LANSING — Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel today joined a coalition of 23 states and the District of Columbia in filing a lawsuit (PDF) against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. for abruptly and illegally terminating nearly $11 billion in critical public health grants nationwide, including $379.3 million in grant funding awarded and owed to the State of Michigan. Michigan grants suddenly terminated include certain mental health and substance abuse grants and grants from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention meant to support infectious disease control and vaccinations for children and vulnerable adults.
“The Trump administration is now terminating millions in grants being used in our state to support vaccine clinics for kids, crisis mental health services, opioid abuse intervention, and to control disease spread in healthcare facilities,” said Attorney General Nessel. “And once again they’re breaking the law to take money that has been granted to the states. These programs keep Michigan healthy and, in some cases, help save lives, and that’s worth standing up and fighting for.”
The grant terminations, which came with no warning or legally valid explanation, have quickly caused chaos for state health agencies that rely on these critical funds for a wide range of urgent public health needs, such as infectious disease management, fortifying emergency preparedness, providing mental health and substance abuse services, and modernizing public health infrastructure. Michigan stands to lose nearly $380 million from these cancellations by HHS.
Among the Michigan grants purportedly terminated were:
- A mental health grant to support services for Michiganders suffering serious mental illness or severe emotional disturbances, including children's services.
- A substance abuse grant to enhance substance use disorder services for underserved and marginalized populations, including pregnant women, women with young children, opioid users, and rural populations.
- CDC funding for the control of infectious diseases that was funding laboratory upgrades statewide, throughout both peninsulas, and without which the MDHHS’s and local health departments’ capacity to respond to healthcare-associated infections in healthcare facilities is effectively eliminated.
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And CDC grants for the immunization and vaccination of children that were being used for vaccine ordering and storage, hosting vaccine clinics, and supporting translation services for vaccination information to non-English speaking parents and patients. The State was due a remaining balance of $49 million toward these awards and intended to use part of these funds to provide routine immunizations and immunizations against seasonal respiratory viruses to children, adults, and vulnerable and underserved populations.
MDHHS staff and affiliates, contractors, and vendors rely on these federally promised funds to perform critical public health services and activities throughout the State. HHS’s abrupt termination of these federal funds has caused panic among MDHHS’s employees, partners, subgrantees, and service recipients, many flooding the health agency with questions still left unanswered by the federal government. These abrupt and illegal grant terminations will cause harm not just to MDHHS as the State’s public health agency, but to all 45 of Michigan’s local health departments, 46 community mental health service programs, and community-based organizations that collectively play a large role in providing direct health and public health services to Michigan residents. More than 300 grants awarded by MDHHS from these federal funds will be impacted by these terminations, which will result in more than $80 million never reaching the direct-care state grant recipients.
The HHS cuts threaten the urgent public health needs of states around the country at a time when emerging disease threats—such as measles and bird flu—are on the rise, Attorney General Nessel and the coalition warn.
Congress authorized and appropriated new and increased funding for many grants in COVID-19-related legislation to support critical public health needs. Many of the grants impacted nationally are from specific programs created by Congress, such as the block grants to states for mental health and substance abuse and addiction services. Yet, with no legal authority or explanation, Secretary Kennedy’s HHS agencies on March 24 arbitrarily terminated these grants “for cause” effective immediately claiming that the COVID-19 pandemic is over and the grants are no longer necessary.
In their lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court in Rhode Island, the coalition of attorneys general assert that the mass terminations violate federal law because the end of the pandemic is not a “for cause” basis for ending the grants, especially since none of the appropriated funds are tied to the end of the pandemic which occurred more than a year ago. HHS’s position, until very recently, was that the end of the pandemic did not affect the availability of these grant funds. Moreover, for some of the grants, termination “for cause” is not a permissible basis for termination, yet the federal government unlawfully terminated them.
With this lawsuit, Attorney General Nessel and the coalition are seeking a temporary restraining order to invalidate Secretary Kennedy’s and HHS’s mass grant terminations in the litigating states, arguing that the actions violate the Administrative Procedure Act. The states are additionally asking the court to prevent HHS from maintaining or reinstating the terminations and any agency actions implementing them.
Joining Attorney General Nessel in the lawsuit are the attorneys general of Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawai’i, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Rhode Island, Washington, and Wisconsin, and the Governors of Kentucky and Pennsylvania.
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