Prospective funding for Historically black colleges and universities has been cut in the newest version of Joe Biden’s spending bill.
Newsweek reported, Historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) that were looking forward to $45 billion in funding may be faced with just $2 billion under the Biden administration’s multitrillion-dollar spending plan.
The $3.5 trillion bill was set to include $45 billion for HBCUs and other minority-serving institutions, but the newest iteration of the bill allots only $2 billion for educational programs and infrastructure of HBCUs. That amount could even be reduced to competitive grant funding, instead of direct funding to the schools.
According to the Associated Press, the funding was reduced as a result of in-fighting among the Democrat party over the size of the funding package.
Democrats like Joe Manchin hold out, refusing to pass the bill. Manchin referred to the bill as “the definition of fiscal insanity.”
President Rodrick L Smothers of Smith College in Little Rock Arkansas said “We used the funds that we received to serve the students that we have, and now we’re asking for additional funds to make sure that when we are on the other side of this global pandemic our institutions will be bigger and better and more resilient.”