President Trump on Friday issued an executive order directing the Community Development Financial Institutions Fund and other government programs to reduce their personnel and operations to the minimum to needed to perform their statutory duties.
The order directs the heads of the CDFI Fund and six other government programs and entities to submit reports to the Office of Management and Budget “explaining which components or functions of the governmental entity, if any, are statutorily required and to what extent” within seven days. It also gives the OMB Director Russ Vought and other administration officials the ability to reject funding requests for the entities “to the extent they are inconsistent with this order.” Other entities covered by the order include the Minority Business Development Agency.
The CDFI Fund in January opened the fiscal year 2025 funding round, with plans to distribute approximately $348 million in awards, pending final congressional appropriations. Awards from the program support CDFIs that provide affordable financing and related services to low-income communities and populations that lack access to credit, capital and financial services. It was not immediately clear how the executive order would affect the funding round or CDFI Fund operations.
