The Theater Offensive in Boston and Rhode Island Latino Arts are among four arts organizations suing the National Endowment for the Arts over President Trump’s executive orders blocking federal funds for “anything that promotes ‘gender ideology,'” according to LGBTQ Nation.
Reports LGBTQ+ Nation:
The lawsuit, filed by lawyers from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), represents the first time a legal challenge against Trump’s order has been filed by artists.
The groups’ lawsuit points out that NEA grants used to be awarded for projects showing “artistic excellence and artistic merit,” The Hill reported. However, since these organizations want to produce artworks that “affirm transgender and nonbinary identities and experiences,” Trump’s order requires the NEA to preemptively deny them funds, violating the artists’ constitutional rights to free speech, due process and equal treatment under the law.
“This lawsuit seeks to enjoin an unlawful and unconstitutional exercise of executive power that has sowed chaos in the funding of arts projects across the United States, causing grievous irreparable harm to Plaintiffs and other organizations,” wrote ACLU lawyer Lynette Labinger.
“The vagueness of the prohibition requires them to guess as to what if anything they can create, produce, or promote that addresses themes of gender, or that affirms the identities of all people regardless of their gender identity,” Labinger added.
The artist organizations represented by the ACLU include Rhode Island Latino Arts; the National Queer Theater in Brooklyn, New York, which supports queer artists; the Theater Offensive of Boston, Massachusetts, which produces queer stage works; and the nonprofit Theatre Communications Group.
Read the complete LGBTQ+ Nation story here.
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