HousingWireHousingWire
After a lawsuit was filed by a coalition of fair housing nonprofits against the Trump administration over the cancellation of Fair Housing Initiatives Program (FHIP) grants, a coalition of 21 state attorneys general — led by California AG Rob Bonta — have filed an amicus brief in the case in support of the nonprofits.
The suit was brought in March by law firm Relman Colfax and four members of the National Fair Housing Alliance (NFHA). Groups in the states of Massachusetts, Idaho, Texas and Ohio filed the suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts.
They claim that the defendants “arbitrarily and without notice, reason, or sensible explanation terminated 78 Fair Housing Initiatives Program (FHIP) grants,” which the groups say “immediately compromised” their work against housing discrimination and segregation.
A federal judge paused the cancellations soon after to review the matter. But the pause was later rescinded by the judge, and the NFHA members and state AGs are asking for it to be reinstated.
Bonta’s office explained that California is home to “at least seven fair housing organizations whose FHIP funds would be terminated.”
FHIP was established by Congress in the late 1980s. It requires “the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to provide funds to nonprofit housing organizations that carry out investigatory, enforcement, education, and outreach activities aimed at rooting out discrimination in the provision of housing,” Bonta’s office explained.
This has led to consistent congressional appropriations for the program on an annual basis. The AGs and plaintiffs argue that the White House does not have the unilateral authority to cancel funds previously appropriated by the legislative branch and signed into law by the president.
“As I’ve said over and over again, the Trump administration is not above the law,” Bonta said in a statement. “My fellow attorneys general and I are proud to be supporting non-profit organizations that Congress tasked to root out housing discrimination in our communities. The termination of these grants was illegal, and they must be reinstated.”
He added that the stakes of the case are high for the impacted nonprofits, since they would be forced to close and states could “suffer severe harms in tackling housing discrimination.”
An announcement of the amicus brief filing stated that the cancellations will have a material impact on the collaborative work that AGs’ offices perform with the impacted organizations.
“In several crucial ways, the work done by the non-profit housing organizations complements the efforts of their states to provide safe, fair, and affordable housing to their residents while easing administrative burdens on their states,” Bonta’s office added.
Other states included in the amicus brief include New York, Massachusetts, Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington.
