Libraries and museums are some of the latest targets of the mass layoffs and funding restrictions that have become characteristic of the second Trump administration.
At the end of March, the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), a federal agency that provides grant funding to museums and libraries across the country, placed its whole staff on administrative leave. As NPR reported, “This followed Trump’s previous executive order shrinking seven federal agencies, including the Institute of Museum and Library Services.” Last year, IMLS awarded $266 million in grants—and with the future of the federal agency uncertain, the cultural institutions that depend on these grants, including libraries, also face uncertainty in their budgets, staffing, and community programs.
According to a statement from the union of IMLS staff, AFGE Local 3403, as reported by USA Today, “The status of previously awarded grants is unclear. Without staff to administer the programs, it is likely that most grants will be terminated.”
This disruption comes in the wake of another action by the Trump administration which has caused upheaval in libraries. The Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights (DOE OCR) dismissed all complaints of book banning. With a press release issued on January 24 titled “U.S. Department of Education Ends Biden’s Book Ban Hoax,” the ability to turn to the DOE OCR to fight book bans—which had proven effective—disappeared.
What’s the reaction from writers, readers, parents, and librarians? And what groups are stepping in to continue to fight book bans and support free speech?
Books, writers, and libraries have not escaped the Trump administration’s anti-DEI agenda.
New Challenges
Book banning has been on the rise for years. In the last academic year, advocacy group PEN America calculated more than 10,000 bans against books in public schools in the United States. According to PEN America, “[I]t is the books that have long fought for a place on the shelf that are being targeted.” These include books about racial justice, disability justice, sexuality, and gender, books with LGBTQ+ characters or authors, historical books, and books about science, climate change, and the environment.
NPQ reported in 2023 that “those who initiate book bans and censorship aren’t only focused on the written material. Often, they go beyond the books and target the writers as well.”
That’s what happened to writer Ashley Hope Pérez, author of the young adult novel Out of Darkness, one of the most banned books in the United States. Pérez told NPQ that she has had to deal “with ongoing harassment—hate mail, ugly phone calls, defamatory messages sent to my employer.” In addition to personal attacks, writers of banned books face lost income due to canceled appearances, dropping sales, and uncertain contracts for future projects.
Books, writers, and libraries have not escaped the Trump administration’s anti-DEI agenda either. Earlier this year, the Department of Defense (DOD) circulated a memo calling for a review of library books in educational settings for the children of US military personnel and DOD’s civilian employees. Challenged books, some of which were permanently removed from school libraries, include No Truth Without Ruth, a picture book about Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and the children’s book Freckleface Strawberry by Oscar-winning actor Julianne Moore.
That book, about a child learning to love her freckles, and others on the list, were allegedly targeted for being “potentially related to gender ideology or discriminatory equity ideology topics,” according to The Guardian.
Groups and Lawsuits
Moore took to social media to protest the attempt at censoring her book and other authors’ books, writing on Instagram, “It is galling for me to realize that kids like me, growing up with a parent in the service and attending a [Department of Defense] school will not have access to a book written by someone whose life experience is so similar to their own.” Moore cited the advocacy done by PEN America, including keeping records of banned books and promoting them with events like Banned Books Week.
Other groups include Authors Against Book Bans, a coalition that also includes illustrators and editors, and aims to have a chapter in each US state.
Publishers, writers, teachers, parents, and students have joined together in the courts with a lawsuit challenging Idaho’s House Bill 710, a 2024 law that requires libraries to restrict to an adults-only area any materials considered “harmful” to children, and prevents anyone under the age of 18 from accessing library books with any “sexual content.” The law defines “sexual content” broadly, including “any acts of…homosexuality.”
The [Office of Civil Rights’] January press release denied not only the urgency of challenging book bans but their very existence, calling book bans—which have tripled since 2023—“so-called.”
Publishers in the lawsuit include the “Big Five” publishing houses—Macmillan, Penguin Random House, Hachette, HarperCollins, and Simon & Schuster—along with Sourcebooks. The Authors Guild, Idaho’s Donnelly Public Library District, as well as writers, parents, teachers, and students are also part of the suit.
A second lawsuit seeking to block the law’s enforcement—with plaintiffs that included schools, libraries, and parents—was denied by a federal judge in March 2025.
Sign up for our free newsletters
Subscribe to NPQ's newsletters to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.
By signing up, you agree to our privacy policy and terms of use, and to receive messages from NPQ and our partners.
Joining the Fight
Under Trump, one of the most effective avenues for successfully fighting book bans has been removed. The DOE OCR had been investigating book bans as civil rights violations, as many targeted books feature characters of color, characters who are from the LGBTQ+ or disabled communities, or authors who share those identities.
But with the DOE OCR’s dismissal of book ban complaints, that line of defense is gone. The office’s January press release denied not only the urgency of challenging book bans, but their very existence, referring to book bans—which have tripled since 2023—as “so-called.”
The press release reads in part:
Attorneys quickly confirmed that books are not being “banned,” but that school districts, in consultation with parents and community stakeholders, have established commonsense processes by which to evaluate and remove age-inappropriate materials. Because this is a question of parental and community judgment, not civil rights, OCR has no role in these matters.
For years, libraries and librarians have been called upon to do far more than support access to books, information, and learning.
In the absence of assistance from the Department of Education, parents, educators, publishers, authors, and students themselves will have to continue turning to the courts. This month, a new lawsuit was filed in South Carolina by parents against the Greenville County Library System, due to the library’s restricting of books with trans characters or storylines.
As for libraries themselves? With potential loss of funding and diminished or laid-off staff, it may be a challenge for libraries to keep up, as the list of banned books grows ever longer, and attempts to censor or remove those books even more aggressive. On April 2, 400 books were removed from the US Naval Academy, under orders from Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s office, for promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion.
For years, libraries and librarians have been called upon to do far more than support access to books, information, and learning. Libraries, sometimes a community’s only hub, are now often expected to serve as emergency climate shelters and refuges for those experiencing homelessness or mental health crises—usually without staff receiving specialized training, support, or additional compensation.
One nonprofit that has joined the fight against book bans is Little Free Library based in St. Paul, MN. The organization that spearheads the community phenomenon of a private residence, organization, church, or office placing an enclosed box on the sidewalk for passersby to both leave and take free books, Little Free Library is stocking banned books, especially in areas hit hard by censorship.
The organization also participated in Banned Books Week last year, and collaborated with PEN America and the American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom, to create an interactive map of Little Free Libraries in book-ban “hotspot” areas around the country.
As LGBTQ+ advocacy organization GLAAD reported, “In communities where book bans have taken hold, these [free books] can be a lifeline for those seeking to find their lives reflected in stories that others want to hide.”
For More on This Topic:
Writers of Banned Books Speak Out
