Senior officials in the Trump administration considered a plan to block millions of dollars in federal security grants from reaching Muslim organizations across the United States — a move internal officials warned could be discriminatory and illegal, CNN has learned.
According to three sources familiar with the discussions, top officials at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) approached the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) earlier this year with a proposal to bar Muslim organizations from eligibility for FEMA’s Nonprofit Security Grant Program, which provides funds for security measures such as cameras, bulletproof glass, and guards.
The proposal, floated amid the administration’s sweeping efforts to downsize government spending, shocked FEMA leadership, who immediately pushed back, warning that such a blanket ban would violate constitutional protections. The idea was ultimately shelved — but months later, dozens of Muslim organizations were stripped of their grant eligibility after DHS and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) alleged, often with scant evidence, that the groups had “terrorism ties.”
From Proposal to Funding Cuts
Five FEMA insiders told CNN that allegations against the organizations were questionable, citing the rigorous vetting the groups had previously undergone. Some described the terror allegations as a pretext to justify the cuts, rather than the result of credible intelligence.
DHS denied ever considering a blanket ban, calling the claim “ludicrous and deeply unserious.” In a statement, the department said funding was terminated for select groups “after an internal review uncovered links to terrorism,” though it declined to provide details or name the affected organizations.
Muslim organizations contacted by CNN strongly rejected the allegations. The Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) said its security grant was abruptly rejected this summer without explanation. “We absolutely deny these allegations,” said ISNA Executive Director Basharat Saleem. “This type of baseless information is very detrimental for civil society and for organizations that are doing good work.”
The FEMA Security Grant Program
The Nonprofit Security Grant Program was expanded in 2024, when Congress added $400 million in funding amid rising antisemitism and Islamophobia tied to the war in Gaza. Grants were intended to protect vulnerable religious institutions — both Jewish and Muslim organizations, including synagogues, mosques, and cultural centres.
But when Trump took office for his second term, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem froze nearly all FEMA grants, including security funding, for a sweeping manual review. By spring, pressure mounted to release funds, particularly to Jewish nonprofits. DHS officials then asked FEMA how Muslim groups could be disqualified, sources said.
FEMA leadership again objected, noting that the organizations had already passed vetting. But in June, when the first batch of grants was announced, 512 Jewish organizations were funded — and no Muslim groups were included. Around the same time, DOGE quietly disqualified over 100 Muslim nonprofits, citing vague intelligence about terrorist ties.
One long-time FEMA official said the process “felt like a manufactured narrative designed to justify excluding Muslim organizations from funding. What had always been an apolitical, risk-based grant process suddenly looked politicized in a way we’d never seen before.”
The Role of Outside Pressure
Around the same period, the Middle East Forum, a right-wing think tank critical of Muslim groups, published a report accusing dozens of Muslim nonprofits of having ties to extremist groups such as al Qaeda, Hamas, and Hezbollah. The report was circulated inside DHS and FEMA, according to sources, and staff were instructed to ensure that groups named in the report would not receive funding.
FEMA officials questioned the credibility of the report. “If you read the report, it’s rather shallow on facts,” said a former high-ranking FEMA official. DHS initially pointed to the think tank’s report and a Fox News article when asked for evidence of the alleged terrorist links, but later claimed the funding cuts were based on an independent internal review.
Many of the targeted organizations, including the Dar Al-Hijrah Islamic Center in Virginia and the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), denied the allegations, calling the Middle East Forum report Islamophobic. CAIR warned that if DHS is “quietly blacklisting organizations without thoroughly vetting accusations,” it would mark “a deeply troubling erosion of due process.”
Civil Rights Concerns
Civil rights groups and FEMA insiders say the episode highlights how chaotic, politically charged policymaking can undermine equal treatment in federal programs.
“This was an overt action to exclude Muslim groups in a way I’ve never seen before — not even after 9/11,” said one FEMA veteran.
The DHS spokesperson declined to provide a full list of the organizations that lost funding or specifics about the alleged intelligence. DOGE, which was heavily involved in the review, did not respond to CNN’s questions.