Trump cuts threaten $1.8 million annually for New Mexico libraries (2025)

Amid talks of cuts to Medicaid and other critical federal programs, it may be easy to overlook another target of President Donald Trump’s efforts to rein in government spending: libraries.

A March executive order constricting the services of the federal Institute of Museums and Library Services may prove devastating for library services in New Mexico, critics warn — especially for places most in need of them.

Some $1.8 million in annual funding sent to New Mexico through the institute is at risk, according to the New Mexico Library Association, meaning services ranging from bookmobiles to interlibrary loans may suffer the consequences.

With the cutting of the agency, State Librarian Eli Guinnee said discretionary grants to institutions are also at risk. In New Mexico, tribal libraries have seen about $204,000 in funding canceled, and, Guinnee added, cuts are also likely at other state institutions that get funding from the federal institute like Explora!, the interactive children’s museum in Albuquerque, and the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum in Santa Fe.

“It is extremely shocking and something that we never thought could actually happen,” Guinnee said.

Since the executive order was handed down March 14, New Mexico has not yet seen federal reimbursement requests be denied under the federal Library Services and Technology Act, Guinnee said.

Fifty-six percent of funding from the program goes toward bookmobiles and other rural services, the New Mexico Library Association said in a statement.

Another 31% goes toward procuring online databases for jobs, academic resources and other information, and the remainder largely goes to interlibrary loans, summer reading programs and the New Mexico State Library for the Blind and Print Disabled.

The executive order, titled “Continuing the Reduction of the Federal Bureaucracy,” calls for the “non-statutory components and functions” of various agencies to be pared down as much as possible and for those agencies to provide only the bare-essential services required by law.

Most of the agency’s staff of 70 have been dismissed, The New York Times has reported.

Over 20 states have sued the Trump administration in an effort to stop the dismantling of the Institute of Museums and Library Services, including New Mexico. The suit was filed in U.S. District Court in Rhode Island on April 4.

Guinnee said he was in the process of making a full accounting of likely canceled funds.

“There [are] potentially millions of dollars of additional grants for New Mexico that have already been canceled,” he said.

Rural parts of New Mexico are expected to bear the brunt of the cuts, with much of the $1.8 million from the Institute of Museums and Library Services devoted to services in those areas.

Shel Neymark, director of the New Mexico Rural Library Initiative, said rural areas especially rely on bookmobiles when they lack a library. Rural libraries also rely on interlibrary book loans, given their typically smaller book collections.

If either or both programs are pared down, he fears New Mexicans in rural areas may lose access to books.

“It’s a big hit,” he said. “... When anything’s cut, rural areas suffer the most because we have so few resources.”

If the executive order stands and New Mexico loses its funding, services will continue, even if in a limited capacity, Guinnee said. One possibility is shifting rural library services to sending books via mail.

‘We’ve had, for decades, a commitment to providing library services to every resident of New Mexico, no matter where they are,” he said. “... So we would figure out ways to continue serving everyone in the state.”