Python Foundation goes ride or DEI, rejects government grant with strings attached
- Reference: 1761596964
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2025/10/27/python_foundation_abandons_15m_nsf/
- Source link:
The programming non-profit's deputy executive director Loren Crary [1]said in a blog post today that the National Science Founation (NSF) had offered $1.5 million to address structural vulnerabilities in Python and the Python Package Index (PyPI), but the Foundation quickly became dispirited with [2]the terms of the grant it would have to follow.
"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 [diversity, equity, and inclusion], or discriminatory equity ideology in violation of Federal anti-discrimination laws,'" Crary noted. "This restriction would apply not only to the security work directly funded by the grant, but to any and all activity of the PSF as a whole."
[3]
To make matters worse, the terms included a provision that if the PSF was found to have voilated that [4]anti-DEI diktat, the NSF reserved the right to claw back any previously disbursed funds, Crary explained.
[5]
[6]
"This would create a situation where money we'd already spent could be taken back, which would be an enormous, open-ended financial risk," the PSF director added.
The PSF's mission [7]statement enshrines a commitment to supporting and growing "a diverse and international community of Python programmers," and the Foundation ultimately decided it wasn't willing to compromise on that position, even for what would have been a solid financial boost for the organization.
[8]
"The PSF is a relatively small organization, operating with an annual budget of around $5 million per year, with a staff of just 14," Crary added, noting that the $1.5 million would have been the largest grant the Foundation had ever received - but it wasn't worth it if the conditions were undermining the PSF's mission.
The PSF board voted unanimously to withdraw its grant application.
The non-profit would've used the funding to help prevent supply chain attacks; create a new automated, proactive review process for new PyPI packages; and makee the project's work easily transferable to other open-source package managers.
[9]
Crary told The Register in a message that she's disappointed not to have been able to undertake the security work proposed in the grant, and she agreed that NSF is harming its own ability to fund quality scientific research with the DEI restriction in its grant terms.
[10]Court lets NSF keep swinging axe at $1B in research grants
[11]American science put on starvation diet
[12]National Science Foundation staff axed by Trump fear for US scientific future
[13]America's National Science Foundation tells DEI, misinfo studies: You're fired
"Part of the problem here is all the uncertainties," Crary told us. "Even if we wanted to give up anything that might be considered [DEI] work - which we don't - part of the risk here is that all these restrictions are new, the language is very broad ... I had no interest in being the test case."
Crary is confident in the group's choice and credits the Python community for standing behind the Foundation.
"Trusting that our community would stand with our decision made it much easier," Crary remarked. "And the support we've seen today in response to announcing the decision has proven that to be true."
The PSF isn't the first tech foundation to withdraw from an NSF grant due to the anti-DEI pledge.
The Carpentries, a nonprofit group that provides software engineering and data science training to researchers, was also in line to receive a $1.5 million grant from NSF but [14]withdrew its application in June for the exact same reason as the PSF.
"The Carpentries showed real leadership making their decision," Crary said.
We reached out to the NSF for comment on the matter, but only received an automated response telling us that, due to the ongoing [15]government shutdown , no one was around to field our questions. ®
Get our [16]Tech Resources
[1] https://pyfound.blogspot.com/2025/10/NSF-funding-statement.html
[2] https://nsf-gov-resources.nsf.gov/files/cafatc-525.pdf
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/devops&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aP_5gRC6JDRJmtF5MO-CTgAAAAg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[4] https://www.theregister.com/2025/02/03/trump_admin_scrubs_dei_websites/
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/devops&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aP_5gRC6JDRJmtF5MO-CTgAAAAg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/devops&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aP_5gRC6JDRJmtF5MO-CTgAAAAg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[7] https://www.python.org/psf/mission/
[8] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/devops&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aP_5gRC6JDRJmtF5MO-CTgAAAAg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[9] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/devops&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33aP_5gRC6JDRJmtF5MO-CTgAAAAg&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2025/09/19/court_lets_nsf_keep_swinging/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2025/05/30/american_science_put_on_starvation/
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2025/02/21/nsf_staff_cut/
[13] https://www.theregister.com/2025/04/21/nsf_cancel_awards_dei/
[14] https://carpentries.org/blog/2025/06/announcing-withdrawal-of-nsf-pose-proposal/
[15] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4g7d9j7p5qo
[16] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Even they had no "discrimination", the grant wording allows the money to be pulled back out, perhaps years later, if in some time the government thinks they have. That is a sucker's play. Also, the feds have been abrogating contracts like crazy the past 9 months, I wouldn't trust a Trump appointee farther than I can toss them.
>> Also, the feds have been abrogating contracts like crazy the past 9 months
Ask Canada how they feel about the USA and abrogation.
> The government really shouldn't be spending money on this type of stuff.
You mean, because you can prove no government offices or majorly government funded bodies ever use anything written in Python, therefore no government funds should be wasted on improving the Python infrastructure?
Well, given the current defunding of science, you may be onto something there.
Which saves me the tedium of doing some googling for you.
"The government really shouldn't be spending money on this type of stuff."
Why not? They use the results of the Foundations work and they wanted them to use the money on specific security concerns they had. Why should they not pay for that?
@a/c
Just go and fuck off will you, with your windalicking shite such as...
"The government really shouldn't be spending money on this type of stuff".
Ishy
It is a Good Thing to say NO to unfair rules. I admire and congratulate these organisations for saying no.
unfair to whom?
