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PSF has withdrawn $1.5M proposal to US Government grant program

• gip 1y ago
  DEI has become such a contentious term that we should consider retiring it, in my opinion.
  • akimbostrawman 1y ago
    Renaming your ideological movement because most people don't like what it stands for won't change peoples opinion.
    • SabrinaJewson 1y ago
      What about DEI makes it an “ideological” movement as opposed to other movements who are presumably not ideological? And I’m not sure what “most people”, is supposed to mean; you do realize you’re talking about 49% – that is, under half, so definitively not “most” – of the US of A’s population?[0] [0]: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/poll-american-voters-are-deeply-divided-dei-programs-political-correct-rcna196377 https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/poll-american...
      • akimbostrawman 1y ago
        Maybe the demonizing everybody who does not agree with it or the agenda driven financial investment by mega corporations with ESG scores invented by the WEF folks
    • gip 1y ago
      Most Americans are growing skeptical of DEI as an ideological framework and that helped Trump. This suggests two possible paths forward: either we move beyond the theoretical underpinnings and focus on practical inclusion — supporting people from diverse backgrounds through approaches with broad consensus. Or DEI becomes increasingly marginalized, championed primarily by masked activists who struggle to maintain relevance.
  • diego_sandoval 1y ago
    The concept that it represents is contentious.
• theschmed 1y ago
  Read to the end. Ways to financially support this important work can be found there.
  • danbrooks 1y ago
    I made a donation. Props to the PSF for standing up.
  • kristjansson 1y ago
    Step One: get them to a better payment processor than PayPal! I waded through it, but that's a high friction funnel.
• metafex 1y ago
  Now that's what a backbone looks like.
  • deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
• bugglebeetle 1y ago
  Makes me wonder what strings were attached to that Allen AI NSF grant. I noticed that they were suddenly using more hawkish language around China.
• paloblanco 1y ago
  1.5M is a laughably small number compared to the value that financial institutions extract from just having PyPi available. I know my company, not financial but still large, has containers hitting it every day. How do we get these groups to fork over even just a small amount?
  • arusahni 1y ago
    The PSF and several other organizations that provide public package registries wrote an open letter [1] announcing a joint effort to make this situation more sustainable. I'll be interested to see where it goes. [1]: https://openssf.org/blog/2025/09/23/open-infrastructure-is-not-free-a-joint-statement-on-sustainable-stewardship/ https://openssf.org/blog/2025/09/23/open-infrastructure-is-n...
    • paloblanco 1y ago
      Thanks! I want to bring this up as a discussion point when I get the chance at work. I can't find a date on this letter - is it recent?
      • fn-mote 1y ago
        The date is at the top of the letter and in the url... September 2025.
      • di 1y ago
        It says "September 23, 2025" right at the top.
        • wahnfrieden 1y ago
          The website hides the date on mobile
      • abnercoimbre 1y ago
        I'm rather baffled at the spike in HN folks missing obvious dates. You're not the first..
• NeutralForest 1y ago
  That's what we like to hear! Read to the end and donate!
• sega_sai 1y ago
  Great job from PSF ! Taking the stand rather them submitting themselves to dictatorial/thought-policing terms.
• djoldman 1y ago
  > These terms included affirming the statement that we “do not, and will not during the term of this financial assistance award, operate any programs that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws.” (Emphasis mine) I'm curious if any lawyer folks could weigh in as to whether this language means that the entire sentence requires the mentioned programs to be "in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws." If so, one might argue that a "DEI program" was not in violation of a Federal anti-discrimination law. Obviously no one would want to have to go to court and this likely would be an unacceptable risk.
  • deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
  • wrs 1y ago
    If it was simply an agreement that the recipient won’t violate Federal law, it wouldn’t need to be stated (how could the intention be otherwise?). So I read it as an agreement to an interpretation that doing those things would violate the law.
    • politician 1y ago
      > I read it as an agreement to an interpretation that doing those things would violate the law. The Executive branch can make any claim it wants, but the Judiciary branch has the authority to decide what a reviewable claim means.
      • fn-mote 1y ago
        The GP's point is that it puts recipients in the position of having to argue that something they agreed to is invalid. This presumably places a higher burden of proof on the company. In the absence of such a statement, the first claim would need to be "the DEI program your company runs is against federal law", which could then be tested in the courts.
        • 1y ago
• aspir 1y ago
  This isn't good for the PSF, but if these "poison pill" terms are a pattern that applies to all NSF and (presumably) other government research funding, the entire state of modern scientific research is at risk. Regardless of how you, as an individual, might feel about "DEI," imposing onerous political terms on scientific grants harms everyone in the long term.
  • numbsafari 1y ago
    The direction of political winds shift over time. An organization like the PSF cannot assume an open-ended liability like that. DEI today, but what tomorrow? As we have seen, political leadership in the US has shown itself to be unreliable, pernicious, and vindictive. US leadership is undermined by the politicization of these grants. That is something that members of this community, largely a US-based, VC-oriented audience, should be deeply, deeply troubled by.
