New Jersey leads lawsuit demanding Trump abandon immigration-related conditions on crime victim funds
N.J 's Matthew Platkin is leading a coalition of Democratic-led states suing the Trump administration over immigration-related conditions they’ve placed on funds for victims of violent crime.
New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin is leading a coalition of Democratic-led states suing President Donald Trump’s administration over immigration-related conditions it has placed on funds for victims of violent crime.
The lawsuit, filed Monday, argues that Trump’s Department of Justice broke the law when it tied grants for victim assistance and compensation to states’ cooperation with federal immigration enforcement.
Platkin called the Trump administration’s policy “the most heinous act that I’ve seen in politics,” accusing the president of using crime victims as pawns. “We will not allow them to put politics ahead of public safety.”
The New Jersey attorney general was joined in the lawsuit by Delaware Attorney General Kathy Jennings and Democratic attorneys general from more than a dozen other states. Pennsylvania Attorney General Dave Sunday, a Republican, did not join the suit.
The Department of Justice declined to comment.
The suit is the latest among several that Democratic attorneys general have brought against the administration seeking the restoration of funds stripped from state governments, often with conditions related to immigration as Trump threatens actions against so-called sanctuary jurisdictions.
Victim assistance funds are provided by the federal government in the form of annual grants and are typically administered by state governments. The funds are used for a variety of services including shelters, funerals, processing of rape kits, and crime victim hotlines.
Trump’s DOJ has sought to require states to cooperate with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and to share information about recipients with the Department of Homeland Security to receive the federal grant money.
New Jersey’s annual funding from the program has ranged from $30 million to $94 million over the last 10 years, according to the suit. Delaware receives $15 million annually under the program, Jennings said.
Democratic attorneys general argued these funds were essential tools for law enforcement and critical to helping victims of violent crime put their lives back together.
It’s unclear how many victims who benefit from those funds are undocumented. In Delaware, Jennings said, law enforcement doesn’t ask, as the law establishing the funds does not require that beneficiaries be legal residents.
“You are a victim regardless of your status,” she said.
The conditions, the suit argues, force states to either sacrifice essential programs or ignore their own best judgment on law enforcement matters to turn over information on the legal status of witnesses and victims to federal authorities.
The attorneys general are asking a federal judge in Rhode Island to find that the conditions violate the Victims of Crime Act and to prevent the Department of Justice from enforcing them when states apply for grants later this year.