Minnesota Scraps Race-Based Grant Program After DOJ Opens Civil Rights Probe

The Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) has voluntarily paused a grant initiative that used race-based eligibility criteria after the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) opened a Civil Rights Act compliance review, the DOJ announced Tuesday.

According to the DOJ, the Capacity Strengthening Initiative restricted eligible recipients to groups serving “people of color,” offered “strategic consideration” and “gave priority” to applications from organizations “led by populations of color.”

The department also alleged that the program favored directing a larger share of grant funding to “Black or African American” and “nonwhite Latino(a)” communities.

A 2023 overview of the Capacity Strengthening Grant published by the third-party Grant Portal said the program was intended “To support and strengthen the capacity of metro and rural community-based organizations and faith-based organizations serving people of color, American Indians, LGBTQIA+, and people living with disabilities.”

Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon, who leads the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, said the program’s explicit race-based wording ran afoul of the Civil Rights Act.

“Recipients of federal dollars cannot decide who benefits from those funds on the basis of race, color, or national origin,” Dhillon said in a DOJ statement. “The Department appreciates that the State of Minnesota has recognized this foundational principle and has repealed the statute governing the program.”

MDH withdrew the grant program after the DOJ initiated a review based on Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, the DOJ statement claimed. Title VI prohibits any recipient of Federal financial assistance — a group that includes MDH — from discriminating on the basis of race, color, or national origin.

INC News contacted the DOJ and MDH for further comment and confirmation.