Trump-appointed judge blocks Trump’s climate and infrastructure funding freeze
The preliminary injunction decision marks the "broadest relief to date," nonprofit plaintiffs in the case said.
A federal judge has ordered the Trump administration to unfreeze Biden-era climate and infrastructure law funding that five agencies awarded to nonprofits and other entities across the country, marking the most sweeping order of its kind yet.
U.S. District Judge Mary S. McElroy temporarily blocked the administration on Tuesday from withholding the funds after finding six nonprofits had shown they were likely harmed by the freeze and had shown a “strong likelihood of success” in the administrative law-focused case.
McElroy, a Democrat who President Donald Trump appointed to the bench during his first term, said the freeze by federal agencies, including the U.S. Interior Department and Environmental Protection Agency, was “neither reasonable nor reasonably explained.”
She added that, while it seems likely that agencies can narrowly withhold funds, the “broad powers” asserted by the Trump administration to block the billions in funding already awarded under the climate investment-focused Inflation Reduction Act and bipartisan infrastructure law “are nowhere to be found in federal law.”
“Agencies do not have unlimited authority to further a President’s agenda, nor do they have unfettered power to hamstring in perpetuity two statutes passed by Congress during the previous administration,” McElroy said.
The EPA said it is reviewing the decision. The other agencies didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
The lawsuit was filed by nonprofits, including the Woonasquatucket River Watershed Council and the National Council of Nonprofits, on March13, challenging the sweeping federal funding freeze linked to an executive order Trump signed in January to “unleash” American energy.
The freeze relates to funds from the two laws passed in 2021 and 2022 during former President Joe Biden’s administration. The laws provide funding, subsidies and tax credits worth trillions to help domestic clean energy manufacturing, with community lead pipe abatement and with building energy efficiency, among other things.
“By blocking these investments in local communities and projects, the administration is jeopardizing public health initiatives, environmental protections, and economic stability,” said Skye Perryman, the president and CEO of Democracy Forward, which represents the nonprofits.
A Democracy Forward spokesperson added in an email that the order is “the broadest relief to date” in a case challenging the Trump climate and infrastructure funding freezes.
The Trump administration had argued that Congress gave the executive branch “broad authority” to implement the laws, including through temporary pauses. The administration also raised technical arguments to bolster their case, including by challenging the plaintiffs’ standing to bring the case.
The lawsuit was filed after a different Rhode Island federal judge issued a preliminary injunction blocking Trump funding freezes in a case brought by the attorneys general of New York, California and 21 other states.
Now we see if the agencies and the OMB respond by issuing the past-due funds, or if they will delay, appeal, and misinform the courts about their actions.
Russell Vought, head of the OMB and one of the authors of Project 2025, is a proponent of the right-wing theory that the President has the power to unilaterally withhold payments for programs created by an act of Congress, even when that authority is not specifirled in the act.
Thank you Clark - encouraging news in a discouraging time!