AG James Sued to Block Trump’s Unlawful Diversion of Funding to Pay for Border Wall
NEW YORK – New York Attorney General Letitia James today released the following statement after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit upheld a lower court decision that found that President Donald Trump’s attempts to use 2019 military appropriations and funding to build a border wall were illegal: “The courts have again flatly rejected President Trump’s illegal attempt to divert critical military spending to a wasteful border wall. We are grateful that this manufactured national emergency and the illegal maneuvers employed to pay for it have been blocked for 2019. But we know the president continues to push to subsidize this project year-after-year. The president’s abuse of power will not stand, so we will continue to fight it using every tool at our disposal.” Last February, Attorney General James and a coalition of attorneys general from around the nation filed a lawsuit challenging President Trump’s declaration of a national emergency and his attempt to divert $1.6 billion in federal funds appropriated by Congress to build a border wall. In December, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California ruled in favor of Attorney General James and other states and against the Trump Administration, which the administration appealed and lost today. As part of the president’s efforts to divert funds, the U.S. Department of Defense announced that the United States Military Academy (West Point) would lose $160 million slated for two major projects at the military academy. In March, Attorney General James and a coalition of attorneys general filed another lawsuit challenging the Trump Administration’s illegal and unconstitutional diversion of $3.8 billion in taxpayer dollars for the construction of an unauthorized border wall from 2020 federal appropriations.