More than two dozen states on Thursday sued the Trump administration for requiring them to comply with election and immigration conditions as a condition of receiving billions of dollars in federal funding for disasters.
The lawsuit, filed in Rhode Island and challenging Federal Emergency Management Agency and Department of Homeland Security policies, argued the administration is requiring states to change their elections systems and help DHS with immigration enforcement. The conditions would also allow DHS to terminate grants at any time and for any reason.
“Once again, the Trump Administration is threatening to jeopardize public safety by unlawfully withholding billions in critical funding, and once again, they won’t get away with it,” Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha said.
The states argue that putting conditions on congressionally appropriated funding violates the Administrative Procedure Act and the U.S. Constitution’s spending clause. A DHS spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Illinois is among the states joining the lawsuit. The Trump administration denied FEMA funding for flood relief in Chicago and the suburbs after storms caused flooding and overwhelmed sewer systems last summer.
Chicago and suburban residents dealt with flooded basements, streets and yards that led to expensive repairs, the Chicago Sun-Times reported.
At the time, Trump approved similar funding requests in North Dakota and Alaska, and boasted on social media that he won “BIG” in those states in the 2016, 2020 and 2024 elections. Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker retorted by calling the denial politically motivated and appealing the decision. That appeal was denied.
Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul hopes the legal effort will free up FEMA relief funding without the condition to alter state elections systems. In the past, Illinois has gotten hundreds of thousands of dollars of similar funding after storms and other disasters.
“President Trump refuses to accept the reality of our democracy and instead insists on wasting state and federal resources when he frequently, consistently and willfully violates the law and our Constitution,” Raoul said at a news conference Thursday. “No matter how many times the president tries to unlawfully impose his will upon the states, I will stand with my fellow attorneys general to uphold the law.”
The lawsuit is one of scores that have challenged the Trump administration over its repeated effort to browbeat mostly Democratic states into complying with its priorities to get billions of dollars in federal funding. The strategy has been used on everything from education funding to domestic violence grants to highway funding.
The courts have repeatedly found this strategy to be unlawful and unconstitutional. A ruling last year barred the administration from putting conditions on other FEMA funding, and a second ruling this year blocked the administration from redirecting DHS funding away from states not seen as supportive of its agenda.
The latest lawsuit argues the administration is attempting to apply some of the same conditions on 2026 funding, as it failed to do with funding last year.
Among the requirements being challenged in Thursday’s lawsuit is that states change their elections systems. They were told they must transition to paper ballot systems, conduct a manual audit of voting systems, reconcile voters, and verify the citizenship of every registered voter in the state’s voter databases.
Contributing: Mary Norkol, Sun-Times