Judge: Feds illegally denied New York homeland security funding

A U.S. District Court judge in Rhode Island has ruled the Department of Homeland Security, in direct violation of the Congressional Administrative Procedure Act, illegally targeted New York, 11 other states and the District of Columbia when it deprived them of allocated federal funds because they refused to support what New York Attorney General Letitia James Tuesday called the Trump Administration’s "mass deportation agenda."

In reaching her decision, filed Monday in Providence, U.S. District Court Judge Mary S. McElroy wrote that while the court cannot make a determination to "the relative merits" of the executive branch’s approach to "civil immigration enforcement," she did find that denying funds designed to support "vital counterterrorism and law enforcement programs" to be "profoundly arbitrary and capricious" — and also to be "precisely" an action that Congress, through the APA, had "forbade."

The suit, filed in September, namedthe Department of Homeland Security and its director, Kristi Noem, as representative of the Trump Administration, as defendants. That filing argued that while the DHS had been barred from attempts to tie federal grants to state and local government assistance to "federal immigration enforcement," it had done so anyway — by withholding funds from so-called "sanctuary jurisdictions."

In her conclusion, McElroy said the funds slated for law enforcement programs that were withheld "likely involved" situations such as response to the "tragic mass shooting" earlier this month at Brown University."To hold hostage funding for programs like these based solely on what appear to be ... political whims is unconscionable and, at least here, unlawful," the judge added. 

In a statement Tuesday, James hailed the outcome as "a major victory," praising the decision to reinstate the funding.

Funds allocated through the Homeland Security Grant Program, established in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, provide state and local governments with money to not only plan response to terrorist attacks, but also natural disasters and other emergencies.

As a result of the administration's reallocations, the state attorney general’s office said, New York saw a reduction of more than $100 million in funding, or, about 77% of money it was scheduled to receive from HSGP, James said.

Those funds, James said in her statement, were earmarked to help support counterterrorism efforts such as security measures along the Canadian border, as well as protect "essential infrastructure" such as power grids and water systems throughout the state.

That funding, the attorney general's office said, also supports so-called Urban Area Security Initiatives, such as training for the NYPD and FDNY to protect "high-risk" areas of New York City.

"The administration’s attempt to play politics with these resources was illegal and put our state at risk," James said in the statement. "This decision is a significant win in our ongoing efforts to protect New Yorkers from reckless funding cuts."

By John Valenti

john.valenti@newsday.com

John Valenti, a Newsday reporter since 1981, has been honored nationally by the Associated Press, Society of the Silurians and National Headliner Awards for investigative, enterprise and breaking news reporting, as well as column writing. He is the author of “Swee'pea,” about New York playground basketball star Lloyd Daniels. His debut crime novel, “For Nothing Is Hidden,” rooted in 1950s Long Island, was released in October 2025.