Sixteen attorneys general and a Democratic governor sued the Trump administration on Thursday to restore access to over $1 billion in federal pandemic relief aid for schools that was recently halted, saying that the pullback could cause acute harm to students.
The suit, led by New York’s attorney general, Letitia James, and filed in Manhattan federal court, is one of the latest efforts by states to fight President Trump’s clawback of funding allocated to programs he does not want the government to support. The funding was part of a windfall of more than $190 billion that the U.S. Department of Education distributed to schools at the height of the coronavirus pandemic.
The government’s reversal “triggered chaos,” the suit says. New York was one of the states with the most unspent money: over $130 million. California had more than $205 million in unspent money, and Maryland had $245 million, the most among the states that sued.
“Cutting school systems’ access to vital resources that our students and teachers rely on is outrageous and illegal,” Ms. James said in a news release.
The coalition’s filing on Thursday comes nearly a month after 21 Democratic attorneys general sued the administration for firing about half of the Education Department’s staff. Linda McMahon, the education secretary, said the move would help the department deliver services more efficiently.
The White House also suspended millions of dollars in teacher-training grants that it argued would promote diversity, equity and inclusion, which prompted yet another suit from New York and other states.
Thursday’s move was made in concert with the attorneys general of Arizona, California, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, Nevada, Oregon and the District of Columbia. Gov. Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania also joined the suit; his state’s attorney general, a Republican, replaced him in that role last year.
The new suit revolves around the Education Department’s recent cancellation of more than $1 billion in unspent federal relief aid sent to schools to help address the wreckage of the pandemic. The Biden administration had previously granted many states an extension to spend their remaining funding through March 2026.
But Ms. McMahon said in a letter to state education leaders late last month that they had been given “ample time” to spend the money and that extending the deadline “years after the Covid pandemic ended” did not align with the administration’s priorities.
The states pushed back in their suit, arguing that much of the funding Congress had allocated had gone to programs not tied to “the duration of the public health emergency.”
In a statement on Thursday, Matthew J. Platkin, New Jersey’s attorney general, called the suspension of the funding “cruel.”
“This rash decision hurts school districts across our state, throwing their budgets into turmoil and hurting their ability to provide the quality education to which students are entitled,” Mr. Platkin said.
The unspent dollars make up a small fraction of the total amount that was distributed to schools. Still, superintendents across the nation have argued that the leftover money is not a luxury but a lifeline for students, and that its removal would force them to cut or scale back efforts to help children catch up in subjects like reading and math, along with other projects.
Some states said the move would threaten improvements to busing for homeless children. Gov. Maura Healey of Massachusetts said on social media that the move would “take us backwards” and jeopardize plans for math tutors, school health centers and building upgrades.
Ms. McMahon said that federal officials would reconsider extensions for states that explained why specific projects were essential for helping students recover from the pandemic, but signaled that the Education Department did not believe infrastructure upgrades qualified.
“They want this money for BUILDINGS, not learning recovery,” a spokeswoman for the department wrote on social media in response to the Massachusetts governor.
The flood of federal pandemic relief funding came with few outright spending restrictions, and districts used it on projects from hiring teachers to upgrading air-conditioning. But it also attracted scrutiny from Republicans in Congress, who claimed that money meant to “address students’ learning loss” was “being used to pay for radical curricula to indoctrinate students.”
Hurubie Meko is a Times reporter covering criminal justice in New York, with a focus on the Manhattan district attorney’s office and state courts.
Troy Closson is a Times education reporter focusing on K-12 schools.
The post Attorneys General Sue Over Access to $1 Billion in Federal School Aid appeared first on New York Times.