    • deleted 1y ago
      [deleted]
    • xeonmc 1y ago
      I wonder, how likely do you think there would be a retaliatory threat of revoking PSF’s nonprofit status for a perceived snub in rejecting the offer?
      • elevation 1y ago
        The IRS has withheld 501(c) status from the president’s perceived adversaries before[0]. But I haven’t heard of 501(c) status being revoked. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IRS_targeting_controversy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IRS_targeting_controversy
        • mgraczyk 1y ago
          "The FBI stated it found no evidence of "enemy hunting" of the kind that had been suspected, but that the investigation did reveal the IRS to be a mismanaged bureaucracy enforcing rules that IRS personnel did not fully understand. "
• di 1y ago
  For some context on the scale of this grant, the PSF took in only $1M in "Contributions, Membership Dues, & Grants" in 2024: https://www.python.org/psf/annual-report/2024/ https://www.python.org/psf/annual-report/2024/
• talawahtech 1y ago
  Thanks for posting this. I just made a donation to the PSF.
• etchalon 1y ago
  Donated, and happy to. It's shocking how fast this administration has gotten institutions to abandon their beliefs, and ones that don't should be rewarded.
• burnerRhodov2 1y ago
  So, all these clauses where changed back in Feb/ March. They definitely had to agree to the amendments on their grants, and they still had funding until October 1st. So, I feel like this is revisionist history because they would have been notified way before today to renew thier grant. So they signed the amendments and spent the money...
  • its-summertime 1y ago
    > In January 2025, the PSF submitted a proposal to the US government National Science Foundation under the Safety, Security, and Privacy of Open Source Ecosystems program to address structural vulnerabilities in Python and PyPI. > It was the PSF’s first time applying for government funding. It doesn't seem to be a renewal, and they seem to have applied before the clauses were added. - - - Additionally, on September 29, 2025, the NSF posted > The U.S. National Science Foundation announced the first-ever Safety, Security, and Privacy of Open-Source Ecosystems (NSF Safe-OSE) investment in an inaugural cohort of 8 teams Implying that until that point, there was no distribution of funds as part of Safe-OSE, so no prior years of funding existed
    • deleted 1y ago
      [deleted]
    • burnerRhodov2 1y ago
      thats not true.... https://www.fpds.gov/ezsearch/search.do?indexName=awardfull&templateName=1.5.3&s=FPDS.GOV&q=python+software+foundation https://www.fpds.gov/ezsearch/search.do?indexName=awardfull&...
      • its-summertime 1y ago
        All of those are marked as "PURCHASE ORDER", I don't think the PSF applies for those. I don't think they are what one would consider funding
        • burnerRhodov2 1y ago
• pbronez 1y ago
  Regardless of how you feel about the specific issues here, it’s a good example of why public policy works best when it targets one issue at a time. If you want to buy cyber security, just do that. Linking cybersecurity payments to social issues reduces how much cybersecurity you can get. Sometimes you can find win-win-win scenarios. There are values that are worth enforcing as a baseline. But you always pay a price somewhere. Anyway, I signed up to be a PSF member.
• 7jjjjjjj 1y ago
  I think people are overlooking the most important part: - Further, violation of this term gave the NSF the right to “claw back” previously approved and transferred funds. This would create a situation where money we’d already spent could be taken back, which would be an enormous, open-ended financial risk. They're saying the terms give the Trump administration what's essentially a "kill the PSF" button. Which they may want to use for any number of arbitrary reasons. Maybe the PSF runs a conference with a trans speaker, or someone has to be ousted for being openly racist. If it gets the attention of right wing media that's the end. The "just comply with the law" people are being extremely naive. There can be no assumption of good faith here.
  • deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
• XCabbage 1y ago
  A point made deep in a comment thread by user "rck" below deserves to be a top-level comment - the clawback clause explicitly applies ONLY to violations of existing law: > NSF reserves the right to terminate financial assistance awards and recover all funds if recipients, during the term of this award, operate any program in violation of Federal antidiscriminatory laws or engage in a prohibited boycott. So there's no plausible way that agreeing to these terms would have contractually bound PSF in any way that they were not already bound by statute. Completely silly ideological posturing to turn down the money.
  • takluyver 1y ago
    And if someone at the NSF decides to terminate the grant & 'recover all funds', does the dispute over the contract involve the same burden of proof and rights to appeal as a federal discrimation case? Someone wrote it into the grant agreement. It's a fair bet that they think that has some effect beyond what the law already achieves.
    • XCabbage 1y ago
      The burden of proof is "on the balance of probabilities" in both cases as far as I know, and there's no limit in principle on how high a breach of contract case can be appealed. Of course it has an effect, but that effect is giving the NSF the ability to sue over a grantee's alleged breaches of discrimination law, instead of that being limited to parties discriminated against and the EEOCs.
