Latest news with #ChristopherCooper
Washington Post
3 days ago
- Health
- Washington Post
Trump administration blocked from cutting local health funding for four municipalities
A federal court has temporarily blocked the Trump administration from clawing back millions in public health funding from four Democrat-led municipalities in GOP-governed states. It's the second such federal ruling to reinstate public health funding for several states. U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper in Washington, D.C., issued a preliminary injunction Tuesday sought by district attorneys in Harris County, Texas, home to Houston, and three cities: Columbus, Ohio, Nashville, Tennessee, and Kansas City, Missouri. The decision means the federal government must reinstate funding to the four municipalities until the case is fully litigated.
The Independent
3 days ago
- Health
- The Independent
Trump administration blocked from cutting local health funding for four municipalities
A federal court has temporarily blocked the Trump administration from clawing back millions in public health funding from four Democrat-led municipalities in GOP-governed states. It's the second such federal ruling to reinstate public health funding for several states. U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper in Washington, D.C., issued a preliminary injunction Tuesday sought by district attorneys in Harris County, Texas, home to Houston, and three cities: Columbus, Ohio, Nashville, Tennessee, and Kansas City, Missouri. The decision means the federal government must reinstate funding to the four municipalities until the case is fully litigated. Their lawsuit, filed in late April, alleged $11 billion in cuts to U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention programs had already been approved by Congress and are being unconstitutionally withheld. They also argued that the administration's actions violate Department of Health and Human Services regulations. The cities and counties argued the cuts were 'a massive blow to U.S. public health at a time where state and local public health departments need to address burgeoning infectious diseases and chronic illnesses, like the measles, bird flu, and mpox.' The cuts would lead to thousands of state and local public health employees being fired, the lawsuit argued. The local governments, alongside the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union, wanted the court to reinstate the grants nationwide. But Cooper said in his preliminary injunction that the funds can only be blocked to the four municipalities and in a May 21 hearing expressed skepticism about whether it could apply more widely. The funding in question was granted during the COVID-19 pandemic but aimed at building up public health infrastructure overall, Harris County Attorney Christian Menefee said in a statement in April. The four local governments were owed about $32.7 million in future grant payments, Cooper's opinion notes. The federal government's lawyers said the grants were legally cut because, "Now that the pandemic is over, the grants and cooperative agreements are no longer necessary as their limited purpose has run out.' They used the same argument in the case brought by 23 states and the District of Columbia over the HHS funding clawback. Menefee said the cuts defunded programs in Harris County for wastewater disease surveillance, community health workers and clinics and call centers that helped people get vaccinated. Columbus City Attorney Zach Klein said the cuts forced the city to fire 11 of its 22 infectious disease staffers. Nashville used some of its grant money to support programs, including a 'strike team' that after the pandemic addressed gaps in health services that kept kids from being able to enroll in school, according to the lawsuit. Kansas City used one of its grants to build out capabilities to test locally for COVID-19, influenza and measles rather than waiting for results from the county lab. The suit details that after four years of work to certify facilities and train staff, the city 'was at the final step" of buying lab equipment when the grant was canceled. Representatives for HHS, the CDC, the cities and Harris County did not immediately respond to requests for comment Tuesday. ___ The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute's Science and Educational Media Group and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
Yahoo
06-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Supreme Court limits outside access to DOGE records
The Supreme Court has reined in a lower-court order that allowed a watchdog group wide-ranging access to records of the Trump administration's Department of Government Efficiency. The high court's majority said a judge's directive allowing Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington to examine DOGE's recommendations for cost savings at executive branch agencies was 'not appropriately tailored.' In a two-page order Friday, the Supreme Court said such access was not a proper way to resolve an ongoing dispute about whether DOGE is a federal agency subject to the Freedom of Information Act or operates as a presidential advisory body that does not have to share its records with the public. 'Separation of powers concerns counsel judicial deference and restraint in the context of discovery regarding internal Executive Branch communications,' the court's majority wrote. All three of the court's liberal justices indicated they disagreed with the decision, but none provided an explanation of her views. The court's action amounted to a partial victory for the Trump administration, which filed an emergency appeal in an effort to avoid complying with orders from U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper, who is overseeing CREW's lawsuit. However, the high court's order appears to leave the door open for CREW to seek records and take testimony about DOGE's structure and authority. The Trump administration has insisted that the DOGE team simply makes recommendations to agency officials, who have the final decision on budget and staff cuts. However, Cooper said there were strong indications that DOGE's recommendations were routinely approved wholesale, suggesting they were more like orders than suggestions.
