Thirteen states sue Trump administration for terminating clean energy grants

The states say the Trump administration went through with terminating federal clean energy grants, even after Congress refused to cut funding it had awarded under the Biden administration.

by Edvard Pettersson, Court House News, February 18, 2026

(CN) — Thirteen states, led by California, Colorado and Washington state, (but not including Hawaii) sued the Trump administration on Wednesday to challenge the U.S. Department of Energy's termination of roughly $2.3 billion in federal funding for clean energy and infrastructure projects.

"These aren't optional programs — these are investments approved by bipartisan majorities in Congress," California Attorney General Rob Bonta said at a news conference announcing the lawsuit. "The president doesn't get to cancel them simply because he disagrees with them. California won't allow President Trump and his administration to play politics with our economy, our energy grid and our jobs."

In their complaint filed in federal court in San Francisco, the 13 states argue that after Congress stymied President Donald Trump's efforts to cut renewable energy grants funded under the Inflation Reduction Act and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, the Energy Department has been using a "nebulous and opaque" review process to eliminate billions of dollars in previously awarded funding.

And when federal government was about to be shut down in September of last year, Russell Vought, the director of the Office of Management of Budget, posted online that the Energy Department would be terminating “nearly $8 billion in Green New Scam funding to fuel the Left’s climate agenda,” the states say in the lawsuit.

Vought's post listed 16 "blue states" where projects would be defunded: California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Vermont and Washington state. Rhode Island and Wisconsin joined of 11 of those states in Wednesday's suit.

"In our constitutional system, only Congress has the power to appropriate funding, and to define if and how federal programs are administered," the 13 states say. "It is the president’s duty, after that legislation is signed by the executive, to execute those laws. He has no power to undo them, whether piecemeal or in their entirety."

One of the victims of the Trump administration's aversion to clean energy is California's Alliance for Renewable Clean Hydrogen Energy Systems, or ARCHES.

The public-private partnership to develop clean hydrogen technologies and infrastructure had been granted $1.2 billion in federal funding under the Biden administration.

The ARCHES hub seeks to facilitate a network of clean, renewable hydrogen production sites to cut fossil fuel use throughout California, with the ultimate goal of decarbonizing public transportation, heavy duty trucking, and port operations by 2 million metric tons per year — roughly the equivalent to annual emissions of 445,000 gasoline-fueled cars, California said in July of 2024 when it announced a $12.6 billion agreement with U.S. Energy Department.

However, this last November, ARCHES said it was pausing its activities "in response to recent changes in federal funding priorities."

"We will not allow Trump to sell out our future to his biggest donors," California Governor Gavin Newsom said in a statement. "Trump didn’t just tear up a contract: he defied Congress, jeopardized more than 200,000 good-paying jobs, and robbed billions of dollars in health savings from communities that have been hit the hardest by pollution."

Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser also decried the administration for ending or abandoning $600 million in federal funding for energy and infrastructure projects in the the Centennial State.

"[Energy] Secretary [Chris] Wright has promised more cuts. Colorado has always been at the forefront of advanced energy research and deployment. I’ll continue to fight for federal dollars for our state,” Weiser said in a statement.

And in Washington state, Attorney General Nick Brown said in a statement, “This administration wants to sabotage all of the progress Washington has made in embracing renewable energy and addressing climate change. We refuse to be dragged back to the days of runaway pollution in flagrant violation of the law.”

Brown noted that the administration had revoked funding for the Pacific Northwest Hydrogen Hub, which aimed to reduce carbon emissions by 1.7 million metric tons per year,

Representatives of the U.S. Department of Energy didn't immediately respond to a request for comment on the lawsuit.