WASHINGTON — Federal taxpayers have backed roughly $230 million in grants tied to research on “intersectionality,” a concept that examines how factors such as race, gender and class can shape privilege and discrimination, according to a new report.
The review, conducted by the right-leaning Defense of Freedom Institute and Legal Insurrection Foundation, identified 249 federal-assistance records — many advanced during the Biden administration — that included the keyword “intersectionality.”
William Jacobson, founder of the Legal Insurrection Foundation, criticized the spending in comments to The Post, arguing that “race-obsessed ‘Intersectionality’ doctrine” helps drive radical campus politics and what he described as anti-American and anti-capitalist agendas.
“Amazingly, we have discovered that the federal government has been funding the Intersectionality movement,” said Jacobson, who is also a professor at Cornell Law School.
“This has to stop,” he added.
Intersectionality is commonly defined as a framework for understanding how overlapping aspects of identity — including race, sex, sexual orientation, economic status and other traits — may affect a person’s experience of advantage or discrimination.
According to the report, grant activity connected to the term grew sharply during former President Joe Biden’s time in office, peaking at $80.1 million in 2023. The groups said the spending totals $140 million so far, with an additional $90 million designated for future funding.
The report also said funding levels have declined since President Trump returned to office.
Some of the programs have performance periods that go through 2030.
The intersectionality funding awards vary greatly from certain types of scientific research done under the National Institutes of Health to museums to federal funding for community living.
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In a lot of cases, the government was funding something such medical research, in which grant applicants wove in intersectionality principles.
This was apparent in some of the awards that are specific to colleges and universities, including $10.99 million to the New Hampshire Department of Health for cancer prevention and control programs and $7.53 million to the University of California, San Francisco, for an Asian American cancer cohort, the report said.
The New Hampshire cancer research grant was aimed at targeting “populations that experience health disparities across the cancer continuum and experience intersectionality of gender and income inequality.”
Other grants made intersectionality a front-and-center issue, including a $8.16 million to New York University for a “National Center for Engagement in Diabetes Equity Research” and a $14.25 million grant to Drexel University for “Catalyzing Systemic Change at Drexel University to Support Diverse Faculty in Health Disparities.”
The 23-page report raised concerns that the intersectionality focus in those grants means that grant recipients will take that federal funding for “unlawful identity-based decision-making to continue while appearing more technical and less explicit.”
It further contended that the practice of ranking people “according to ideological assumptions about oppression and privilege based on group membership” is flawed.
“Intersectionality is a main driver of anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism, and antisemitism, yet for federal grantmaking purposes, it exists mostly in the shadows,” said Defense of Freedom Institute President and co-founder Robert Eitel to The Post.
“Federal agencies must ensure that grants are used to advance the purposes Congress authorized and address real public needs, not bankroll an ideological framework designed to divide Americans into categories of privilege and oppression.”
Roughly 100 of the 249 flagged grant obligations appear to be active at the moment. Jacobson’s organizations previously pushed the Trump administration to crack down on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) as well as critical race theory (CRT) initiatives.
The two groups are encouraging Trump to take executive action to root out federal funding for intersectionality initiatives.
“Having eliminated CRT and DEI from federal grants, the Trump administration should close the Intersectionality loophole and stop federal grantmaking for programs that promote Intersectionality,” Jacobson told The Post.