  • burkaman 1y ago
    Why was the clause included if it's completely redundant? PSF's decision is based on the government's demonstrated track record of what they consider to be "illegal DEI", not what the law actually says. Grant cancellations have been primarily based on a list of banned words (https://www.urban.org/urban-wire/nsf-has-canceled-more-1500-grants-nearly-90-percent-were-related-dei https://www.urban.org/urban-wire/nsf-has-canceled-more-1500-...), and of course nobody involved with any of the thousands of cancelled grants has been charged with breaking a law, because they haven't broken any. Here's a list of math grants identified by the Senate to be DEI-related because they contained strings like "homo" and "inequality": https://www.reddit.com/r/math/comments/1ioo2x9/database_of_woke_dei_grants/ https://www.reddit.com/r/math/comments/1ioo2x9/database_of_w... Here's the actual list of NSF cancelled grants: https://www.nsf.gov/updates-on-priorities#termination-list https://www.nsf.gov/updates-on-priorities#termination-list. You can also explore the data at https://grant-witness.us/nsf-data.html https://grant-witness.us/nsf-data.html. There are 1667 in there, so I'll just highlight a couple and note the "illegal DEI": - Center for Integrated Quantum Materials - CAREER: From Equivariant Chromatic Homotopy Theory to Phases of Matter: Voyage to the Edge - Remote homology detection with evolutionary profile HMMs - SBIR Phase II: Real-time Community-in-the-Loop Platform for Improved Urban Flood Forecasting and Management - RCN: Augmenting Intelligence Through Collective Learning - Mechanisms for the establishment of polarity during whole-body regeneration - CAREER: Ecological turnover at the dawn of the Great Ordovician Biodiversification Event - quantifying the Cambro-Ordovician transition through the lens of exceptional preservation When the federal government cancels your grant and claws back money you've already spent because they claim something innocuous is illegal, knowing in your heart that they're wrong is not very helpful.
• ggm 1y ago
  I would hope another funding source with no interest in this kind of legalistic politics emerges. Conditionality like this is going to be much more common for another 3 years at least. Turning down money is the easiest thing in the world, if you have the fortitude. I think a lot of organisations don't.
  • bitexploder 1y ago
    It truly is not easy IMO. I am just picking a nit here but "if you have the fortitude" is doing a lot of work. I ran a company for a while and you not only have to have the fortitude, but principles and an ability to weather the consequences of a choice like that. If you are in a tough position and you have employees who are counting on you and the business it is anything but easy. Even if you have fortitude. These decisions can be existential. Of course there are and should be red lines based on your ethics and morals, but none of that is easy. To me it is very hard.
• elicash 1y ago
  On the one hand, the plain text of the language is not against DEI practices in general -- only DEI practices that are "in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws." On the other hand, the federal government has gone after law firms that are not actually in violation of law and forced settlements due to their DEI programs, so you can't actually trust that you won't be hassled. Additionally, that you won't at minimum have the money clawed back, even if the claims are meritless, as the administration has done on Congressionally appropriated funds repeatedly as part of DOGE efforts.
  • adastra22 1y ago
    The conjunction used is "or". It could mean either.
    • elicash 1y ago
      My reading in context is different: https://www.governmentcontractorcomplianceupdate.com/2025/08/11/attorney-general-pam-bondi-issues-dei-guidance-to-recipients-of-federal-funds/ https://www.governmentcontractorcomplianceupdate.com/2025/08...
      • adastra22 1y ago
        That's a different, non-governmental website?
        • pseudalopex 1y ago
          That was labor lawyers interpreting a governmental memorandum about the same issue substantially or precisely.
  • alfalfasprout 1y ago
    Reality: the trump admin has shown that the law doesn't matter in the short term. If they think it's "DEI" they'll find a way to yank funding/make an example out of an organization agreeing to this. Even if they're legally in the wrong. Years later courts may agree no federal anti discrimination laws were violated but it's too late-- the damage has been done.
• rileymat2 1y ago
  > "do not, and will not during the term of this financial assistance award, operate any programs that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws." How does the legalese parse here? Does "violation of Federal anti-descrimination laws" apply to the whole thing or just the "discriminatory equity ideology" portion of the statement? I ask, because being in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws would be a problem whether or not you took the money.
  • MallocVoidstar 1y ago
    I'd assume it parses however the US government wants it to parse.
    • readthenotes1 1y ago
      Lawyers wouldn't have as much job security if commas didn't matter some of the time
      • valiant55 1y ago
        This administration is working very hard to make all lawyers redundant. The law doesn't really matter if the court is at the beck and call of the President.
  • jrochkind1 1y ago
    Honestly who knows, i wouldn't even trust a lawyer's advice, this administration has shown itself to not be a plain dealer or trustworthy, and willing to weaponize whatever they want to punish whoever they think needs punishing. Past experience of what should be legally enforceable or not does not seem very reliable at present.
