Trump Admin Threatens to Strip Federal Money Over Woke Language. Fresno Is Fighting Back in Court

By Omar S. Rashad, Fresnoland

The City of Fresno filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration, challenging its use of executive orders to strip local governments of federal funds over what the White House and others have vaguely and repeatedly described as “woke language.”

Seven local governments and agencies, including Fresno, came together to file a joint lawsuit Wednesday in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California. The suit seeks a temporary restraining blocking federal agencies from stripping hundreds of millions in federal funds.

The lawsuit filing alleges that the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Department of Transportation and other federal agencies “have imposed vague and unauthorized conditions on federal grants to coerce compliance with executive policy preferences.”

On Monday, HUD officials notified Fresno city leaders that they faced a Thursday noon deadline to remove specific words in a city plan for how it would use funds from the federal government.

“HUD has directed Fresno to remove all references to the words ‘equity,’ ‘environmental justice,’ and all transgender references, and provide assurances that ‘[t]he City of Fresno shall not use grant funds to promote ‘gender ideology,’ as defined in Executive Order (E.O.) 14168, Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government,” according to the lawsuit filing.

A HUD spokesperson was not immediately available for comment. Fresnoland asked via email why federal funding should be stripped from local governments due to the inclusion of specific words in a plan.

The lawsuit details how each of the local agencies in California, Minnesota and New York depend on hundreds of millions in federal funding.

For example, Fresno’s airport has been allocated $50 million in grants from the Federal Aviation Administration to complete capital improvement projects, according to the lawsuit filing. Fresno’s airport is also counting on another $100 million in FAA grants for other planned improvements, including the construction of a new air traffic control tower.

Fresno is also depending on more than $100 million in federal transportation grants, an annual $11.7 million in housing-related grants and $2.2 million in environmental safety grants, according to the lawsuit filing.

The full list of plaintiffs in the lawsuit include the following local governments and agencies:

• City of Fresno (California)
• City of Eureka (California)
• City of South Lake Tahoe (California)
• County of Sacramento (California)
• City of Saint Paul (Minnesota)
• County of Monroe (New York)
• Monroe County Airport Authority (New York)

The seven plaintiffs are represented by San Francisco law firm Renne Public Law Group. In a news release Wednesday night, Fresno City Attorney Andrew Janz said the lawsuit is an attempt to restore fairness in the federal grants system.

“This lawsuit is not about partisan politics—it is about protecting essential federal funding that Congress previously authorized and intended for local communities,” Janz wrote in the news release.

The lawsuit filing also argues that Trump’s executive order cannot constitutionally override funding allocations approved by congress, or be used to strip federal funding from local governments and agencies.

“While the Executive Branch is charged with faithfully executing the laws enacted by Congress, that duty does not include the power to unilaterally rewrite or expand the statutory terms under which federal funds are awarded,” the lawsuit filing reads.

In the city’s statement Wednesday, Fresno Mayor Jerry Dyer said federal funds are integral to meet the city’s housing and transportation needs.

“When Washington suddenly rewrites the rules, it’s our families, seniors, and small businesses who suffer most,” Dyer said, “and the impact is felt throughout our nation.”

This article first appeared on Fresnoland and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

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Previously Published on fresnoland.org with Creative Commons License

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