Office of the
Illinois Attorney General
Kwame Raoul

Chicago — Attorney General Kwame Raoul today, as part of a coalition of 13 attorneys general, filed a lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s unlawful decision to terminate funding for congressionally mandated energy and infrastructure programs created by Congress in laws such as the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA, also known as the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law). The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, challenges the decisions by the United States Department of Energy (DOE), DOE Secretary Chris Wright, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), and OMB Director Russell Vought, to terminate billions of dollars in energy and infrastructure funding.

“This unlawful attempt to block funding approved by Congress will seriously harm work being done in Illinois and across the nation to improve energy efficiency, strengthen energy resiliency and increase clean energy – all of which benefit the public,” Raoul said. “I will continue to stand with my fellow attorneys general to fight back against the president’s illegal actions that harm our communities and our environment.” 

On his first day in office, President Trump issued executive orders declaring an unlawful “national energy emergency” and “terminating the Green New Deal.” Pursuant to this directive, the DOE compiled a “hit list” of energy and infrastructure awards worth billions of dollars. The list was intended to further the administration’s illegal objective of eliminating energy and infrastructure programs created under Congress’s authority in laws such as the 2021 IIJA and the 2022 IRA. 

In May 2025, the DOE issued a policy memorandum asserting that it would subject projects to which it had previously awarded funding to a vague and opaque “review” process that was, in truth, designed to provide cover to eliminate energy and infrastructure programs. As a government shutdown loomed in late September of 2025, the president told reporters he could “do things during the shutdown that are irreversible” to attack Democrats, including “cutting programs that they like.” The next day, OMB Director Russell Vought posted on X that the DOE would be terminating nearly $8 billion in “Green New Scam” funding to fuel “the Left’s climate agenda.” The post listed 16 states where projects would be defunded, including Illinois. The DOE announced the cuts the next day, citing the May 2025 policy memorandum. Meanwhile, throughout the first year of the Trump presidency, the DOE has quietly abandoned projects, including those contained in various “hit lists.” All were funded as elements of high-profile energy and infrastructure legislation, including bipartisan legislation, passed during the previous administration.

In Illinois, the DOE terminated six grant awards to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and the University of Illinois-Chicago that are collectively worth over $20 million. The grants funded projects to make the electricity grid more reliable and resilient, reduce carbon emissions, and utilize domestic sources of rare earth elements and critical minerals.

The complaint filed by Raoul and the attorneys general today alleges that the Trump administration’s decision to eliminate energy programs created by Congress is unlawful because it violates the separation of powers and the Administrative Procedure Act. The programs were created by statute, and federal agencies have a duty to faithfully execute those statutes. Raoul and the coalition ask the court to declare that the Trump administration’s actions are unlawful and to permanently stop the administration from interfering with these programs. 

Joining Attorney General Raoul in filing the lawsuit are the attorneys general of California, Colorado, Connecticut, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington and Wisconsin.