  • dragonwriter 1y ago
    > How does the legalese parse here? Does "violation of Federal anti-descrimination laws" apply to the whole thing or just the "discriminatory equity ideology" portion of the statement? “Discriminatory equity ideology” seems intended to be an expansion of DEI (its not the normal meaning of that term, but the structure would be an odd coincidence if it was intended to be an alternative) in which case the sentence should probably read: “[...] that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology, in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws.” (note added comma after ideology). If “DEI” and “discriminatory equity ideology” were intended as alternatives, the sentence should probably read: “[...] that advance or promote DEI or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws.” (note removed comma before “or”) In either case, the “in violation of federal anti-discrimination law” clearly applies to the whole structure. To make it not do so, you’d have to interpret the meaning as best expressed by: "[...] that advance or promote DEI or, in violation of Federal anti-discrimination law, discriminatory equity ideology.” That is, that they were intended as alternatives, but also that the “in violation of Federal anti-discrimination law” was misplaced. But it really doesn’t matter that much how you read it, when you recognize that the whole reason it is in there at all is as implementaiton of the policy in EO 14151, which characterizes DEI (with its normal expansion, not the new one that looks like an expansion but could be read as an alternative) as categorically a violation of federal anti-discrimination law.
• paulsutter 1y ago
  If I'm reading that right, it looks like "do not and will not ... operate any programs... in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws" Did your lawyer say otherwise? Interested to understand > We were forced to withdraw our application and turn down the funding, thanks to new language that was added to the agreement requiring us to affirm that we "do not, and will not during the term of this financial assistance award, operate any programs that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws." > Our legal advisors confirmed that this would not just apply to security work covered by the grant - this would apply to all of the PSF's activities.
  • deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
  • ihaveajob 1y ago
    The core sentence has an OR clause, which means if any of the 2 conditions happens (DEI promotion; violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws), then they're in violation. Their stated mission is directly in contradiction with the first part. Even if it wasn't, I'd probably vote in the same direction, given the (let's call it) volatility we are seeing with capricious interpretation of executive privilege.
  • nicole_express 1y ago
    The current administration has taken, shall we say, a broad approach to what they consider "in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws", this clause is suddenly interpreted very differently than in past administrations despite the laws in question not changing. Therefore, I can definitely see why the PSF's lawyers encouraged giving this clause an extremely wide berth and pulling the grant entirely.
    • paulsutter 1y ago
      Then the brave thing is you accept the grant and let them take it to court. Get a court ruling against them, which in our common law system establishes case law The administration can try to press charges, but they don’t control the courts
• rdtsc 1y ago
  Good for them for putting their money where their mouth is and standing up for what they believe. Also, this is a golden opportunity for multi-billion dollar tech companies to also do the same and match or double the grant money in support of PSF! Google, AWS, Microsoft, anyone?
  • nerevarthelame 1y ago
    If those tech companies make a habit of funding "pro-DEI" organizations, their contracts with the US government could be jeoparized. There's a reason that Google, Amazon, and Microsoft all gave Trump money to demolish the East Wing of the White House and build a ballroom. And it's not their love of ballroom dancing.
    • rdtsc 1y ago
      Good points. And I'd say that also falls into the "put the money where the mouth is" category. We know where both of those things are for them, so we don't have to have any illusions or fantasies.
    • VagabundoP 1y ago
      It is literally quid pro quo right now. you have to play the game and I don't blame them as such. But PSF doing this and not playing the game is really awesome. I just hope they can fund themselves through other means. EU should be stepping up more with funding for projects like this as a replacement for US tech. Major secure reliable funding for open source projects that EU infrastructure can be built on would only increase our independence.
      • int_19h 1y ago
        They don't have to play the game. It would lead to less profits, sure. But we're talking about companies already sitting on tens of billions of unused cash.
      • Cheer2171 1y ago
        > you have to play the game and I don't blame them as such. Not to Godwin the thread, but that is exactly what the executives at IBM thought about their European subsidiary Dehomag in the 1930s. Soon they were custom building machines that organized the logistics of the Holocaust. They got away with it and kept all the profits and were exempted at Nuremberg, for the same reason as all the rocket scientists: America needed the tech.
• The-Ludwig 1y ago
  Bold and right decision!
• godelski 1y ago
  > The PSF is a relatively small organization, operating with an annual budget of around $5 million per year, with a staff of just 14. This might be the bigger story. How many trillions of dollars depend on Python? Yes, I mean trillion. Those market caps didn't skyrocket on nothing. A lot of ML systems run on Python. A lot of ML systems are first implemented in Python. Even with more complicated backends a Python layer is usually available, and used. A whole lot of other stuff depends on Python too, but the AI part is obvious. This is the weird part about our (global![0]) economics that I just don't get. We'll run billions of dollars in the red for a decade or more to get a startup going yet we can't give a million to these backbones? Just because they're open source? It's insane! If we looked at projects like this as a company we'd call their product extremely successful and they'd be able to charge out the wazoo for it. So the main difference is what? That it's open source? That by being open source it doesn't deserve money? I think this is a flaw we probably need to fix. In the very least I want those devs paid enough that they don't get enticed by some large government entity trying to sneak in backdoors or bugs. [0] it's not just the US, nor is it just capitalist countries. You can point me at grants but let's get honest, $5m is crazy low for their importance. They're providing more than 1000x that value in return. [side note] I do know big companies often contribute and will put a handful of people on payroll to develop, bug hunt, etc. But even if we include that I'm pretty sure the point still stands. I'm open to being wrong though, I don't know the actual numbers [P.S.S] seems to parallel our willingness to fund science. Similarly people will cry "but what is the value" from a smartphone communicating over the Internet, with the monetary value practically hitting them in the face.
