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Click above for the audio. 90% of funding for Humanities Montana has been cut by the Trump administration. (Wosunan/adobe Stock)
PNS - July 23, 2025 - Federal dollars support around 90% of funding for Humanities Montana, which has provided state grants and programming for 50 years.
After the Trump administration cut funding in February, the group is scrambling to replace it.
Jill Baker, executive director of the nonprofit, said public-private partnerships have been key to serving every Montana county.
"We take the federal dollars and they're locally directed and locally delivered," Baker explained. "Private donations will not be able to replace the level of federal funding that we receive from the National Endowment for Humanities."
In the past year, Baker added Humanities Montana has supported local literary festivals and a youth journalism camp, and supported projects involving cowboy poetry, Indigenous language revitalization and veterans’ oral histories.
Baker argued the humanities teach critical thinking and civic engagement and are a “foundation of democracy.”
"We need more humanities-based programming that bring people together across divides," Baker contended. "My concern for these cuts is that there'll be less of that and that will contribute to more division."
The Modern Language Association is one of three plaintiffs filing a lawsuit in May against the U.S. Department of Government Efficiency, the National Endowment of Humanities and others over the cuts.
