A class action lawsuit alleges that the Department of Government Efficiency used ChatGPT to identify and cancel humanities grants related to Jewish topics by labeling them as diversity, equity and inclusion. According to court filings, staffers prompted the artificial intelligence tool to determine whether grant descriptions related to diversity, equity and inclusion, and projects flagged by the system were largely terminated. Plaintiffs say this approach led to the cancellation of roughly eighty percent of the National Endowment for the Humanities grants last year.

Among the canceled projects were studies on violence against women during the Holocaust, Jewish literature in the Soviet Union, Jewish women’s forced labor during the Holocaust, and a biography of a Jewish playwright and activist. Depositions indicate that a senior official at the humanities agency was unaware that ChatGPT had been used and did not agree that Holocaust related scholarship constituted diversity, equity and inclusion. The final authority for the cancellations rested with the Department of Government Efficiency.

The lawsuit, brought by the Authors Guild and several academic associations and scholars, seeks restoration of the funding. At the same time, the humanities agency moved forward with a record grant to a politically conservative Jewish cultural organization and continued support for affiliated scholars. The case has intensified debate over whether Jewish studies fall under diversity, equity and inclusion policies and raised broader concerns about the use of artificial intelligence to make federal funding decisions.