Yahoo
15-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Judge rules Trump unconstitutionally retaliated against ABA by canceling grants
May 15 (UPI) -- A federal judge has ruled that the Trump administration unconstitutionally retaliated against the American Bar Association when it abruptly canceled millions in grants awarded to the world's largest association of lawyers and legal professionals. Judge Christopher Cooper of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia issued a preliminary injunction against the cancelation of the five grants and ordered the Justice Department to fully pay out the $3.2 million previously allocated to the ABA. The grants were intended to train lawyers and judges who work with survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault. "The ABA has made a strong showing that Defendants terminated its grants to retaliate against it for engaging in protected speech," the President Barack Obama-appointed judge wrote in his ruling. The Trump administration has been accused of retaliating against President Donald Trump's perceived political opponents, including law firms associated with Democrats and judges who have ruled against his policies. The ABA is among those who have described such attacks as threats to the judiciary, and in February, it joined a lawsuit challenging the Trump administration's freeze of international development grants to the U.S. Agency for international Development. In April, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche issued a memorandum calling out ABA over its lawsuit against the government and support for "activist causes," essentially severing the Justice Department's interactions with the organization. The department then canceled the grants the next day The organization filed its lawsuit against the Trump administration on April 23, accusing it of unlawful retaliation for exercising its First Amendment right to petition the courts. "This lawsuit is necessitated by DOJ's undisguised efforts to retaliate against the ABA for taking positions that the current Administration disfavors," the lawsuit filed by Democracy Forward on behalf of ABA stated. In his ruling Wednesday, Cooper said the government does not have any "meaningful" arguments to contest ABA's claims, stating it points to deficiencies in the organization's performance of its grant obligations while conceding that similar grants administered to other organizations remain in place. "The government claims that it had a non-retaliatory motive for terminating the grants: They no longer aligned with DOJ's priorities. But the government has not identified any non-retaliatory DOJ priorities, much less explained why they were suddenly deemed inconsistent with the goals of the affected grants," he said, adding that similar grants to other organizations continue without the government explaining why those are still being maintained. "The government's different treatment of other grantees suggests this justification is pretextual." Democracy Forward President and CEO Skye Perryman celebrated the ruling in a statement, saying it is "welcome news" for survivors of domestic and sexual violence and for their families. "For decades, the American Bar Association has provided critical training to lawyers to enable the provision of essential legal services to survivors. The court recognized today that the ABA is being unconstitutionally targeted by the Department of Justice because of their longstanding and unchanged stance on the importance of the rule of law and our Constitution," Perryman said.
Yahoo
14-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Justice Department must reinstate ABA domestic violence grants, judge says
The Justice Department unconstitutionally retaliated against the American Bar Association by terminating grants for a program aimed at helping victims of domestic violence, a federal judge ruled Wednesday. Five grants from DOJ's Office on Violence Against Women to the ABA's Commission on Domestic and Sexual Violence totaling $3.2 million must be reinstated and fully paid out, U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper ruled. 'The ABA has made a strong showing that Defendants terminated its grants to retaliate against it for engaging in protected speech,' Cooper wrote. The grants at issue were terminated on April 10, one day after Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche issued a memo laying out new DOJ policy that severely limits the ability of department employees to attend or participate in ABA events or programs. The memo was sent to all department employees after the ABA joined an earlier lawsuit challenging a freeze on foreign aid grants via the State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development. The ABA, the largest national association of lawyers in the country, then sued the Justice Department on April 23 over the canceled grants. 'The ABA is free to litigate in support of activist causes, including by inserting itself into pending litigation as an amicus curiae,' Blanche wrote in the memo. 'But 'public service is a public trust.' The Department of Justice must, consistent with the Constitution, be careful stewards of the public fisc, represent all Americans regardless of ideology or political preferences, and defend the policies chosen by American's democratically elected leadership.' DOJ failed to show a sufficient motivation for terminating the grants other than retaliation, Cooper ruled. 'The government claims that it had a nonretaliatory motive for terminating the grants: They no longer aligned with DOJ's priorities,' Cooper wrote. 'But the government has not identified any nonretaliatory DOJ priorities, much less explained why they were suddenly deemed inconsistent with the goals of the affected grants.' Other Office on Violence Against Women grant recipients have not had their funding disrupted and continue to conduct similar programs to the ABA's, Cooper noted. Losing this funding would require the ABA to lay off almost all of the staff at the Commission on Domestic and Sexual Violence, the group's chief counsel said in a declaration. 'The government has offered no nonretaliatory explanation for why it continues to fund these other OVW grantees after terminating the ABA's grants, or why these other grantees' projects still effectuate DOJ's priorities while the ABA's do not,' Cooper wrote. Wednesday's order doesn't prevent DOJ from terminating the grants for 'permissible and truly nonretaliatory reasons,' though any further action to cancel the payments would be subject to more legal challenges. The order also doesn't require DOJ to renew the grants once the funds have been paid out. The ABA has joined with other bar associations in recent months to criticize the Trump administration's efforts to punish lawyers and firms that represent certain clients, saying they are 'designed to cow our country's judges, our country's courts and our legal profession.'
