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California and a host of Democratic-led states are accusing the Trump administration of withholding more than $740 million in combined funding for disaster preparedness and counterterrorism. The states and the Federal Emergency Management Agency for what they say is retaliation for not cooperating with federal deportation raids and voter ID procedures.
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“Last year, DHS and FEMA embarked on an unprecedented campaign to leverage the billions of dollars in federal funding that they administer to coerce states into adopting the administration’s preferred policies,” Bonta said in the suit, which was filed Thursday.
The new lawsuit revolves around a trio of complaints: an election overhaul mandate, forced cooperation with federal immigration raids and what the states claim is a new, unlawful “termination condition.” States called the move a “gun-to-the-head” cudgel that forces them to comply with federal overreach or risk funds that they rely on for first responder salaries and counterterrorism efforts.
The lawsuit said federal agencies have mandated an overhaul of elections, which includes transitioning all digital voting technology to paper ballots, conducting manual post-election audits based on federal guidelines that have not yet been written, and citizenship verification of all voters in state databases using the federal SAVE system.
Many states have argued the system is error-prone and cite concerns based on DHS’ own assessment which reported an error rate between 5% and 10%. The lawsuit also cites a 2026 court ruling which found that the system’s “shortfalls in data accuracy” could lead to “incomplete or false” voter verification results.
The lawsuit also cracks down on the federal government’s attempt to withhold funding if states do not pledge their local law enforcement officials to help Immigration and Customs Enforcement conduct raids and deportations. A federal court already ruled against this mandate in a previous lawsuit from 2025.
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The final layer of the states’ three-fold criticism is over the new “termination condition” that gives FEMA authority to cancel state grants if they are determined to not align with agency priorities. The attorneys general noted this makes emergency planning exceedingly difficult because “money can just disappear,” adding that even the stipulations for keeping the money are “hopelessly vague.”
The lawsuit accuses DHS and FEMA of being “undeterred” by their previous losses, pointing to immigration conditions that are “word-for-word identical” to the ones struck down in 2025, which the court qualified as the agency withholding funding on “political whims.”
Bonta said given the success of the two previous lawsuits against FEMA on similar penalties, this third round in the courts will go in favor of the states as well.
“We expect this latest unlawful attempt to fail as well. Our communities deserve better than to have essential resources caught up in political games,” Bonta said.
Read more Bonta slams Trump for ‘coercing’ states into assisting ICE, overhauling elections