  • braza 1y ago
    > A lot of ML systems run on Python. A lot of ML systems are first implemented in Python. > That by being open source it doesn't deserve money? I think this is a flaw we probably need to fix. Independent of how one feels about the current US administration, I do not think, as a non-American, that a particular government should foot the bill for it, but in reality I know that no company will do it in good will either. I've been thinking a lot in terms of financing, but the current system of grants, where some agency tied with the executive body will approve or reject something, is fundamentally broken, as we can see. In those cases of critical infrastructure, I think it's worth some kind of minimum 1:1 deductible of pre-tax programs where the foundations can apply, and then they could have their financing without being at the whims of some branch of the executive.
• lifeisstillgood 1y ago
  Six million is peanuts for guiding probably the most popular language on the planet these days I mean is OSS effective despite the funding problem, or if we gave every maintainer a million quid, would they all stop making tough decisions ? I suspect that it’s the organisations that define the decision quality - but that’s just a hunch.
• bgwalter 1y ago
  [flagged]
  • nsagent 1y ago
    I'd be 100% okay with the government stating no grant money can be used for funding DEI, but the actual wording in the grant prevents organizations like the PSF from any DEI, whether or not it is funded by the government grant. That's overly broad and seems likely to be an infringement of the first amendment (though I'm not a lawyer, so this is my lay interpretation).
    • bgwalter 1y ago
      It was clear to me where this was going in January, but a more explicit version can be found in the beginning of June 2025: https://www.science.org/content/article/u-s-college-first-decline-federal-science-grants-because-new-dei-language https://www.science.org/content/article/u-s-college-first-de... But hey, some of the same people that celebrated the cancellation of Tim Peters are celebrating the "bold" and "audacious" step of the PSF now (I don't mean you, I mean others). EDIT: The Python fascists can get this one down to -4 as well to distract from their incompetence.
• nsagent 1y ago
  do not, and will not during the term of this financial assistance award, operate any programs that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws. The government can certainly add restrictions to the use of the grant money, but applying that broadly over any actions the grantee performs during that time is overreach. I wonder about the legality of that condition.
• anon946 1y ago
  Note that many universities still have DEI offices. I believe that they are interpreting as described here: https://www.governmentcontractorcomplianceupdate.com/2025/08/11/attorney-general-pam-bondi-issues-dei-guidance-to-recipients-of-federal-funds/ https://www.governmentcontractorcomplianceupdate.com/2025/08.... So as long as they can show that they are not doing any of those, they seem to believe that they will be okay.
• gcanyon 1y ago
  This is what happens when people who take things seriously take seriously things said by people who don’t take things seriously.
• speakfreely 1y ago
  Choosing to advocate your personal political beliefs over the interests of your organization should be grounds for dismissal.
  • acdha 1y ago
    Exactly why they had to do this: the PSF mission statement is “to promote, protect, and advance the Python programming language, and to support and facilitate the growth of a diverse and international community of Python programmers.” Letting a minority of Americans limit them to the subset of people they consider politically correct wouldn’t be in keeping with that mission.
    • speakfreely 1y ago
      There's nothing mutually exclusive about non-discimination and diversity. They won't take the grant money because they want to drive a politicized agenda, to the detriment of the Python community as a whole.
      • acdha 1y ago
        Speaking of politicized agendas, I note that you are asserting without evidence that they have a secret motive other than the one states while also assuming that the administration’s interpretation of the relevant contract language will be fair and aboveboard despite the observed evidence.
        • speakfreely 1y ago
          Their position is logically inconsistent. If they are worried about being eventually targeted by the Trump administration, they have done more to paint a target on their back now then they ever could've done by quietly accepting the money. I don't believe they intended for their motive to be secret at all. This was an opportunity to bring attention to their political position.
          • 1y ago
• sho_hn 1y ago
  Bummer about the funding (and for a small org, almost more importantly the wasted application work), but all around an excellent decision. And a good reference for non-profit backbone. Time to amp up my Xmas donation.
• johnnyApplePRNG 1y ago
  This hurts two things at once: people and security. Anti-DEI clauses push out under-represented contributors, and the lost funding delays protections millions rely on. Shame on the decision-makers who made that tradeoff.
  • 9dev 1y ago
    [flagged]
• Kye 1y ago
  >> "Our legal advisors confirmed that this would not just apply to security work covered by the grant - this would apply to all of the PSF's activities." Given this, I could easily see work supporting the creation of less biased models being used as an attack vector. They made the right call.
