Former AmeriCorps service member Daniel Zare, 27, visits Project Change at Sligo Middle School on Monday, Aug. 11, 2025 in Silver Spring, Maryland, where he mentored students before federal government cuts in April. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)

SILVER SPRING, Md. — Daniel Zare worked one-on-one as an AmeriCorps member with students going through rough times in school, lightening teachers’ workload in the classroom.

At AmeriCorps Project CHANGE, based in Silver Spring’s Sligo Middle School, Zare was one of several in his group who tracked adolescents’ emotional and social wellbeing over months using a system dubbed “My Score.” They then helped support the kids who were struggling the most.

In April, though, the program screeched to a halt. That’s when the Trump administration abruptly canceled nearly $400 million in active AmeriCorps grants across the United States that fund volunteers who embed in communities, in exchange for a small stipend and education award.

“All the work that we had culminating toward the end of the year, the relationships that we built with teachers and students and officials, it just completely went kaput because we were told we weren’t allowed to go to work at all,” Zare, 27, told States Newsroom.

Like so many longstanding federal programs and institutions severely reduced or dismantled as part of President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency project, AmeriCorps — and its nonprofit partners — are now assessing the damage and seeking a way forward.

AmeriCorps programs that survived last spring’s DOGE cuts are slowly beginning a new year of service amid major uncertainty over whether they will be able to continue their work in classrooms, food banks, senior centers and other community hubs.

Winners and losers among states

AmeriCorps, a federal agency signed into law in 1993 by former President Bill Clinton, places roughly 200,000 members across the United States at 35,000 service locations, according to current agency data.

Members serve in schools, local governments and with a wide range of nonprofits that focus on health, disaster relief, environmental stewardship, workforce development and veterans.

The staffers, who pledge to “get things done for America,” are paid a modest living allowance that hovers around the poverty line. Some, but not all, can get health insurance while in the program.

Members who complete their service term, which usually lasts from 10 to 12 months, receive an education award that can be used to pursue a degree, earn a trade certificate or pay student loans.

AmeriCorps federal dollars reach programs via a couple routes. In many cases, grants flow from AmeriCorps to governor-led state and territorial commissions that divvy them up according to local priorities. In other cases, federal dollars flow straight to a program via a competitive grant process. 

Kaira Esgate, CEO of America’s Service Commissions, said when the Trump administration ordered the cuts in April, some states lost large portions of their AmeriCorps portfolio, while other states fared better.

“There were no real clear trend lines around what or who got terminated and why,” said Esgate, whose member organization represents all 49 state commissions (South Dakota doesn’t have one) and the commissions for the District of Columbia, Guam and Puerto Rico.

Abby Andre, executive director of The Impact Project, an initiative of Public Service Ventures Ltd., a private corporation that launches and scales solutions to strengthen public service and communities., has been collecting data and plotting on an interactive map where AmeriCorps programs have been canceled. Andre, a former Department of Justice litigator, has also worked with her team to build other maps showing where federal workforce cuts have been felt across the country.

“AmeriCorps is a really great example of the federal dollars being kind of invisible in communities. Communities often don’t know that a local food bank or a senior center are supported by AmeriCorps volunteers and AmeriCorps money,” said Andre, who taught administrative law at the Vermont Law School after working under President Barack Obama and in Trump’s first administration.

Andre said communities with a lack of social services, including in rural areas, will likely feel the biggest losses without an AmeriCorps presence because the agency “facilitates pennies-on-the-dollar type services through volunteer work.”

“It’s not as though if these community services folded, those communities would have the money to fund equal or better services through the private market,” she said.

Losing trust

The Maryland Governor’s Office on Service and Volunteerism gave the green light to Project CHANGE to keep its program, which serves Montgomery County in suburban Washington, D.C., running through the upcoming school year.

Paul Costello, director of Project CHANGE, is now scrambling to launch a new AmeriCorps cohort after receiving the news on July 22 that the initiative had been funded. He estimates members won’t be able to begin until almost a month into the school year.

“Sadly, AmeriCorps, as a brand name, is badly damaged, I think. I mean, I’ve got a meeting on Wednesday with a major partner who told us two weeks ago ‘We thought you were dead,’” Costello told States Newsroom in an Aug. 11 interview.

Costello’s program not only places service members in Montgomery County Public Schools, where Zare served, but also with partners including Community Bridges, Montgomery Housing Partnership and Family Learning Solutions.

The nonprofits respectively focus on helping adolescent girls from diverse backgrounds, children whose families live in community-developed affordable housing units and teens eyeing college and career paths.

