{"id":917945,"date":"2026-07-06T22:14:17","date_gmt":"2026-07-07T03:14:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/06\/trumps-epa-unlawfully-cancelled-environmental-justice-grants-judge-rules\/"},"modified":"2026-07-06T22:14:17","modified_gmt":"2026-07-07T03:14:17","slug":"trumps-epa-unlawfully-cancelled-environmental-justice-grants-judge-rules","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2026\/07\/06\/trumps-epa-unlawfully-cancelled-environmental-justice-grants-judge-rules\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump\u2019s EPA Unlawfully Cancelled Environmental Justice Grants, Judge Rules"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A federal judge in South Carolina ruled<\/a> this week that the Trump administration\u2019s termination of environmental justice grants was \u201cillegal.\u201d The decision dealt a setback to efforts to dismantle a Biden-era program that funded projects addressing environmental and public health challenges in underserved communities across the country.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the ruling, U.S. District Judge Richard Gergel found that the Environmental Protection Agency\u2019s decision to eliminate the $2.8 billion Environmental and Climate Justice Block Grant Program was unlawful and voided the action.\u00a0<\/p>\n

However, Gergel stopped short of issuing a permanent injunction requiring the agency to resume administering the program. He said such an order would likely require the federal government to rehire staff responsible for overseeing the grants, which appeared \u201cimpractical\u201d since the Trump administration already fired those employees. The judge also denied a request to extend the program\u2019s September deadline for awarding grant funds.<\/p>\n

The Southern Environmental Law Center filed the lawsuit in partnership with the Public Rights Project. Kym Meyer, the center\u2019s litigation director, said the organization is still \u201cworking through\u201d the ruling.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re anxious to talk to EPA and to see how they\u2019re planning to move forward, and then we will figure out what our own next steps need to be,\u201d Meyer said, adding that the grant program should resume as soon as possible.<\/p>\n

The grant program was established under the Inflation Reduction Act as part of the Biden administration\u2019s broader efforts<\/a> to address longstanding inequities across the nation. The grants were intended to support community priorities, such as reducing pollution and bolstering public health and climate readiness, according to budget documents<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The grants were often awarded to community groups, in partnership with local governments, to address issues<\/a> such as rising utility costs, air pollution, decaying infrastructure and extreme heat.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThese are projects that hundreds of communities across the country had been working on for years,\u201d said Zealan Hoover, a former senior advisor to the EPA Administrator and director of implementation. \u201cThese are projects that would have addressed long-standing sources of local pollution or climate risk, and it is really tragic that these grants were terminated.\u201d<\/p>\n

One of the grant recipients, the nonprofit CleanAIRE NC, which works to improve the health of North Carolina residents, received $500,000 to install air sensors across four communities in Mecklenburg County, which includes Charlotte.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThese communities are all in areas that experience higher pollution exposures than the more affluent neighborhoods surrounding them, resulting in vastly different experiences and health outcomes,\u201d said Andrew Whelan, the director for communications strategy. \u201cThey\u2019re closer to major highways, greater industrial activity and polluting factories and coal plants.\u201d<\/p>\n

The data would be used to help educate communities on how to advocate for cleaner air, he said.<\/p>\n

At the beginning of his term, President Trump issued executive orders, one of which paused<\/a> \u201cthe disbursement of funds appropriated through the Inflation Reduction Act,\u201d and another<\/a> that directed agencies to \u201cterminate, to the maximum extent allowed by law\u2026 \u2018environmental justice\u2019 offices and positions.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

According to court documents, an EPA official told the court that, after a review, he decided to terminate the Environmental and Climate Justice Block Grant Program last February for \u201cpolicy reasons.\u201d Gergel found that the decision was unlawful.<\/p>\n

In a similar lawsuit over the same grants<\/a>, Gergel also ruled in favor of CleanAIRE NC and other plaintiffs, but the the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the decision.<\/a> This time, the case concerned the legality behind the cancellation of the entire program, rather than individual grants.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for the EPA said in a written statement that the agency is \u201creviewing the decision.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor decades, the families of north Mecklenburg County have been forced to wait for basic transparency about the air they breathe,\u201d Whelan of CleanAIRE NC said in an email. \u201cWhile it\u2019s too soon to know how this ruling will impact individual grant recipients, the court has validated that our community was wrongfully deprived of these critical air monitoring resources.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

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About This Story<\/h2>\n

Perhaps you noticed: This story, like all the news we publish, is free to read. That\u2019s because Inside Climate News is a 501c3 nonprofit organization. We do not charge a subscription fee, lock our news behind a paywall, or clutter our website with ads. We make our news on climate and the environment freely available to you and anyone who wants it.<\/p>\n

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Thank you,<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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\n\t\t\t\t\t\tLauren Dalban\t\t\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n<\/h3>\n

Reporter, New York City<\/h4>\n

Lauren Dalban is a New York City-based reporter with a background in local journalism. A former ICN fellow, she now covers environmental issues in all five boroughs. Originally from London, she earned a B.A. in History and English from the University of Virginia, and an M.S. from Columbia Graduate School of Journalism.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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By Lauren Dalban
Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A federal judge in South Carolina ruled this week that the Trump administration\u2019s termination of environmental justice grants was \u201cillegal.\u201d The decision dealt a setback to efforts to dismantle a Biden-era program that funded projects addressing environmental and public health challenges in underserved communities across the country.\u00a0 In the ruling, U.S. District Judge Richard Gergel<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":917946,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[111185,163],"tags":[5123,150836],"class_list":["post-917945","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-unlawfully","category-trumps","tag-trumps","tag-unlawfully"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/917945","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=917945"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/917945\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/917946"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=917945"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=917945"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=917945"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}