AG Brown files a lawsuit against the Trump administration for subverting Congress by canceling millions in funds to provide shelter for migrants

SEATTLE – Attorney General Nick Brown today filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for unlawfully canceling more than $4 million in congressionally approved funds intended to help the state provide shelter and support to migrants as they await further action on their asylum or other immigration claims.

Since 2019—in a law signed by President Trump in his first term—Congress has provided funds to help states, local jurisdictions, and nonprofit organizations offer emergency food and shelter to noncitizen migrants after their release from DHS custody. As tens of thousands of humanitarian migrants arrived in Washington between 2022 and 2024, local shelters and municipalities struggled to meet the needs of these newcomers, which prompted the state to take action, including by applying for federal funds through the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Shelter and Services Program.

FEMA, which is part of DHS, awarded Washington more than $4 million in SSP funds. But before Washington could request payment under the award, FEMA unlawfully froze and later terminated the funding in a continuation of the Trump administration’s efforts to deprive states, like Washington, of federal funding to support the health and safety of migrants.

“Once again, the Trump administration is breaking the law and ignoring Congress,” Brown said. “Congress created a program to provide funding for shelter for migrants. But now the president has illegally yanked the funds, ignoring the separation of powers, simply because he doesn’t like the program.”

As the complaint notes, by creating a program intended to relieve overcrowding in federal short-term detention facilities, Congress “made a conscious choice to provide funds in a manner that would benefit some individuals who may have entered into the United States unlawfully.”

As a result of broader migration trends that resulted in millions of people crossing the southwest border into the U.S. between 2019 and 2024, the number of noncitizen migrants present in Washington climbed ten-fold to 45,603 in 2024 from 4,156 in 2022. The state’s housing and homeless crisis response system was strained, and most emergency shelters were already filled each night, leaving thousands of newly arrived migrants homeless.

Washington responded by appropriating $25 million for the Washington Migrant and Asylum-Seeker Support Project (the WA MASS Project), which was launched in October 2024 to help newly arrived migrants meet their basic needs such as shelter, food, and access to medical care. But the state recognized that more was needed and sought federal funding through the Shelter and Services Program.

Brown argues in the complaint that DHS violated the Constitution’s separation of powers doctrine because the Constitution grants “the power of the purse” to Congress and not the president. That means the administration can’t refuse to pay out funds already approved by Congress “simply because of policy objections,” the complaint states. He also alleges that DHS has violated the Administrative Procedure Act by taking actions that are arbitrary, capricious, and contrary to law.

Brown is asking the court to declare DHS’s decision to terminate the Shelter and Services Program unlawful and order the federal agency to restore the funding program.

A copy of the complaint is available here.

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