New federal grant restrictions have left providers of domestic violence services in New Jersey and beyond scrambling for support. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)
More than 100 congressional Democrats are pushing Attorney General Pamela Bondi to restore withheld funding and rescind new grant restrictions that have left providers of domestic violence services in New Jersey and beyond scrambling for support.
In a letter sent Thursday to Bondi and obtained by the New Jersey Monitor, the lawmakers said the Department of Justice’s actions have effectively halted access to Violence Against Women Act grants that nonprofits have relied on since 1994 to provide victims with counseling, legal advocacy, emergency and transitional housing, and more.
New Jersey providers have gotten no VAWA funding this year to support victims of domestic abuse, sexual assault, dating violence, and stalking, despite getting $11.2 million last year and an average of $9.1 million in grants a year since 2020, according to federal data. The feds have distributed just $9 million of this funding to 29 grantees across the country so far this year, compared to $684 million to 880 grantees last year, federal data shows.
At the same time, domestic violence has risen in New Jersey in recent years, with police reporting nearly 71,000 incidents, including 57 fatalities, in 2023, according to the state police’s most recent domestic violence report.
“The lives, safety, and well-being of survivors across the country depend on swift and decisive action,” the House lawmakers wrote in Thursday’s letter.
Four members of New Jersey’s congressional delegation — Reps. Josh Gottheimer, LaMonica McIver, Nellie Pou, and Bonnie Watson Coleman, all Democrats — signed the letter.
The lawmakers’ letter comes a month after a coalition of states, including New Jersey, sued Bondi and the Justice Department over new restrictions that condition VAWA and other funding that support victims’ services on the ideological goals of President Donald Trump’s administration.
The restrictions are rooted primarily in two memos Bondi and Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche issued in February and May ordering federal officials to eliminate diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility considerations from federal programs, policies, and funding, or face investigation and penalties under the federal False Claims Act.
Those memos and the “vague and burdensome” requirements they impose on nonprofits seeking grants undermine “both the letter and spirit of VAWA,” the lawmakers wrote. The Violence Against Women Act requires grant recipients to comply with antidiscrimination requirements.
“The threat of federal investigation or civil enforcement — especially for small, under-resourced nonprofits — poses an unacceptable barrier to accessing funds that Congress has explicitly appropriated to serve survivors of gender-based violence,” the lawmakers wrote.
The Congress members also are objecting to a Justice Department plan to reduce the Office on Violence Against Women’s budget by nearly 30% and merge it into the Office of Justice Programs, calling those moves “directly at odds with congressional intent.” In 2022, Congress reauthorized the Violence Against Women Act and strengthened the office’s statutory protections to prevent such consolidation, they wrote.
“The Department has a responsibility to uphold the commitments made by Congress under VAWA and to avoid placing critical support for survivors and their service providers at risk,” they wrote.
The letter comes six months after a bipartisan coalition of Congress members sent a similar plea when funding threats first emerged.
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