The U.S. Supreme Court, in a 5–4 ruling, cleared the Trump administration to proceed—at least for now—with terminating about $783 million in National Institutes of Health grants that officials say conflict with the president’s opposition to diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. Justice Amy Coney Barrett provided the decisive vote, joining the court’s four other conservatives to stay a lower-court injunction. Chief Justice John Roberts sided with the three liberal justices in dissent. Thursday’s unsigned order lifts a June decision by U.S. District Judge William Young that declared the mass cancellations “arbitrary and discriminatory” and halted them nationwide. While the high court allowed existing grants to be cut, it left in place the part of Young’s ruling that voided NIH guidance documents outlining the anti-DEI policy, limiting their use in future funding rounds. The majority suggested that challenges to the cancellations belong in the Court of Federal Claims rather than in district court. The grants at issue fund research on topics such as HIV prevention, Alzheimer’s disease and health disparities in minority and LGBTQ populations. Sixteen Democratic attorneys general and several public-health groups, which say the cancellations threaten scientific progress and public health, vowed to continue litigating. The administration argues that the projects are “off-mission” and that funding choices should not be second-guessed by courts. NIH can now begin withdrawing money from roughly 1,700 awards while the underlying lawsuits, and potentially new ones filed in the claims court, continue.