The county’s school system is the largest in the state and serves a highly diverse population. About 44% of the system’s 160,000 students qualify for free and reduced meals, and close to 20% are learning English while continuing to speak another language at home.

Costello’s 18 cohort members embedded in those schools and nonprofits this past academic year were suddenly yanked in April when the government cut his grant. The partners, which had planned and budgeted to have the members through June, were thrown into “total chaos,” Costello said.

“So some of them are so desperate, they rely on their members. They had to dig into their pockets to keep them on as staff. And then we go back to them this year and say, ‘You want members this year?’ AmeriCorps has made no attempt to make them whole. So they’ve been screwed,” Costello said.

AmeriCorps did not respond to States Newsroom’s questions about nonprofits losing money.

Legal action

The federal courts granted some relief to members and organizations who abruptly lost living allowances and contractually obligated funding.

A Maryland federal district judge ordered in June that funding and positions  be restored in 24 Democratic-led states and the District of Columbia that sued the agency.

Another district judge in the state also handed a win to more than a dozen nonprofits from across the country that sued to recover funding they were owed.

But for many it was too late, and AmeriCorps’ future still feels shaky.

After suddenly losing his living allowance in April, Zare had to leave Silver Spring.

“I was renting a room off of Georgia (Avenue), and I was not able to pay rent there anymore, so I actually moved back to my mom’s in Germantown for the time being,” he told States Newsroom in August, referring to another Maryland suburb.

Hillary Kane, director of the Philadelphia Higher Education Network for Neighborhood Development, said by the time the court orders were issued, many of her AmeriCorps members had already found other positions and she had completely let go of one of her full-time staffers.

While the court injunctions were “welcome news,” reinstating the programs remained “questionable,” Kane wrote in a July 21 update for Nonprofit Quarterly.

Kane’s organization is a member of the National College Attainment Network, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit that was among the successful plaintiffs.

Other organizations that joined the lawsuit are based in California, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Dakota and Virginia.

The Democratic-led states that won reinstatement for AmeriCorps members include Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Kentucky, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington, and Wisconsin.

Going forward?

Kane got news on July 10 that PennSERVE, Pennsylvania’s state service commission, reinstated funding for her AmeriCorps program that places members in four West Philadelphia high schools to mentor students on their post-graduation plans.

The late notice meant Kane could only begin recruiting new members in mid-July.

“And so our start date has to be a bit fluid,” Kane told States Newsroom during a July 22 interview. “We have to essentially recruit people into this one-year cohort position, and say, ‘We’re hoping to start September 2, but we’re not 100% sure. Can you kind of just roll with it?’ It’s an awkward position to have to be in.”

Other AmeriCorps programs have not fared so well, as the Trump administration’s Office of Management and Budget continues to withhold funds that were appropriated by Congress for the ongoing fiscal year.

Trump signed legislation in March that extended the $1.26 billion for AmeriCorps for the full 2025 fiscal year, which ends on Sept. 30.

Kane said the most “insidious” part of the recent AmeriCorps storyline is that programs that receive grants directly from the federal agency are being strung along by OMB.

“So there are agencies who have been theoretically awarded money, but they’re like, ‘Is it actually going to happen? Should I spend all this money and then not be able to bill the federal government to reimburse me if OMB is going to hold it hostage?’”

Programs at risk include 130 recently expired contracts for AmeriCorps Foster Grandparent and Senior Companions programs that support roughly 6,000 senior citizen volunteers across 35 states. The programs are eligible for just over $50 million for the new service year, which should be off to a start.

Congress pleads with budget office

A bipartisan group of U.S. senators pressed the executive branch agency on Aug. 1 to release the funds.

“Further delays in grantmaking will have immediate and irreversible consequences for programs, AmeriCorps members, and communities,” the senators wrote in a letter to OMB Director Russ Vought.

Republican Sens. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Thom Tillis of North Carolina joined Democratic Sens. Chris Coons of Delaware, Jack Reed and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York in signing the letter. All are members of the Senate National Service Caucus.

The White House and AmeriCorps did not respond for comment.

The Republican-led Senate Committee on Appropriations voted on July 31 to preserve $1.25 billion in AmeriCorps funding for fiscal year 2026. Collins chairs the committee.

U.S. House appropriators, which for the last two years under Republican leadership have sought to cut AmeriCorps funding, are expected to debate its budget in September. But it’s almost certain Congress will have to pass a stopgap spending bill when the end of the fiscal year arrives to stave off a partial government shutdown, so a final decision on funding may not come for months.

