City, county, join lawsuit asking court to bar White House from withholding disaster funding
Dante Ulanday - News Moderator 
The city and county of San Diego have filed a lawsuit with more than two dozen local governments, mostly in California, challenging the Trump administration.
The suit, the latest in a series of actions filed by state and municipal agencies, accuses the White House of attempting to place unlawful conditions on emergency and disaster preparedness funds.
Filed in federal court in Northern California, the suit alleges that the federal government has threatened to withhold more than $350 million in Department of Homeland Security and Federal Emergency Management Agency grants unless municipalities assist in the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement efforts.
The city, county and other agencies also allege that President Donald Trump’s administration is linking abandoning public diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives to securing the funds.
The San Diego City Attorney’s Office says that locally, those funds support wildfire and flood prevention projects, counterterrorism emergency response, port and transit security infrastructure and fire department staffing.
The parties are seeking a court order preventing the federal government from imposing any such conditions and a declaration that states the conditions are unconstitutional.
“Federal preparedness funding is meant to save lives, not advance a political agenda,” San Diego City Attorney Heather Ferbert said in a news release. “These unlawful conditions jeopardize our ability to keep San Diego families safe, and we are taking action to ensure our city continues to receive the resources needed to protect our communities.”
The city of San Diego is also part of separate, but similar litigation filed earlier this year alleging that funds for key city services in the form of Department of Transportation and U.S. Housing and Urban Development grants are being threatened unless the city and other local governments adhere to Trump administration policies.
The County of Santa Clara and the City and County of San Francisco are the lead plaintiffs in the case, which both the city and county of Los Angeles also has joined. Aside from the California agencies that are part of the suit, four in Washington state have joined, and one in Arizona.
