful. We understand the risks ahead, but we also believe in the power of voters, constituents, and communities to defend what matters," a statement reads. "Now is the time to fight, not just in D.C. but also in state houses, city halls, school board meetings, and ballot boxes nationwide."