Change for everyone

Zare never did have a chance to say goodbye to all his students in April.

And even though the option was on the table, he did not sign up to serve a third year with AmeriCorps.

Before he applied and earned a spot with Project CHANGE, Zare was working odd jobs, including as a utilities contractor for Comcast. He had also earned his associate’s degree.

“I don’t think there’s any other program to take someone like me who was working a couple of different jobs and put them in an environment like this, to see firsthand as an American citizen how our classrooms operate and what position I would need to be in to actually be of benefit,” Zare told States Newsroom.

Zare is now freelancing and debating his next move, whether that’s a new job or further higher education.

“AmeriCorps is something that I’m always going to cherish because a lot of the people there still help me,” he said.

Editor’s note: D.C. Bureau Senior Reporter Ashley Murray served in AmeriCorps in 2009-2010.

“The focus here is going to be on basically keeping our food safe and preventing disease from spreading,” Sen. Howard Marklein said at a press conference. (Photo by Baylor Spears/Wisconsin Examiner)

Republicans and Democrats on the Wisconsin Joint Finance Committee were divided Tuesday about the amount of money the state should invest in several state agencies including the Department of Workforce Development, the Wisconsin Supreme Court and the Department of Agriculture Trade and Consumer Protection.

Republicans on the committee said they were making strategic and realistic investments in priority areas, while Democrats said Republicans’ investments wouldn’t make enough of an impact.

GOP rejects new protection for state Supreme Court 

The first divisive issue came up when the committee considered the budgets for Wisconsin’s courts. 

Democrats proposed that the state provide an additional $2 million and 8 new positions for the creation of an Office of the Marshals of the Supreme Court that would provide security for the Court. 

Rep. Tip McGuire (D-Kenosha) and Sen. Kelda Roys (D-Madison) said the need for the office has increased recently due to the number of threats the judges and justices are facing. 

“Given the role that they play in our judiciary in order to be impartial, we shouldn’t want them to be in danger or to fear for their safety or to have any outward pressures on them that would influence the case,” McGuire said. “I believe it’s important for the cause of justice. I believe it’s important for the cause of safety.”

Roys noted the inflammatory language that members of the Trump administration have used when talking about judges and justices, noting that Republicans have passed legislation before to help protect judges. She also noted that former Juneau County Circuit Court Judge John Roemer was targeted and murdered at his home in 2022. 

“It is really frightening… and the Supreme Court has made this request over numerous years because they understand better than any of us do what it’s like to try to serve the public in this critically important but increasingly dangerous role,” Roys said. “I am much less interested in putting people in prison after they have murdered a judge than I am in preventing our judges from being attacked or killed, so, this seems to me a tiny amount of money to do a really important task to protect the third branch of government and particularly our Supreme Court.” 

Republicans rejected Democrats’ motion. Committee co-chair Rep. Mark Born (R-Beaver Dam) said at a press conference ahead of the meeting that the Wisconsin Capitol Police are tasked with protecting visitors, employees, legislators, the Court and anyone else in the building.

“They do a good job and continue to provide top-notch work here at the Capitol as part of security for everyone who works here,” Born said. 

The committee also voted 13-3 with Andraca joining Republicans to allocate an additional $10 million each year to counties for circuit court costs.

Meat inspection gets additional funding

The committee took action on portions of the budget for the Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection (DATCP), giving a boost to he agency’s Meat Inspection Program and Division of Animal Health. 

“The focus here is going to be on basically keeping our food safe and preventing the disease from spreading,” committee co-chair Sen. Howard Marklein (R-Spring Green) said. 

The Meat Inspection Program got an additional $2.7 million and two additional positions under the proposal approved by the committee. The program works to ensure the safety and purity of meat products sold in Wisconsin, including by inspecting the livestock and poultry slaughtering and processing facilities that are not already inspected by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). 

The Division of Animal Health would get three additional employees that would be funded with about $500,000. 

According to the Legislative Fiscal Bureau, Wisconsin has 233 official meat establishments and 70 custom meat establishments that require state inspection. 

Roys said the proposal “falls far short of what is needed,” noting that agriculture is a major economic driver in Wisconsin and the industry is under pressure due to actions being taken by the Trump administration. The USDA recently terminated its National Advisory Committee on Meat and Poultry Inspection, which had been in place since 1971, and the administration has considered ending most of its routine food safety inspections work. 

“That kind of uncertainty is exactly why we need to step up our work at the state level,” Roys said, adding that she hopes that Republicans “consider funding at the appropriate level what our farmers…deserve.”  

