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PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

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Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#71

Post by philipallstar »

aspir wrote: post #29

This isn't good for the PSF, but if these "poison pill" terms are a pattern that applies to all NSF and (presumably) other government research funding, the entire state of modern scientific research is at risk. Regardless of how you, as an individual, might feel about "DEI," imposing onerous political terms on scientific grants harms everyone in the long term.

It would be very good for the PSF if it can get grant money without DEI things. Before you needed to have them to get much of a look-in.

Now it can spend the money on important stuff like packaging. uv is amazing, but also a symptom of the wrong people stewarding that money.

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#72

Post by rck »

djoldman wrote: post #26

> These terms included affirming the statement that we “do not, and will not during the term of this financial assistance award, operate any programs that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws .” (Emphasis mine) I'm curious if any lawyer folks could weigh in as to whether this language means that the entire sentence requires the mentioned programs t…

Not a lawyer, but the NSF clause covering clawbacks is pretty specific:

> NSF reserves the right to terminate financial assistance awards and recover all funds if recipients, during the term of this award, operate any program in violation of Federal antidiscriminatory laws or engage in a prohibited boycott.

A "prohibited boycott" is apparently a legal term aimed specifically at boycotting Israel/Israeli companies, so unless PSF intended to violate federal law or do an Israel boycott, they probably weren't at risk. They mention they talked to other nonprofits, but don't mention talking to their lawyers. I would hope they did consult counsel, because it would be a shame to turn down that much money solely on the basis of word of mouth from non-attorneys.

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#73

Post by ipaddr »

etchalon wrote: post #54
zo1 wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

pro-skin-diversity is a real weird way to say "against racism."

They are for racism. Treat one group different from others based on race.

We can debate whether doing this rights historical wrongs but we can't pretend it is not racist to treat different people of different skin colors differently.

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#74

Post by burnerRhodov2 »

So, all these clauses where changed back in Feb/ March. They definitely had to agree to the amendments on their grants, and they still had funding until October 1st. So, I feel like this is revisionist history because they would have been notified way before today to renew thier grant.

So they signed the amendments and spent the money...

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#75

Post by wrsh07 »

throwaway091025 wrote: post #33
dang wrote: post #310

[stub for offtopicness / flamewarness / guideline-breakingness] (this is a rough cut - I know there are other posts left in the thread that arguably belong here, but this time I'm in a bit of a rush) (please, everyone, you can make substantive points thoughtfully but do so within the guardrails at https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html - avoid the generic-indignant-flamey-snarky-namecalley-hardcore-battley…

[flagged]

If psf wants supports ten conferences and 9 of them have a typical gender ratio of 7:3 (males:females) and so they support 1 conference with a gender ratio of 3:7, then I think they're in violation of these terms.

Was PSF acting in a discriminatory manner by supporting the tenth conference?

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#76

Post by philipallstar »

dangus wrote: post #61
aspir wrote: post #29

This isn't good for the PSF, but if these "poison pill" terms are a pattern that applies to all NSF and (presumably) other government research funding, the entire state of modern scientific research is at risk. Regardless of how you, as an individual, might feel about "DEI," imposing onerous political terms on scientific grants harms everyone in the long term.

[flagged]

> I am going to add my own stronger language than yours: if you don’t feel positively about diversity, equity, and inclusion, then you are sending a message that you instead support homogeneity, inequity, and exclusion.

This "if you're not for us you're against us" is a very broken way of thinking.

It excludes the many, many more people just don't care about diversity and want the best people in a role regardless of ethnicity or sex or anything else. That's not "pro homogeneity" - only someone whose perspective is entirely warped by this one factor would think that way.

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#77

Post by politician »

wrs wrote: post #31
djoldman wrote: post #26

> These terms included affirming the statement that we “do not, and will not during the term of this financial assistance award, operate any programs that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws .” (Emphasis mine) I'm curious if any lawyer folks could weigh in as to whether this language means that the entire sentence requires the mentioned programs t…

If it was simply an agreement that the recipient won’t violate Federal law, it wouldn’t need to be stated (how could the intention be otherwise?). So I read it as an agreement to an interpretation that doing those things would violate the law.

> I read it as an agreement to an interpretation that doing those things would violate the law.

The Executive branch can make any claim it wants, but the Judiciary branch has the authority to decide what a reviewable claim means.

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#78

Post by [deleted] »

dragonwriter wrote: post #69
bilekas wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This seems very un-American. The government dictating how you run your business ? > “do not, and will not during the term of this financial assistance award, operate any programs that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws.” Is that even legal to add such an arbitrary and opinionated reason to a government grant? I applaud them for taking a stand, it…

> Is that even legal to add such an arbitrary and opinionated reason to a government grant? On the surface, it is simply a requirement that the grantee comply with existing non-discrimination laws coupled with a completely fictional example of a potential violation (“discriminatory equity ideology”) provided as an example that happens to have an initialism collision with a real thing. This is legal and ( but for the…

[deleted]

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#79

Post by skrebbel »

takluyver wrote: post #52
skrebbel wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh come on. The language means that if PSF at any point, maybe years from now, at some conference or wherever maybe somehow supports or hosts a panel about diversity and inclusion, the NSF can force them to pay the money back, even though it's already spent. That's not "wanting to discriminate", it's a free ticket for a rogue government to bully the PSF without a good argument, if it ever sees fit. Even if I were an…

Small correction: the restriction would only affect the PSF for the 2 years the grant runs. That's still more than bad enough when 'diverse' is in the mission statement, and of course they might well apply for other grants, but in principle it can't be applied 'at any point'.

Appreciate it. I still wouldn't take the risk tbh, not with the current administration's terrible track record on stuff like this.

Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

#80

Post by ksynwa »

bilekas wrote: post #8
dang wrote: post #310

[stub for offtopicness / flamewarness / guideline-breakingness] (this is a rough cut - I know there are other posts left in the thread that arguably belong here, but this time I'm in a bit of a rush) (please, everyone, you can make substantive points thoughtfully but do so within the guardrails at https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html - avoid the generic-indignant-flamey-snarky-namecalley-hardcore-battley…

This seems very un-American. The government dictating how you run your business ? > “do not, and will not during the term of this financial assistance award, operate any programs that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws.” Is that even legal to add such an arbitrary and opinionated reason to a government grant? I applaud them for taking a stand, it…

> Is that even legal to

Does it matter for the Trump administration what is legal and what isn't?

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