• AlSweigart 1y ago
  > If we accepted and spent the money despite this term, there was a very real risk that the money could be clawed back later. That represents an existential risk for the foundation since we would have already spent the money! > I was one of the board members who voted to reject this funding - a unanimous but tough decision. I’m proud to serve on a board that can make difficult decisions like this. Kudos to Simon and the rest of the board. Accepting that money would be more than a strategic mistake, it'd be an existential danger to the PSF itself.
• btown 1y ago
  More details on the underlying project that the grant would have funded: https://pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/10/NSF-funding-statement.html https://pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/10/NSF-funding-statement.h... And for those who want to fund the security of one of the few remaining independent foundation-led package ecosystems: https://www.python.org/psf/donations/ https://www.python.org/psf/donations/ https://www.python.org/sponsors/application/ https://www.python.org/sponsors/application/
• dang 1y ago
  [stub for offtopicness / flamewarness / guideline-breakingness] (this is a rough cut - I know there are other posts left in the thread that arguably belong here, but this time I'm in a bit of a rush) (please, everyone, you can make substantive points thoughtfully but do so within the guardrails at https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html - avoid the generic-indignant-flamey-snarky-namecalley-hardcore-battley sectors of internet discourse - we're trying for something different here and we need everyone to help with that)
  • bilekas 1y ago
    This seems very un-American. The government dictating how you run your business ? > “do not, and will not during the term of this financial assistance award, operate any programs that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws.” Is that even legal to add such an arbitrary and opinionated reason to a government grant? I applaud them for taking a stand, it seems to be more and more rare these days.
    • dboreham 1y ago
      The fascist language is a no-op because it optimizes to: "don't violate federal laws" which presumably is reasonable.
      • takluyver 1y ago
        I would imagine it is much easier to enforce as part of a grant agreement that organisations have signed. Especially if the law is either not really a law (yet), or it might be invalidated by a court on free speech grounds. There's probably a reason someone wrote it into the grant agreement, and that they're declaring DEI stands for something other than the familiar Diversity, Equity & Inclusion.
    • __alexs 1y ago
      > discriminatory equity ideology Isn't that when you let your mates buy into your corrupt private investment vehicles for cheap?
• ghiculescu 1y ago
  Reading this you would think the US is the only country in the world. Why can’t any other country - one that’s more politically or ideologically aligned - fund the PSF? It seems odd the gripes about the US government and its ideologies as if there’s no other options. (Not an American.)
  • Kye 1y ago
    It's a US-based organization discussing funding from the US government. Why would you expect a different focus in an article about that funding?
    • troyvit 1y ago
      It's a good point that this is a US-based organization, but I don't think the parent is looking for a different focus from this post. Rather, they're asking that given Python's international influence why aren't organizations from more countries (or the countries themselves) contributing? My gut feeling is that it's because the PSF isn't looking outside the US for those sponsors. Here's their sponsor list btw: https://www.python.org/psf/sponsors/ https://www.python.org/psf/sponsors/
  • deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
• jkelleyrtp 1y ago
  In high school, I ran a robotics team that did lots of STEM outreach. We went to community centers, after school programs, and worked with other similar orgs like "girls who code." I think we played an important role in the community. In our mission we stated we wanted to help bring "equity to STEM education." In 2025, according to the current admin's stance on "DEI," my robotics team would not be able to receive grants without risk of being sued. It's plainly obvious the line is not drawn at restraining "overly progressive policies" - it's just arbitrarily placed so the govt can pick and choose the winners based on allegiance. It's a shame that folks with a strong moral fiber are now punished for wanting to help their communities.
  • actionfromafar 1y ago
    [flagged]
    • a456463 1y ago
      [flagged]
      • actionfromafar 1y ago
        They don't like being found out.
        • CursedSilicon 1y ago
          Sorry. Given the context of the thread Who is "they" exactly?
          • actionfromafar 1y ago
            Presumably, somebody downvoting that comment. Of course, it doesn't have to be that reason, but if the shoe fits
  • ashtonshears 1y ago
    I appreciate your efforts to support community and people
• th 1y ago
  It seems like a number of the "DEI is anti-merit discrimination" messages in this thread are overlooking how DEI work usually works. A relevant tweet from 2016 (https://x.com/jessicamckellar/status/737299461563502595 https://x.com/jessicamckellar/status/737299461563502595): > Hello from your @PyCon Diversity Chair. % PyCon talks by women: (2011: 1%), (2012: 7%), (2013: 15%), (2014/15: 33%), (2016: 40%). #pycon2016 Increased diversity in communities usually comes from active outreach work. PyCon's talk selection process starts blinded. If 300 people submit talks and 294 are men, then 98% of talks will likely be from men. If 500 people submit talks and 394 are men, then ~79% will likely be by men. Outreach to encourage folks to apply/join/run/etc. can make a big difference in the makeup of applicants and the makeup of the end results. Bucking the trend even during just one year can start a snowball effect that moves the needle further in future years. The world doesn't run on merit. Who you know, whether you've been invited in to the club, and whether you feel you belong all affect where you end up. So unusually homogenous communities (which feel hard for outsiders to break into) can arise even without deliberate discrimination. Organizations like the PSF could choose to say "let's avoid outreach work and simply accept the status quo forever", but I would much rather see the Python community become more diverse and welcoming over time.
