By Taylor Dolven/Colorado Sun
This story was produced as part of the Colorado Capitol News Alliance. It first appeared at coloradosun.com.
Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser sued the Trump administration Thursday in an effort to stop federal funding cuts for the state’s poorest families before they take effect, saying the cuts will cause irreparable harm.
The lawsuit comes after the Trump administration this week announced it is freezing $10 billion of federal funding meant for families with low incomes in five Democratic states, including Colorado. The funding is used for Colorado’s child care payment assistance program, cash assistance for basic needs and job training, among other things.
The state’s safety net programs supported by the funding will be gutted, the lawsuit alleges. Colorado’s child care payment assistance program, known as CCCAP, will not be able to continue past Jan. 31, the state’s Department of Early Childhood said, risking child care center closures.
Weiser and attorneys general from New York, California, Illinois and Minnesota made an emergency request to a federal judge for a temporary restraining order to stop the cuts. A hearing on the restraining order will be held in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York at 12 p.m.
“The ability of the Plaintiff States to operate programs supporting the wellbeing of millions of children and families hangs in the balance,” the states’ request said.
Vague fraud allegations
Weiser’s lawsuit cites a December YouTube video in which right-wing content creator Nick Shirley claimed to expose widespread fraud at day care centers in Minnesota operated by Somali immigrants. Vice President JD Vance and Elon Musk promoted the video, which has been viewed millions of times.
Minnesota investigators visited all of the child care centers accused of fraud in the video earlier this month, and all were operating as expected, state officials said.
After the video was published, President Donald Trump attacked Minnesota’s governor and threatened to cut funding for other Democratic-led states.
Days later, Alex Adams, assistant secretary for the Administration for Children and Families, under the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, sent letters to Gov. Jared Polis notifying him that the federal government would be withholding funds for Colorado’s Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, or TANF, as well as the Social Services Block Grant program and the Child Care and Development Fund until the federal government reviews how the state uses the dollars.
The letters said the federal government is “rooting out fraud” and that the administration “has reason to believe” that Colorado is “illicitly providing illegal aliens” with benefits “intended for American citizens and lawful permanent residents.”
Undocumented immigrants do not qualify for TANF funds or Colorado’s child care payment assistance program.
Adams requested Colorado provide the feds with state data about recipients of TANF and Social Services Block Grant funds by Jan. 20, including names, addresses, Social Security numbers, birthdates and any other state identification numbers, according to copies of the letters reviewed by The Sun. He also requested “verified attendance documentation for subsidized child care services to the State.”
Weiser and the other attorneys general say the Trump administration is targeting their states for political retribution and has not followed the law, which allows for penalizing states for noncompliance with the federal programs’ rules only after an investigation and with the opportunity to appeal.
The funding cuts are the latest Trump administration attack on Colorado. Last week, Trump vetoed a bill that would have provided funding to complete a pipeline to carry clean water to communities in southeastern Colorado. A week before that, he denied disaster funding to help northwestern Colorado recover from wildfires and southwestern Colorado recover from flooding.
The lawsuit is the 50th Weiser has filed against the Trump administration.
This is a developing story.