Were these restrictions only added to the Python Foundation's contract(s)?
Re: unfair to whom?
I doubt it. Just others have less principles.
My irony-meter just overheated and shut off.
Here we are, a decision to not advance the security of a software library is made on ideological grounds (not being able to force their anti-woke agenda) - by the very people that accuse just about everyone else of basing their findings and decisions, even the results of their scientific measurements like the warming effect of CO2 on earth's climate, purely on ideology.
Re: My irony-meter just overheated and shut off.
Some things are worth more than money. Your humanity, for instance, not to mention the humanity of the person next you. But, if the money, and/or a bit of code, matters more to us than people, and life itself, then we really are part of 'The Problem'.
BTW, we ALL discriminate, every day. It's an essential component of decision making. Why we descriminate, and the consequences of doing so, are what matters, not whether we do it. We all do it. All the time.
Re: My irony-meter just overheated and shut off.
The humanity? Of a 501(c)(3) foundation? fuck 'em all.
Re: My irony-meter just overheated and shut off.
Irony indeed! Your screed just hit soooo many places on my Bullshit Bingo™ (MAGAt Edition®) card, I just got a Double Bingo!
Re: My irony-meter just overheated and shut off.
Would you have written...
"Here we are, a decision to not advance the security of a software library is made on ideological grounds (not being able to force their anti-slavery agenda)"
A principle is nothing until it costs something.
Re: My irony-meter just overheated and shut off.
As no native speaker I wonder whether I or the 10 (as of now) downvoters misunderstood your post??
Grant rejection
As soon as I read this article, I immediately donated money to this group. I use their good stuff so I will pay back.
.resist the machine!
Re: Grant rejection
I have also chucked a hundred bucks their way. True that is not much compared to the US gov, but my cash lacks a nasty orange stain on humanity to help make up for it.
Re: Grant rejection
Better your money than mine.
To those anti DEI: it's not discrimination (in the positive sense)
I have many examples I could share from my 45 year career but I have two extreme cases:
1- A guy that worked at the same Unix hardware vendor as myself (which by definition means software stuff like kernels and 3rd party porting such as Oracle database engines...you know critical stuff). He had core and hard to find knowledge but had a car accident (not his fault) and lost motor control of his arms/legs so was in a wheel chair.
The company employed another techie to be his aid and while he couldnt operate a keyboard he could still trouble shoot software problems faster than anyone else despite needing a second pair of hands. DEI works and his value to the company wasn't diminished.
2- A lady that worked at a large org that I consulted into had deteriorating eyesight and when I first meet her (she was at her workstation), I was shocked to see that her workstation font size was so large, it showed maybe 10 character per line and maybe 5 lines in total. But as above, she had systems knowledge that no one else had and again she could still work efficiently despite this disability and was that orgs tech lead for our mission critical project.
You don't throw away (or not onboard) good people just because of their physical limitations, binary or non-binary gender, skin colour, religious beliefs or background.
Which is what the Trumpistan government is forcing on orgs.
So well done the Python org.
Bluck
Seems like the USA thinks that supply chain attacks are a price worth paying to push a political agenda. Although perhaps the USA administration would say the reverse.
No, the USA (read: the current so-called "leaders" of the USA political machinery) think that in order to retain control of said machinery, they must foment division, and the most expedient mechanism to do that is to create an "us-vs-them" mentality; that is, to create hate between groups that would not ordinarily hate each other.
Make America Hate Again!
And by the way, don't ascribe to USAians as a whole what its putative "leaders" promote. tRump and his MAGAt minions are a minority here.
1/3, 1/3, 1/3
1/3 MAGA
1/3 DEM
1/3 DON'T CARE, WON'T VOTE
So yes at the 1000ft level your assertion that MAGA is in the minority is true but when you drill down, unless next time around the "don't care, won't vote" get off their arse and vote in a positive manner, then it's still neck and neck between MAGA and Dems.
And that points to a bigger problem: if both parties have failed to make a positive gain to those who didn't vote last time, then they sure as hell won't have changed that feeling this time around.... in fact the system is way more broken than before.
Bluck
"And by the way, don't ascribe to USAians as a whole what its putative "leaders" promote. tRump and his MAGAt minions are a minority here."
True. But there was enough MAGA voters out there to win. More so than Dems. The rest didn't care enough to vote and so are just as complicate as the MAGAs. Of course, what we don't know is if all the non-voters were legally mandated to turn out and vote is if the result would have been different.
as we know, it's more than that
You become a member of the Trumpistan government not for your subject matter expertise but that you share the same ideology.
The interesting thing about that is you end up with an inversely proportional competency graph: the stronger the ideology in the person, the lesser their competence.
So the incompetence is not just in say the tech security space but in every aspect of governance.
If the country undergoing this incompetence wasn't able to print money with impunity the way the US can then it would have collapsed already but at some point even the money printing machine won't save them and in fact will make the collapse more severe.
Bluck.
DEI quotas
"The PSF is a relatively small organization, operating with an annual budget of around $5 million per year, with a staff of just 14"
I assume 7 are women, 8 Asians, 2 Africans, 1 European, 1 North American, 4 Christians, 3 Muslims, 2 non-religious, 2 Hindus, and 2 people with a significant disability?
So they won't give up discrimination to take a grant? That's fine. Although this is still the type of grant the government really should eliminate. The government really shouldn't be spending money on this type of stuff.