Marklein noted that the committee’s work on DATCP’s part of the budget is not completed yet. 

“This is a program that’s had a shortfall year over year,” Andraca said, adding that she hopes “members of this committee are vegetarians.” 

“If there’s one place that I wouldn’t cut, it would probably be in meat inspection. If we’re looking at places to take a little off the edge, food safety is not one of them, particularly in a time where we have avian flu and other diseases breaking out,” Andraca said.

Youth apprenticeship program gets boost

The committee also voted along party lines to invest additional funds in programs administered by the Department of Workforce Development, including $6 million in youth apprenticeship grants, $570,000 in early college credit program grants, $250,000 for the agency’s commercial driver training grant program and $250,000 for the workforce training grants. 

Democrats had suggested that the committee dedicate $11 million for the youth apprenticeship program, which provides an opportunity for juniors and seniors in high school to get hands-on experience in a field alongside classroom instruction, but Republicans rejected it opting to put a little more than half of that towards the program. 

Andraca said the program is important for allowing youth to “try out new skills and new jobs” and train to fill positions in  Wisconsin  and that the $6 million investment makes it seem like the program is “pretty much getting gutted.” The program has steadily grown annually over the last several years at an estimated rate of 16%, although, according to the LFB, the number of additional students each year has declined going from a high of 1,923 additional students in 2022-23, to 1,703 more in 2023-24, and 1,430 in 2024-25. 

Andraca noted that the program currently operates on a sum certain model, meaning that there is a specific amount of money available and the size of a grant could vary depending on participation and available funds. If there is continued growth of 16% then the grant sizes could shrink. A sum sufficient model (which Democrats wanted) would mean that the agency’s spending on the program isn’t capped by a specific dollar amount.

Sen. Romaine Quinn (R-Birchwood) noted that the grants for students would likely grow from an average of about $900 currently to about $1,000 under the Republican proposal. 

“This motion [is] at $6 million and $100 per award over the last budget, but we’re supposed to believe it’s gutting the program,” Quinn said. 

“Welcome to the People’s Republic of Madison where stuff like that happens a lot; $6 million in new money is a lot of money to most people but obviously the other side, it’s gutting the program,” Born said, responding to Quinn. “At some point when you’re building a budget, you have to figure out a way to afford it, be reasonable in your investments, so maybe that’s why we don’t view a $6 million investment as gutting because we’re trying to live within our means.” 

Funding to support new Wisconsin History Center

The committee approved $2.3 million to support the new Wisconsin History Center in downtown Madison for 2025-26 and $540,800 and six positions annually starting in 2026-27.

Construction on the museum, which will be operated by the Wisconsin Historical Society, started in April and  its opening is set for 2027. 

The  Historical Society had requested the one-time funding of $2.3 million in 2025-26 as well as ongoing funding of $1.7 million annually — more than double the amount the committee approved — starting in 2026-27 to help with operational costs, including security, janitorial and maintenance services. It said without ongoing funding from the state it wouldn’t be able to open and maintain the museum. It also said that it was not anticipating needing to request additional funding for the museum operations in future budget cycles if the request is funded. 

The committee also approved an additional $562,000 in one-time funding across the biennium for security and facilities improvements for the Historical Society’s facilities and collections and $157,000 to cover estimated future increases in services costs. But the committee decreased funding for the Historical Society by $214,000 for estimated fuel and utilities costs.

DOR budget moves resources to Alcohol Beverages Division 

A law, 2023 Wisconsin Act 73, overhauled alcohol regulation in Wisconsin and created a new Division of Alcohol Beverages under the Department of Regulation tasked with preventing violations of the new laws. Republicans on the committee approved a motion to recategorize nine general DOR positions and over $900,000 to the Division of Alcohol Beverages to help with enforcement. It also transferred an attorney to the division and added $456,000 in funding for two more positions in the Division of Alcohol Beverages.

Democrats said that Republicans on the committee were “nickel and diming” the Department of Revenue with its proposal given that it recategorizes already existing positions rather than creating new ones. 

“I do appreciate some of the efforts involved in this motion,” McGuire said, adding that he noticed there were 10 positions that were moved around.

“That seemed odd to me,” McGuire said. “Were their feet up on their desk? They weren’t collecting taxes… or what were they doing? We want to be able to give the Department of Revenue tools they need to succeed, and frankly, the tools they need to provide resources to the state to make sure that everyone’s on an even playing field so we can fund the priorities” of the state. 

The GOP proposal passed on a party-line vote.

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