Trump Nemesis Letitia James Takes Victory Lap On New Ruling Against Administration
New York Attorney General Letitia James took a victory lap after a new decision against President Donald Trump’s administration — and just after a very high-profile Trump defeat.
Barely a week after the bombshell dismissal of revenge cases against AG James and former FBI Director James Comey, a second grand jury declined to indict James. Then on Wednesday, news broke that yet another grand jury refused to charge James.
But it was another case that had AG James celebrating on social media Friday afternoon. James wrote:
We won our lawsuit against FEMA after they unlawfully withheld billions in funding meant to protect our communities from natural disasters.
We’ll keep fighting to ensure New York has the support we need to be safe when disaster strikes.
The post was accompanied by an AP article explaining the multi-billion-dollar decision:
A federal judge in Massachusetts on Thursday ordered the Trump administration to restore billions of dollars in canceled FEMA disaster mitigation funding, siding with 22 states and the District of Columbia that sued over the canceled grants this summer.
President Donald Trump’s administration said in April it was “ending” the Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC) program, which helped communities with predisaster projects to harden infrastructure and improve resilience against the increasing threats of climate change.
The administration called the program “wasteful and ineffective” and said it would halt $3.6 billion in funding awarded but not yet paid and would not award $882 million in grants for the following fiscal year.
The program’s disruption upended projects across hundreds of communities in both Republican- and Democratic-led states, thwarting plans to improve stormwater drainage, harden electrical lines and even help relocate households living in areas most vulnerable to disasters.
AG James also slammed the GOP-led Senate for “vot(ing) not to extend the Affordable Care Act tax credits, leaving health insurance premiums to spike.”
“This decision will leave millions of Americans with unaffordable healthcare. It’s despicable,” James wrote.
