The Trump administration's temporary federal funding freeze sent shockwaves through the nonprofit sector Jan. 28 — and faced legal challenges almost immediately. But the administration’s ongoing efforts to quash diversity, equity and inclusion pose an additional threat to arts initiatives in McLean County, with rural and underserved communities likely to feel the greatest impact.
In a news release on Feb. 6, the National Endowment for the Arts [NEA] announced new guidelines for arts grant applicants in the 2026 fiscal year and shuttered the Challenge America program benefiting underserved communities.
The agency said it will instead prioritize patriotic program applications honoring the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Trump’s recent efforts to assume control of programming at the Kennedy Center for the Arts further signals a culture shift toward state-controlled art.
The NEA funds research and arts access programs for rural communities, seniors and veterans. McLean County Arts Center for rural arts programming, the ISU literary journal Obsidian and the Town of Normal’s pending Uptown underpass project all received direct grants.
“Every congressional district currently receives funding from the National Endowment for the Arts,” said Doug Johnson in an interview for WGLT’s Sound Ideas.
Johnson is the executive director of the McLean County Arts Center, which administers Illinois Arts Council grants. He also serves on board of the statewide lobbying group Arts Alliance Illinois and spoke to WGLT in that context.
More McLean County arts organizations and initiatives receive NEA funding indirectly, via state, county and municipal grants. State arts councils receive, match and distribute money that ultimately came from the NEA, whose annual budget is about $210 million.
Illinois Art Station, Illinois Symphony Orchestra, West Bloomington Revitalization Project, the Holiday Spectacular, Threshold to Hope and BCAI Cultural Arts and Humanities were among the groups the lllinois Arts Council awarded Community Arts Access Grants to last year.
“The funding that the federal government provides for the arts is a rounding error, which is interesting because the arts themselves have a return on investment of more than a trillion dollars," Johnson said.
The previous Trump administration took swings at the NEA and National Endowment for the Humanities, which funds cultural programming, and similarly seeds Illinois Humanities. Attempts to eliminate the agency stem back to the Reagan administration, but have lacked sufficient support from Congress or the public. Should a second Trump administration be successful, it could cut state arts agencies off at the knee, further dampening a sector that’s still recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic.
“The threat is real,” said Johnson, pointing to the half-million dollar impact of the Sugar Creek Arts Festival as an example — and how downtown Bloomington’s art scene motivated RJ Scaringe to select Normal for Rivian's manufacturing plant.
“The threat against cultural enterprise, against underserved audiences, against our shared humanity is very real,” he said. “The arts are a bulwark for individualism, self-expression, and empathy. They’re a bulwark to protect those things that, in the end, define us.”
