The Balance of Power

Federal Restrictions on Benefits

Press Release:

Attor­ney Gen­er­al Tong Files Law­suit to Block Fed­er­al Restric­tions on Pub­lic Ben­e­fits

Preceding Event:

Three gov­ern­ment agen­cies with­in the exec­u­tive branch put out new guid­ance and restric­tions — the Depart­ment of Health and Human Ser­vices (HHS) the Depart­ment of Jus­tice (DOJ) and the Depart­ment of Edu­ca­tion (ED) — on access to fed­er­al safe­ty net ben­e­fits based upon legal sta­tus.

This is a rein­ter­pre­ta­tion of the Per­son­al Respon­si­bil­i­ty and Work Oppor­tu­ni­ty Rec­on­cil­i­a­tion Act of 1996, a statute which dic­tates what states must do in order to receive fed­er­al fund­ing for social safe­ty net pro­grams. This changes eli­gi­bil­i­ty and access to these pro­grams for mil­lions of peo­ple around the coun­try.

General Overview:

Accord­ing to the press release from July 21, 2025, “Attor­ney Gen­er­al William Tong today joined a coali­tion of 20 oth­er attor­neys gen­er­al in suing the fed­er­al admin­is­tra­tion to stop its unlaw­ful attempt to restrict access to crit­i­cal health, edu­ca­tion, and social ser­vice pro­grams… Attor­ney Gen­er­al Tong and the coali­tion are ask­ing the court to halt the new fed­er­al rules and act quick­ly to ensure con­tin­ued access to some of the nation’s most cru­cial social ser­vices pro­grams.“
Accord­ing to the release, the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment made these changes and did­n’t fol­low the steps laid out in the Admin­is­tra­tive Pro­ce­dure Act and mis­ap­plied the Rec­on­cil­i­a­tion Act to entire pro­grams. “The changes also vio­late the Constitution’s Spend­ing Clause by impos­ing new fund­ing con­di­tions on states with­out fair notice or con­sent,” the press release said. Accord­ing to the press release, the orders give the exec­u­tive branch con­trol over mon­ey that only Con­gress is sup­posed to have.

Connecticut Nexus:

Accord­ing to the press release, “In Con­necti­cut, tens of mil­lions of dol­lars’ worth of fund­ing is at risk. Connecticut’s nine Com­mu­ni­ty Action Agen­cies, which run Head Start, Meals on Wheels, food pantries, and a vari­ety of oth­er anti-pover­ty, employ­ment, and train­ing ser­vices, cur­rent­ly receive rough­ly $9 mil­lion each year in Com­mu­ni­ty Ser­vices Block Grant (CSBG) fund­ing. These agen­cies could poten­tial­ly be forced to shut down while they attempt to nav­i­gate these new guide­lines for ver­i­fy­ing immi­gra­tion sta­tus. This means putting the edu­ca­tion of more than 5,000 chil­dren enrolled at Head Start pro­grams in Con­necti­cut and the more than 100,000 Con­necti­cut fam­i­lies served by Com­mu­ni­ty Action Agen­cies each year at risk.”

Date of filing:

July 4, 2025

Case #:

1:25-cv-00345

Case title:

State of New York et al v. U.S. Depart­ment of Jus­tice et al

Plaintiffs: 20 states and D.C.

Defendants:

Court:

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF RHODE ISLAND

Status as of Dec. 1, 2025:

OPEN
Last fil­ing: Nov. 21, 2025

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