  • endomorphosis 1y ago
    Disparate treatment on the basis of protected and usually immutable characteristics, is literally illegal, all the sort of mental gymnastics do not matter, that's literally what the law is.
    • Dylan16807 1y ago
      Encouraging specific people to submit applications is not illegal. Even based on those characteristics.
      • endomorphosis 1y ago
        [flagged]
• neuronexmachina 1y ago
  Some predictions on how the current admin is going to probably retaliate for the PSF withdrawing their proposal: * IRS audit into the PSF's 501c3 status * if the PSF has received federal funds in the past, they'll probably be targeted by the DOJ's "Civil Rights Fraud Initiative" * pressure on corporate sponsors, especially those that are federal contractors
• ModernMech 1y ago
  [flagged]
  • ethical_source 1y ago
    Do you understand, intellectually, that quite a few of your colleagues find gestures like juxtaposing the Rust logo and the LGBTQ* flag off-putting and resent being unable articulate our discomfort while all your specious complaints get addressed instantly? We don't bear you any ill will. We just don't want your sexuality shoved in our faces. I've been hearing claims of the necessity of doing so for over a decade. It wasn't true back then and it's not true now. There is no law of nature requiring that technology communities become platforms for celebrating certain personal identities. That's an absurd claim. Honestly, it doesn't matter whether you understand. For over a decade, we've just wanted to be left alone. You have refused. We won the last election. We can and will, with sadness but determination power, turn the power of the state against you and make you leave us the hell alone.
    • ModernMech 1y ago
      Let me put it this way: computing as a field, and programming languages in particular would not be where they are today without the hard work and dedication of LGBTQ people in particular. I mean, we have to look no further than Alan Turing to understand this at a visceral level. In his tradition, LGBTQ people flock toward this field. The reason the flag is in the Rust discord logo isn't because people are throwing their sexuality in your face. They put that flag up as a signal that the community is safe for other like-minded people. The flag stays up because the people who built the community want it up and keep it up. So the logo isn't juxtaposed with the LGBTQ flag -- juxtaposition implies contrast. Rust is intrinsically LGBTQ because it's built by LGBTQ people. That's the essence of community and languages if anything are communities. This is what happens when someone's mere existence in public life is considered dangerous or "your sexuality being shoved in our faces" -- they stay inside, they find community in secret places where few people go, and they put up signs to signal to others similarly situated that they are welcome. So of course we're not gonna take the flag down, it's up for a reason! Won't come down until that reason it's up goes away.
• brokegrammer 1y ago
  Confused about this decision. Why not take the money and then do only DEI activities that don't break the law?
  • speakfreely 1y ago
    [flagged]
    • deleted 1y ago
      [deleted]
• zb3 1y ago
  [flagged]
  • 4uazeT17 1y ago
    Of course. DEI is for "community" members from the right families to get jobs through PyCon networks regardless of qualifications. The leadership is generally white affluent virtue signaling male. A PSF fellow was canceled for pointing exactly that out (at the same time as Tim Peters was canceled). So it is understandable why they want to preserve DEI but do not go after other economic or corruption or foreign policy failures of this administration --- after all, they have to preserve the same corporate sponsors who also sponsor Trump.
  • thunderfork 1y ago
    [dead]
• bgwalter 1y ago
  [flagged]
• rcpt 1y ago
  Under discussed is that it should not takes months of work to apply for scientific funding. Grant writing and the gigantic infrastructure for checking that the researchers are doing exactly what you've approved is an enormous burden on progress.
• hashstring 1y ago
  Good game. Trump 2.0’s Maoism is becoming boring.
  • next_xibalba 1y ago
    [flagged]
    • hashstring 1y ago
      In what way? This whole manufacturing of a fear culture, the emphasis on us-vs-them (ICE), loyalty oaths (MIT, pledges of CEOs), purging of institutions (doge), attempts to reorganize higher education (Harvard), control of media (Kimmel), the symbolism (maga), it’s all Trump 2.0 boring attempt at a ‘Cultural Revolution’ a la Mao. It’s just a bit messier because Trump never commits to much and blatantly chases much of his own selfish interests (crypto schemes and market manipulation). I believe that the parallels that someone may draw between Biden and Mao are much much weaker.
• deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
• sam345 1y ago
  Welcome to government funding. This is par for course. It's not just dei or anti dei. If you want to take government funding, you have to not read the fine print and swallow hard.
• chmorgan_ 1y ago
  [dead]
• schemester 1y ago
  [flagged]
  • rlprlprlp 1y ago
    i have no take on this comment, but i like the model in this paper for considering whether it could be possible or appropriate wrt different levels of vetting: https://arxiv.org/pdf/1801.03533 https://arxiv.org/pdf/1801.03533
  • fn-mote 1y ago
    Misunderstanding the GP. Possibly deliberately? In the parent’s view, the top N% is fixed. In the GP’s view, it’s the top N% of the applicant pool, so a more diverse applicant pool leads to more diverse talks. Talk selection is blind (per GP), so the increasing % of female-led talks is evidence for the GP viewpoint. If the Parent view were correct, the same 98% male talks would be selected because they are “objectively better” than the lower-quality female-led talks that are bulking up the applicant pool. I have not verified the claim about talk selection being blinded. A source (or contradicting source) would be welcome.
