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The Trump administration has proposed cutting funds for tribes and universities by almost 90%. This is a move that is likely to close most or all institutions created to serve disadvantaged students by abuse of Indigenous communities.
The proposal was included in a budget request from the Interior Ministry to Congress and was published Monday. The document only mentions two federally administered tribal universities. Haskell Indian Nations University and the Institute for Polytechnics in Southwest India — points out that demand for post-secondary programs will fall from over $182 million this year to just $22 million in 2026.
If Congress supports the administration’s proposal, it would destroy the nation’s 37 tribes’ universities and universities, said Ahniwake Rose, president and CEO of the American Indian Higher Education Consortium, representing universities in Washington, DC.
“The proposed number would close the tribal colleges,” Rose told Propovica. “They can’t keep it.”
Propublica discovered last year that Congress is underfunding its $4 billion annual tribal college. The Indian Education Bureau was tasked with requesting funding for institutions and never asked lawmakers to fully fund the institutions at the level required by law, Propublica found.
But rather than remedying the issue, the Trump administration’s budget will destroy universities, tribal education leaders said.
The Indian Education Bureau, which manages the federal funds of tribal universities, and the parent company of the Bureau, which is the Ministry of Home Affairs, declined to answer questions.
Rose said she and other university leaders were not warned and consulted about the proposed cuts during the budgeting process. Federal officials had not contacted the university by the end of Monday.
The proposal comes as the Trump administration outlined many funding cuts related to federal trust and treaty obligations on tribes. The Tribal Sovereign Coalition said last month that discretionary spending proposed by the administration in the interests of Native Americans would fall to its lowest point in more than 15 years.
Congress passed the law in 1978, funding the tribal university system and pledging an inflation-adjusted budget based on the number of students registered in federally recognized tribes. However, these spendings have consistently lagged behind inflation.
Despite the small funding, the university manages to preserve Indigenous languages, conduct high-level research, and train local residents of nursing, meat processing, and other occupations and trade. But virtually no money for infrastructure and construction forces schools to navigate broken water pipes, sewer leaks, crumbling roofs and other issues that have exacerbated other financial shortcomings.
Tribal College leaders were unaware of the cuts they proposed to raise already inadequate funds, saying there are more questions than answers.
“I’m shaking in my boots,” said Manojipatil, president of Little Priest Tribal College in Nebraska. “It’s basically a chest knife. It’s a dagger and I don’t know how I can survive these types of cuts.”
The legislature has the power to finalize the budget, noted Rep. Teresa Leger Fernandez, a ranking Democrat on the House Subcommittee on India and Islands, which includes three tribal universities in the New Mexico area. Tribal universities are “a lifeline of the Indian country,” Leger Fernandez said in a statement. “They provide higher education rooted in language, culture and community. These cuts take native students out of opportunity and violate our trust.”
Other members of the House and Senate Indian Affairs Committee did not immediately respond to questions from Propublica. The White House also did not respond to requests for further information.
Monday’s budget release was the latest in a string of bad financial news for tribal universities since President Donald Trump began his second term. The administration suspends agricultural subsidies that fund scholarships and research, and the tribal university president spent last week trying to cut deep into a Pell grant program for low-income students. The majority of tribal college students rely on Pell’s funds to attend school.
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Tribal universities argue that their funds are protected by treaties and federal trust liability. This is a legal obligation that requires the United States to protect Indigenous peoples’ education, resources, rights and assets. And they note that facilities are the economic engines of some of North America’s poorest regions, often providing jobs, training and social services in remote areas.
“We’ve seen a lot of effort and we’ve seen you in a lot of trouble with our team,” said Dawn Frank, president of Oglala Lakota University in South Dakota. “We really rely on our senators and representatives to meet their obligations of treaty and trust.”
However, others noted that they had met with federal representatives for years to highlight the importance of tribal universities to their communities and were disappointed by the chronic lack of funding.
“We’ve been working hard to get into the world,” said Chris Caldwell, president of Menominee Nation University in Wisconsin. “They don’t listen to our message.”
