MILES PARKS, HOST:
The White House has targeted groups that it says work against its policies, like universities and law firms. Nonprofit groups worry they're next, and they're coming together ahead of time to figure out a unified response. NPR correspondent Joseph Shapiro has been talking to some of those nonprofit leaders, and he's in studio with us now. Hi, Joe.
JOSEPH SHAPIRO, BYLINE: Hey, Miles.
PARKS: So tell us what you're hearing. What are these nonprofits worried is coming down the road?
SHAPIRO: Well, they're hearing that the White House is preparing a series of executive orders that would target the work that many of them do - orders that would give the administration added powers to audit these nonprofit groups, maybe even seize their assets in some cases. So there's worry that the administration's going to target groups, particularly ones that do legal services for immigrants and environmental groups.
PARKS: So we should emphasize this - it's still speculative about these...
SHAPIRO: Yes.
PARKS: ...Executive orders from President Trump. But do these groups have reason to be worried about this?
SHAPIRO: Yeah, they have lots of reason. Alarm bells went off last week when members of the president's Department of Government Efficiency called one nonprofit and said, hey, we're sending over a team to be embedded with you.
PARKS: Oh, no.
SHAPIRO: We want to look at the work that you're doing, the grants that you get from the government. And, you know, DOGE has been doing this. They've been going into federal agencies, collecting data, laying off staff. But this would be a new step to intervene with a private nonprofit.
PARKS: And so what happened when the DOGE representatives tried to go to that nonprofit?
SHAPIRO: Well, they backed off because they found out that the Justice Department had already canceled all of the group's federal grants. And that nonprofit, it's the Vera Institute. It's known for working on criminal justice reform. In the past, it's provided legal services to immigrants. But here's the thing that worries the nonprofits - the Vera Institute showed us a transcript of the call, and in it, Nate Cavanaugh, the DOGE representative, said, the administration, it's planning to send teams to many nonprofits that get government grants. And Cavanaugh cited an example where DOGE took control of another nonprofit, the United States Institute of Peace, and it fired the entire staff of 300 people.
Now, that was a little bit different because that group, which does peace building overseas, it gets appropriations from Congress, and it had board members appointed by the president. But also, the president last week in the Oval Office, he was asked about whether he was going to move against nonprofits that serve immigrants and do environmental work, and he said, maybe. And then he also then lashed out at a group that - the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, or CREW. It's a liberal group that has sued him and DOGE.
PARKS: Has the White House said anything about this new reporting?
SHAPIRO: Well, we asked the White House, and it sent a response. It said, no EO is in the works or being discussed at this time. Any suggestion otherwise is more gaslighting. Maybe the key phrase there is - at this time.
PARKS: So I also know that there was a pretty unusual meeting this week...
SHAPIRO: Yeah.
PARKS: ...Among a bunch of different nonprofits. Can you tell us about that?
SHAPIRO: Yeah. Well, nonprofit groups, they saw Columbia University's struggle when the administration froze its federal funding. So they're already trying to get together and come up with a united strategy. And they met this past week. And one key player told me, we broke the Zoom because they called an emergency meeting, and in less than 24 hours, 11,000 representatives of nonprofit groups signed up. But the Zoom could only take 5,000. So the ones who could get on that call, late Friday, they talked about the threat, also what to do to get ready, like, auditing their expenses, lining up lawyers. And there are lawyers who offered pro bono or free legal services to charities and philanthropies that get targeted by the Trump administration.
PARKS: NPR correspondent Joe Shapiro - thanks, Joe.
SHAPIRO: You're welcome, Miles.
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