On April 10, lawyers for the American Library Association (ALA) filed a motion for preliminary injunction blocking the Trump administration from destroying the agency. In its motion, ALA lawyers request a hearing be scheduled within 21 days “due to the exigencies of Defendants’ ongoing dismantling of IMLS.” But the motion also asks the court for a ruling by May 4, which is the date on which the the "mass termination of IMLS staff will reportedly take effect."
The ALA motion for a preliminary injunction comes after it filed suit on April 7 in federal court in Washington D.C. seeking to block the Trump administration’s efforts to dismantle of the Institute of Museum and Library Services as laid out in Trump’s March 14 executive order. The suit, which is joined by AFSCME/AFL-CIO as co-plaintiffs, argues that the order and the subsequent actions taken by acting director Keith Sonderling to shutter the agency are unlawful, and will cause irreparable harm if not stopped.
“The services that IMLS’s staff provides and the grants it issues are the lifeblood of the American library system,” the ALA’s April 10 filing stresses.
“By reducing IMLS to a husk, Defendants have made it impossible to carry out those duties, violating Congress’s commands. Refusing to disburse money Congress appropriated in connection with several statutory grant programs similarly treads upon Congress’s appropriations authority and the separation of powers. And even if Defendants’ scheme were constitutional, they have violated the Administrative Procedure Act by acting contrary to law and arbitrarily and capriciously,” the filing goes on to argue. “Those factors, plus the public interest, strongly favor an immediate preliminary injunction to stop Defendants’ devastating and unlawful acts until this Court can consider the merits of Plaintiffs’ claims.”
The ALA filing comes as a separate suit, filed in federal court in Rhode Island by 21 states also seeking to block the administration’s destruction of IMLS, received a hearing date on their motion for a preliminary injunction.
That case will be argued on Friday, April 18 before chief judge John J. McConnell, Jr.