    • schemester 1y ago
      th asserts “If 500 people submit talks and 394 are men, then ~79% will likely be by men.” I didn’t misunderstand. That is simply nonsense.
  • StilesCrisis 1y ago
    I’m not sure why you would think the “top N” of any given field would be men. There aren’t more men than women overall, and men aren’t inherently any smarter or more talented. If you’ve only ever worked in tech, though, maybe you have a skewed perspective.
    • schemester 1y ago
      [flagged]
• Kalanos 1y ago
  pypi put out a survey a while back that was full of bs questions about dei fluff. the lack of subject matter made me really question the competence of the project staff.
• hedora 1y ago
  I wonder if we need a GPL v4 that revokes itself if the end user violates other people’s human rights. That way, this sort of situation would result in the revocation of the python license, instead of the grant proposal.
  • pabs3 1y ago
    Python doesn't use the GPL, and such a license wouldn't meet the FSF Four Freedoms, nor the OSI Open Source Definition, so it would likely lead to a fork, less usage and less redistribution.
• jameslk 1y ago
  The government didn’t have to spend more money, and this organization didn’t have to take money with strings attached they didn’t like… It seems like a win-win to me
• test6554 1y ago
  Under the grant rules programming languages must be strongly typed. No strings identifying as an int, etc. :-)
  • JuniperMesos 1y ago
    I realize this is a joke, but honestly, I wouldn't mind if US federal government grant funding policy was targeted towards promoting strongly typed programming languages. It's actually bad if your programming language allows a string to identify as an int!
• BrenBarn 1y ago
  It's the right move. DEI has always been a weird thing because half the people supposedly doing it were always just trying to curry favor with people in positions of power who supported it, and now that the winds have shifted they're equally happy to curry favor by getting rid of it. They signal virtue or vice depending on how virtuous or vicious the leader. I think the PSF actually wants to do the right thing, which in the current perverse environment makes them more likely to be targeted. The wisest move is not to play.
• Galanwe 1y ago
  What is most scary to me, is that these grants are not opportunistic (money is raised when needed), they are on an enveloppe basis (the amount to be distributed is fixed). Essentially that means for every dollar not spent on, say, the PSF; then an other organization willing to denounce DEI is going to get these $1.5M. I fear less for the opportunity loss to _proper_ organizations, and worry that activist anti-DEI/partisan organizations are artificially going to get a massive funding increase. In that setup, it may be the lesser of two evils for the PSF to accept that grant, if only to deny a more partisan organization to get this funding.
  • lan321 1y ago
    It's a general issue with budgeting grants but at the same time companies need to be talked to in numbers. If there's no known money jar, I don't believe anyone will partake and it'll all get more sketchy. 'Why did money appear for them but not for us?' type of thing
  • JuniperMesos 1y ago
    The PSF itself is an activist pro-DEI/partisan organization. If US federal money is going to go to an activist organization no matter what, I would prefer that it does to one that denounces DEI rather than supports it.
• trymas 1y ago
  > discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws. Striving for equality according to MAGA is discrimination. Make systematic racism and sexism great again like it’s <1950s?
  • theandrewbailey 1y ago
    Racism and sexism is illegal under Federal anti-discrimination laws.
• shadowvoxing 1y ago
  DEI is racist. It's picking people because of skin color instead of merit.
• globular-toast 1y ago
  DEI is actually a bit of red herring here. It's worth reading again the commentary from simonw's blog: > If we accepted and spent the money despite this term, there was a very real risk that the money could be clawed back later. That represents an existential risk for the foundation since we would have already spent the money! This is the real problem. It's not about DEI really. It's the same problem as so much else this year: the US government is currently wildly unpredictable and doing business with such an entity is a liability.
• JuniperMesos 1y ago
  I'm strongly in favor of the US federal government requiring that recipients of federal grant money affirm the statement that they "do not, and will not during the term of this financial assistance award, operate any programs that advance or promote DEI, or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws.". I'm a US citizen and taxpayer, and I don't want my tax dollars going towards organizations that are unwilling to affirm this. As a Python user, I do wish that the PSF wouldn't institute DEI policies on their own volition; but ultimately they're a private organization that I have no relationship with, and they're entitled to make political decisions differently than I would. But in terms of receiving taxpayer money, I'm glad that these US federal government grant rules are putting real financial pressure on them.
• robd003 11mo ago
  This was a really stupid move. Isn't the Python Foundation almost exactly $1.5 million over budget? According to their recent post they only have 6 months of runway before going broke. https://pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/10/connecting-the-dots.html https://pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/10/connecting-the-dots.htm...