A group of 20 state attorneys general has filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration, alleging that the government is “unlawfully” withholding billions in emergency and disaster aid to coerce states into following the president’s firm immigration rules and endorsing widespread deportations.

The 73-page legal complaint was submitted on Tuesday to the U.S. District Court in Rhode Island. The document claims that the administration intends to keep back federal grant allocations, which Congress has financed with billions, meant to address the country’s needs after extensive floods, fires, earthquakes, and other large-scale calamities.

States joining the lawsuit include New York, California, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey, and Connecticut. Named defendants include the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), and DHS Secretary Kristi Noem in her official capacity, among others.

Specifically, the plaintiffs claim that DHS and FEMA are “holding critical emergency preparedness and response funding hostage” unless the states agree to devote criminal law enforcement resources to one of the Trump administration’s top priorities — the enforcement of civil immigration policies, which they say go “beyond what state law allows (in some States) or requires (in others).”

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“[T]hey seek to require many States to abandon well-considered policies that advance public safety by promoting trust between law enforcement and immigrant communities as a condition on continued funding of emergency management programs unrelated to immigration enforcement,” the complaint says. “By hanging a halt in this critical funding over States like a sword of Damocles, Defendants impose immense harm on States, forcing them to choose between readiness for disasters and emergencies, on the one hand, and their judgment about how best to investigate and prosecute crimes, on the other.”

Referring to the Trump administration’s policy as a “grant funding hostage scheme,” plaintiffs go on to assert that the government’s actions violate two key principles of the U.S. system of checks and balances. The first alleged violation is that agencies in the executive branch “cannot act contrary to the authority conferred on them by Congress.” The second, per the states, is that the federal government cannot “use the spending power to coerce States into adopting its preferred policies.”

“Defendants have ignored both principles, claiming undelegated power to place their own conditions on dozens of grant programs that Congress created and bulldozing through the Constitution’s boundary between state and federal authority,” the complaint states.

The suit alleges that the administration, “in furtherance of this funding hostage scheme,” issued new sets of “Standard Terms and Conditions” applicable to all federal grant awards in March and April 2025. Those terms and conditions included new requirements that, for the first time, compel states to pull their law enforcement resources away from “core public safety missions” and divert them toward the administration’s immigration enforcement priorities.

The states are also required to halt any programs that might benefit migrants in the country illegally or that may incentivize illegal immigration, according to the plaintiffs.

New York Attorney General Letitia James, who has been a persistent thorn in Trump’s side since before his reelection, said that Noem and other officials have been engaged in a concerted pressure campaign since January aimed at forcing individual states to “assist with the administration’s mass deportation agenda.”

“DHS is holding states hostage by forcing them to choose between disaster preparedness and enabling the administration’s illegal and chaotic immigration agenda,” James said in a statement. “This funding is vital to keeping New Yorkers safe during hurricanes, floods, and other catastrophes. The federal government cannot weaponize disaster relief to coerce states into abandoning public safety and community trust.”

The plaintiffs are asking a federal judge to declare that the new conditions on funding are unlawful and to issue a court order blocking the administration from using emergency funds as political leverage.