Nonprofits, Tribes and local governments sue Trump administration for terminating EPA grant programs

Terminating these programs leaves communities more vulnerable to pollution and disasters

Press Release from the Southern Environmental Law Center

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 25, 2025

CONTACT
Stephanie Ebbs, sebbs@selc.org, 202-915-9795
Alexandria Trimble, atrimble@earthjustice.org
Grace Kair, gracek@chatham-strategies.com

WASHINGTON, D.C.  — Today, a coalition of nonprofits, Tribes and local governments sued the Trump administration for unlawfully terminating the Environmental Protection Agency’s Environmental and Climate Justice Block Grant programs despite a congressional directive to fund them.

The plaintiffs come from every region of the country and will be seeking class action certification and preliminary relief so that all 350 grant recipients who have been harmed by the wholesale termination of the EPA program may continue their projects. These community-based initiatives include improving natural disaster preparedness, expanding workforce development opportunities, improving and monitoring air quality, mitigating stormwater and flood damage, combat high energy costs, and improving community members’ ability to participate in decision-making and permitting processes that impact their health and environment.

Southern Environmental Law Center, Earthjustice, Public Rights Project, and Lawyers for Good Government filed the challenge on behalf of ECJ grant recipients to seek the nationwide restoration of the program and to require the administration to reinstate awarded grant agreements.

“Unlawfully ending this program threatens the ability of local governments to protect their people and the environment,” said Jon Miller, Chief Program Officer, Public Rights Project. “This case isn’t just about restoring grant funding in a handful of places — it’s about restoring critical services and projects in areas of the country with the greatest need. We’re fighting alongside our partners to right the wrongs of the past and chart a healthier path forward for thousands of organizations, Tribes and communities.”

The Environmental and Climate Justice Program was created by the Inflation Reduction Act   under Clean Air Act   Section 138 to award $3 billion in grants to community-based non-profits, Tribes, local governments, and higher education institutions in every state to tackle the climate crisis and environmental harms at the local level.

“Environmental justice grants were created to address the real harm to public health in communities of color and low wealth communities. The communities were promised transformative funding to address generations of injustice and now that’s being taken away,” SELC Litigation Director Kym Meyer said. “This administration has shown no interest in learning the truth about how these grant funds are supporting essential and impactful work on the ground.  Rather they have arbitrarily and unlawfully terminated the grant programs with callous disregard for the impact of their actions- all to score political points. ”

The grant-funded initiatives in rural, small town and urban communities across the country include air quality monitoring, community pollution notification systems, tree planting in urban heat zones, lead pipes replacement in community drinking water systems, resilience projects to strengthen communities against more frequent and intensifying extreme weather events, and more.

“Since his first days in office, the Trump administration has unlawfully withheld congressionally-mandated funds,” said Hana Vizcarra, senior attorney at Earthjustice. “Terminating these grant programs caused widespread harm and disruption to on-the-ground projects that reduce pollution, increase community climate resilience and build community capacity to tackle environmental harms. We won’t let this stand.”

“We are proud to stand alongside our partners and these plaintiffs to fight for the communities who have been unlawfully denied the resources Congress promised them. This is a blatant, illegal attempt to sidestep federal law and strip critical funding away from the communities who need it most,” said Jillian Blanchard, Vice President of the Climate Change and Environmental Justice Program at Lawyers for Good Government. “These grants were lawfully awarded, binding agreements, backed by clear Congressional authorization under the Inflation Reduction Act. The administration’s unconstitutional termination of these grants are not only destabilizing local projects addressing pollution, public health, and climate resilience, they violate core principles of administrative law and the separation of powers.”

Plaintiff quotes:

“We are proud to be standing up for the communities and environment where we work — and, very importantly, for the rule of law and the U.S. Constitution,” said Appalachian Voices Executive Director Tom Cormons. “America’s support for homegrown, local solutions to serious problems is crucially important. We are happy to be going to bat, not just for our own grant and the communities it serves, but for this program as a whole that supports similar work in rural communities, cities, and suburbs from coast to coast. The program is written into law by Congress, and it’s the EPA’s job to follow the law and implement it.”

“We were informed in February that our EPA environmental justice grant, now in its second year, was abruptly terminated,” said Brooke Perry Pardue, President/CEO of the Parks Alliance of Louisville. “This isn’t just another budget line item disappearing. We’ve had to reduce staff and adjust programming. We’ve been forced to scale back plans to expand access to greenspace in one of the city’s most underserved neighborhoods that is severely impacted by urban heat island effect. And we’re having to stretch every dollar even further at a time when operating costs are already extremely tight.”

“When we initially applied for this grant, we did so because it was the right thing to do — it would bring workforce development, support the circular economy and advanced manufacturing sector, and reduce soil pollution in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia,” said Landforce CEO Ilyssa Manspeizer. “Now, 16 months after submitting our application, we joined this lawsuit because it is also the right thing to do. The work laid out in this grant, and all the other terminated grants, is too important, touches too many lives, and creates too much opportunity to walk away. Crucially, this also acts as a record of the damage caused by the EPA’s broken promises to so many communities, so that moving forward things like this will not happen again.”

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The Southern Environmental Law Center is one of the nation’s most powerful defenders of the environment, rooted in the South. With a long track record, SELC takes on the toughest environmental challenges in court, in government, and in our communities to protect our region’s air, water, climate, wildlife, lands, and people. Nonprofit and nonpartisan, the organization has a staff of 200, including more than 130 legal and policy experts, and is headquartered in Charlottesville, Va., with offices in Asheville, Atlanta, Birmingham, Chapel Hill, Charleston, Nashville, Richmond, and Washington, D.C. selc.org

As a nonpartisan nonprofit organization, Public Rights Project helps local government officials fight for civil rights. We do this by building their capacity to protect and advance civil rights, convening and connecting them on issues of civil rights, and providing legal representation to governments to help them win in court on behalf of their residents. Since our founding, we’ve built a network of over 1,300 partners, including elected officials and 227 government offices across all 50 states, and helped recover over $46 million in relief for marginalized people. publicrightsproject.org

Lawyers for Good Government (L4GG) coordinates large-scale pro bono programs and issue advocacy efforts to protect human rights, defend the environment, and ensure equal justice under the law, and has a network of 125,000+ lawyers to assist in its efforts. lawyersforgoodgovernment.org

Earthjustice is the premier environmental law organization in the U.S., and the legal backbone of the domestic environmental movement. For over 50 years, we have been fighting in the courts, in legislatures, and in the court of public opinion to stop the climate crisis, create healthy communities free of pollution, safeguard our precious lands and waters, and expand environmental legal frameworks to achieve these goals. Earthjustice.org