Arts organizations across the country saw their grants pulled with little explanation, while a proposed federal budget sought to eliminate the arts funding agency altogether.

The email subject line was blunt: “Our NEA grant was canceled.”

It was from Dani Oliver, the development director of the literary magazine n+1. She told readers that the promised federal grant of $12,500 was rescinded late Friday.

The magazine was just one of the numerous cultural institutions sent scrambling this weekend, after receiving an abrupt notice from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) that terminated or withdrew funds that had been offered for the 2025 fiscal year. Many have spent the already awarded amounts expecting to receive payment from the government, and now wonder whether they’ll be on the hook for those expenses.

“Honest to God, I have no idea if we’re going to get this money or not,” Oliver told The Washington Post in a phone interview Sunday, adding: “We really don’t know, and I think this is what arts organizations are trying to figure out right now.”

In emails sent to affected organizations, the NEA said that it was “terminating awards” that fell outside of the priorities set by the president, and that “funding is being allocated in a new direction in furtherance of the Administration’s agenda.” Though the extent of the funding terminations is unknown, arts groups posted messages on social media throughout the weekend, expressing distress at the funding cuts and calling for donations from their supporters.

The NEA notice described the arts agency’s new priorities as “projects that elevate the Nation’s HBCUs and Hispanic Serving Institutions, celebrate the 250th anniversary of American independence, foster AI competency, empower houses of worship to serve communities, assist with disaster recovery, foster skilled trade jobs, make America healthy again, support the military and veterans, support Tribal communities, make the District of Columbia safe and beautiful, and support the economic development of Asian American communities.”

The NEA, established by Congress in 1965, serves as the largest funder of arts and arts education nationwide and receives approximately $200 million in federal funding every year. The agency previously announced that in the first cycle of funding for 2025, it was awarding 1,474 grants, for a total of $36,790,500. (There are two grant cycles annually; grantees for the second round, typically notified in the spring, have not yet been named.) The agency did not respond to requests for comment.

Mary Gannon, executive director at the Community of Literary Magazines and Presses (CLMP), called the news “a tremendous blow for publishing.” These cuts appear to have hit the country’s literary organizations particularly hard, according to data gathered by CLMP: Of the 51 small publishers who received NEA funding so far for this fiscal year, at least 37 have had their funding affected, including the Paris Review, McSweeney’s and the Oxford American. (Some grantees who have had funding “terminated” can submit requests for payment for activities occurring by May 31; grantees who have had funding “withdrawn” do not have that option.)

“This will have a devastating effect on literary publishers and the authors they champion,” Gannon said.

Many recipients had already suspected their grants were in jeopardy, amid President Donald Trump’s numerous efforts to reshape the country’s cultural landscape via its arts institutions and grant-making agencies. Earlier Friday, the Trump administration had released a budget proposal seeking to dismantle the NEA and the National Endowment for the Humanities. The tentative budget, which must be approved by Congress and signed by Trump before it can be implemented, also targets the Institute of Museum and Library Services and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting as part of proposed cuts totaling $163 billion.

Chad Post, who runs the nonprofit literary translation press Open Letter Books, anticipated an termination email was coming from the NEA. But it still felt jarring, he said, to read it on a Friday night while waiting to see Marvel’s “Thunderbolts*” at the movie theater.

The situation is still sitting with him days later, especially since the decisions were made seemingly without deliberation. “It's just a way more corporate DOGE-like way of approaching this, where it's like, ‘You're just inefficient and not needed, you are gone,’” he said. “You can just be kind of erased.”

Adam and Ashley Nelson Levy, co-founders of Transit Books, publisher of Nobel laureate Jon Fosse, described being taken aback by the email’s rationale about the new funding priorities, such as to “make America healthy again,” which seemed far afield from the agency’s traditional remit. “You’re going to come up with a crack cure for measles with arts funding?” Adam asked.

“We’re obviously thinking about this beyond the financial impact,” said Ashley, describing the cuts as “another form of censorship that we’re seeing from the administration.”

Will Evans, founder of Deep Vellum, one of the country’s largest publishers of literature in translation, said that his concerns extend well beyond the $20,000 awarded to his Dallas-based press this year that the NEA rescinded.

“This makes abundantly clear that there is going to be no more NEA funding coming for anything that the NEA has ever funded — at least through this administration,” Evans said. And it was unclear whether other funders would fill in the gaps left by the government, he added: “The donor class is also pulling back.”

A number of performing arts groups also had their grants slashed. Heather Noonan, vice president for advocacy at the League of American Orchestras, said that while member organizations are still learning the extent of the cuts, those impacted so far span the country, and include both youth and professional orchestras.

Affected grantees also include the Classical Theatre of Harlem and the Olney Theatre. Portland Playhouse, a theater in Oregon, received an email canceling the funding for “Joe Turner’s Come and Gone,” one of the plays from August Wilson’s famous Century Cycle, 24 hours before the production’s opening. The NEA’s grant of $25,000 would have paid for the production’s staff.

“To receive this news on the eve of opening night is deeply disappointing,” the theater said in a social media post. “While we have no plans currently to cancel our production, moving forward without the support of this critical funding presents a significant challenge for our company.

“We know we’re not alone.”

It was not immediately clear whether the NEA is allowed to rescind grants it has already awarded, a concern several affected grantees raised. The termination email states that the NEA “may terminate a federal award to the greatest extent authorized by law if an award no longer effectuates the program goals or agency priorities.” The email continues, “Accordingly, because your project no longer effectuates agency priorities, the agency is exercising its ability to terminate this grant award in accordance with the [General Terms and Conditions] with which you agreed to comply.”

These cuts follow a tumultuous several months for the NEA, which in February announced the cancellation of a grant program for “underserved communities,” saying that it would prioritize projects that “honoring the semiquincentennial of the United States of America.” The agency then issued new rules telling arts applicants not to promote “gender ideology” or “diversity, equity and inclusion” to comply with executive orders from Trump; those rules were temporarily suspended after legal challenges were brought against them. (The NEA has not had a chair since Maria Rosario Jackson, who served under the Biden administration, stepped down in January; Mary Anne Carter, NEA chair during Trump’s first term, is leading the agency as senior adviser.)

In April, the acting chair of the National Endowment for the Humanities told staff that some funds from both his agency and the NEA would be redirected to a patriotic statuary garden, initially proposed by Trump during his first term.