TRENTON, N.J. — New Jersey Attorney General Jennifer Davenport is co-leading a coalition of 26 states in a lawsuit challenging what the states say are unlawful conditions the Trump administration has placed on billions of dollars in federal counterterrorism and emergency preparedness funding.
Filed Thursday, the lawsuit challenges actions by the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security that the coalition says unlawfully tie federal grant funding to immigration enforcement, election administration changes and broad federal authority to terminate grants.
“Despite its repeated losses in court, the Trump Administration continues to try to impose unlawful funding conditions well outside of its authority,” said Attorney General Davenport. “FEMA cannot use counterterrorism and other essential federal funding as a weapon to coerce states into assisting with civil immigration enforcement or to change our election administration. Threatening counterterrorism funding at a time when the President’s war in the Middle East magnifies threats is dangerous and wrong.”
According to the lawsuit, New Jersey receives more than $55 million annually through the Homeland Security Grant Program to support state and local efforts to prevent, prepare for and respond to terrorism and other security threats.
The coalition argues the challenged conditions would require states to devote law enforcement resources to federal immigration enforcement, adopt election administration policies favored by the administration and accept provisions allowing DHS to terminate grant funding at any time.
Among the election-related requirements cited in the lawsuit are transitioning to paper ballot systems, conducting mandatory manual audits of voting systems, implementing voter and ballot reconciliation procedures and using the federal Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements, or SAVE, system to verify the citizenship of election workers and registered voters. The lawsuit alleges states that do not comply could lose at least 20% of their Homeland Security Grant Program funding.
The coalition contends the funding conditions violate the Administrative Procedure Act and the Spending Clause of the U.S. Constitution.
New Jersey previously co-led two successful lawsuits in 2025 challenging similar attempts by DHS to condition federal emergency funding on states’ cooperation with federal immigration enforcement.
Davenport is co-leading the latest lawsuit with California Attorney General Rob Bonta, Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul and Rhode Island Attorney General Peter Neronha. The coalition also includes attorneys general from Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Vermont, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin, as well as the District of Columbia and the governors of Kentucky and Pennsylvania.
