The embattled federal agency AmeriCorps denied the Notre Dame Mission Volunteers a $4.6 million grant, the Baltimore-based organization announced Wednesday.

Leaders called that funding vital and said they now must cut staff at sites in 27 cities.

“While this decision is deeply disappointing, it does not define us,” Ted Miles, executive director of Notre Dame Mission Volunteers, said in a statement.

Notre Dame Mission Volunteers was founded in 1992 by the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur and began working with AmeriCorps in 1995. It dispatches about 300 AmeriCorps members to programs focused on education, literacy, after-school programs and other community initiatives across the country.

Notre Dame Mission Volunteers’ AmeriCorps program requested $4.6 million to cover three years of its work and the living stipends and education awards that come with being a corps member. AmeriCorps sent notice of a denial on June 18.

Weeks earlier, a judge ordered the Trump administration to restore AmeriCorps grants and members.

“There’s a lot of uncertainty,” said Cora Davis, communications director of Notre Dame Mission Volunteers.

Notre Dame Mission Volunteers said it plans to cut back on program managers and participants and pivot its funding model.

“This is not the end of our story,” Miles said in the statement. “It’s a turning point, and we intend to move forward with commitment, creativity, and hope.”

AmeriCorps, formed in 1994, dispatched about 200,000 members and invested more than $960 million across the country each year to help communities tackle challenges like natural disasters, childhood literacy and poverty.

The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), then led by tech billionaire Elon Musk, took steps to dismantle the federal agency in April, placing 85% of the 500 full-time AmeriCorps staff on administrative leave, dismissing more than 2,000 members and suddenly terminating grants that helped thousands of programs.

This dissolving of the federal agency trickled down to Maryland, leading to the loss of at least $12 million in grants and about 550 positions among more than 20 programs in the state.

Maryland nonprofits and AmeriCorps members were left devastated by the moves from the federal government. Some programs completely shut down, while others turned to other funding in order to move forward.

Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown, in partnership with other democratic state officials, led a lawsuit in April against the Trump administration to restore the AmeriCorps agency and its grants.

U.S. District Judge Deborah Boardman granted a temporary block on the cancellation of grants and discharges of corps members in June for the 24 states and Washington, D.C., that sued the administration.