This hurts two things at once: people and security.
Anti-DEI clauses push out under-represented contributors, and the lost funding delays protections millions rely on.
Shame on the decision-makers who made that tradeoff.
PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program
301–310 of 886 posts
Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program
#302> The PSF is a relatively small organization, operating with an annual budget of around $5 million per year, with a staff of just 14. This might be the bigger story. How many trillions of dollars depend on Python? Yes, I mean trillion. Those market caps didn't skyrocket on nothing. A lot of ML systems run on Python. A lot of ML systems are first implemented in Python. Even with more complicated backends a Python laye…
> A lot of ML systems run on Python. A lot of ML systems are first implemented in Python.
> That by being open source it doesn't deserve money? I think this is a flaw we probably need to fix.
Independent of how one feels about the current US administration, I do not think, as a non-American, that a particular government should foot the bill for it, but in reality I know that no company will do it in good will either.
I've been thinking a lot in terms of financing, but the current system of grants, where some agency tied with the executive body will approve or reject something, is fundamentally broken, as we can see.
In those cases of critical infrastructure, I think it's worth some kind of minimum 1:1 deductible of pre-tax programs where the foundations can apply, and then they could have their financing without being at the whims of some branch of the executive.
Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program
#303>> "Our legal advisors confirmed that this would not just apply to security work covered by the grant - this would apply to all of the PSF's activities."
Given this, I could easily see work supporting the creation of less biased models being used as an attack vector. They made the right call.
Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program
#304> If we accepted and spent the money despite this term, there was a very real risk that the money could be clawed back later. That represents an existential risk for the foundation since we would have already spent the money!
> I was one of the board members who voted to reject this funding - a unanimous but tough decision. I’m proud to serve on a board that can make difficult decisions like this.
Kudos to Simon and the rest of the board. Accepting that money would be more than a strategic mistake, it'd be an existential danger to the PSF itself.
Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program
#305Earlier quoted context omitted.
[flagged]
> > The mission of the Python Software Foundation is to promote, protect, and advance the Python programming language, and to support and facilitate the growth of a diverse and international community of Python programmers. > The mission explicitly calls for engineering a racial and ethinic composoition to the user base. If you're going to lie, don't refute yourself right before the lie.
What does 'facilitate the growth of a diverse and international community of Python programmers' mean?
Here 'diversity' refers to race/ethnicity.
If you don't think so, the PSF do, because its their explicit reason for their lawyers declining the grant. It's also the plain meaning of the term in this context.
Yes, the foundation for a programming language has a mission which involves the racial composition of its user base. Yes, this is entirely in-keeping with their comms and practices over the last few years, if you are at all aware of how they've acted.
Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program
#306More details on the underlying project that the grant would have funded: https://pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/10/NSF-funding-statement.h...
And for those who want to fund the security of one of the few remaining independent foundation-led package ecosystems:
Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program
#307> "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." How does the legalese parse here? Does "violation of Federal anti-descrimination laws" apply to the whole thing or just the "discriminatory equity ideology" portion of the statement? I ask, because being in vi…
> How does the legalese parse here? Does "violation of Federal anti-descrimination laws" apply to the whole thing or just the "discriminatory equity ideology" portion of the statement?
“Discriminatory equity ideology” seems intended to be an expansion of DEI (its not the normal meaning of that term, but the structure would be an odd coincidence if it was intended to be an alternative) in which case the sentence should probably read:
“[...] that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology, in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws.” (note added comma after ideology).
If “DEI” and “discriminatory equity ideology” were intended as alternatives, the sentence should probably read:
“[...] that advance or promote DEI or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws.” (note removed comma before “or”)
In either case, the “in violation of federal anti-discrimination law” clearly applies to the whole structure. To make it not do so, you’d have to interpret the meaning as best expressed by:
"[...] that advance or promote DEI or, in violation of Federal anti-discrimination law, discriminatory equity ideology.”
That is, that they were intended as alternatives, but also that the “in violation of Federal anti-discrimination law” was misplaced.
But it really doesn’t matter that much how you read it, when you recognize that the whole reason it is in there at all is as implementaiton of the policy in EO 14151, which characterizes DEI (with its normal expansion, not the new one that looks like an expansion but could be read as an alternative) as categorically a violation of federal anti-discrimination law.
Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program
#308[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…
Wow. What luxury some people have to reject $1.5 million. For that kind of money, I would put a large national flag in the banner of the socketcluster.io website, I would relocate HQ to whatever country and state they want. I would never utter the word 'diversity' for the rest of my life and upon receiving the money, I would take a screenshot, frame it, put it up on the back wall of my new office and I would pray to…
> What luxury some people have to reject $1.5 million.
For a non-profit backing a community, an important goal is to ensure the long-term sustainability and viability of the org, because the community relies on it to keep infra working, legal representation in place, and other vital needs.
Accepting those $1.5mio would have come with significant "we want that money back" risk, as the post explains. At a $5mio annual budget that could seriously destabilize a small org like this, from the money shortfall to community unrest. Taking this money would be irresponsible.
My two cents, as treasurer of another large FOSS non-profit.
Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program
#309On the one hand, the plain text of the language is not against DEI practices in general -- only DEI practices that are "in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws." On the other hand, the federal government has gone after law firms that are not actually in violation of law and forced settlements due to their DEI programs, so you can't actually trust that you won't be hassled. Additionally, that you won't at min…
Reality: the trump admin has shown that the law doesn't matter in the short term. If they think it's "DEI" they'll find a way to yank funding/make an example out of an organization agreeing to this. Even if they're legally in the wrong. Years later courts may agree no federal anti discrimination laws were violated but it's too late-- the damage has been done.
If it’s not “DEI” then it’s “waste fraud and abuse”. And if it’s not that then it’s “terrorism” or “treason”.
Re: PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program
#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 sectors of internet discourse - we're trying for something different here and we need everyone to help with that)