Bonta Backs Challenge to Election Conditions on Federal Counterterrorism Funding
California Attorney General Rob Bonta announced in Oakland, Alameda County, California, on November 6 that he co-led a multistate coalition in filing an amicus brief in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit supporting a challenge to election-related conditions the Trump Administration, through the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), attached to federal counterterrorism funding. Six local governments in Republican-led states had won in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia; FEMA appealed and asked the D.C. Circuit to stay the judgment so it can enforce the conditions during the appeal, a request the brief urges the court to deny.
"The Trump Administration is once again making the safety of our communities collateral damage in its partisan agenda," Bonta said. "Time and time again, this administration has tried to weaponize critical federal funding to force states into submission, and time and time again, the courts have rejected these unlawful power grabs. Counterterrorism funding exists to protect our communities from real threats, not to advance baseless election conspiracy theories. The safety of our communities is not a bargaining chip, which is why I urge the D.C. Circuit to deny the request to stay the district court ruling."
Congress established the Homeland Security Grant Program (HSGP) in direct response to the September 11, 2001 attacks to help states and local governments prevent, prepare for, protect against, and respond to acts of terrorism; California and its cities receive $150 million in HSGP funding each year. Over the last 18 months, the Attorney General's Office said, FEMA has used hundreds of millions of dollars in HSGP and other federal grant funding to extract unrelated policy changes from the states. The conditions challenged here require states to take actions consistent with the President's election agenda, including adopting hand-marked paper ballots and using the SAVE database, which the coalition calls inaccurate, to verify voter eligibility, in order to receive HSGP funds. Bonta and the coalition challenged the same conditions in a separate lawsuit filed in July 2026.
The brief was filed in the municipalities' case, Nashville v. DHS. Bonta and Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul lead the attorneys general of Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin, and the Governor of Kentucky.
(Source: California Attorney General's Office)
Source: California Attorney General's Office
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：位于华盛顿特区的联邦紧急事务管理署（FEMA）总部入口标识。CC BY 4.0，经 Wikimedia Commons。 / Photo: Entrance sign at FEMA headquarters in Washington, D.C. CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
