California Attorney General Rob Bonta, alongside attorneys general from New York, Colorado, Illinois, and Minnesota, filed a motion for preliminary injunction to continue blocking the Trump Administration's unlawful freeze of $10 billion in federal funding for child care and family assistance programs and to prevent broad data requests for personally identifiable information of millions of residents. The funding freeze targets five Democratic-led states without evidence of fraud, and the data requests are part of the challenged unlawful actions. A temporary restraining order was previously granted blocking these measures.
The motion seeks to extend the court's temporary restraining order that blocks the funding freeze and prohibits HHS from enforcing its broad data and document requests related to state use of federal funding.
In-house legal teams should review agreements involving federal funding, such as vendor contracts with service providers for child care and family assistance programs, customer agreements with government entities, and data processing agreements. Key clauses to examine include data sharing and privacy provisions, government audit and oversight rights, termination conditions related to funding loss or government actions, and compliance with federal regulations. Changes may be needed to add explicit terms for handling funding freezes, protecting personally identifiable information from broad data requests, ensuring service continuity, and incorporating force majeure or similar provisions for unlawful government directives.
Entity
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
Also known as: Department of Health and Human Services
Industry
OtherOfficial Press Release
https://oag.ca.gov/news/press-releases/attorney-general-bonta-files-motion-preliminary-injunction-continue-blocking
39 Memorandum of Law in Support of Motion for Preliminary In
https://oag.ca.gov/system/files/attachments/press-docs/39%20Memorandum%20of%20Law%20in%20Support%20of%20Motion%20for%20Preliminary%20Injunction.pdf
attorney general bonta sues trump administration block unlaw
https://oag.ca.gov/news/press-releases/attorney-general-bonta-sues-trump-administration-block-unlawful-freeze-10
attorney general bonta secures emergency order unfreezing 10
https://oag.ca.gov/news/press-releases/attorney-general-bonta-secures-emergency-order-unfreezing-10-billion-federal
California Attorney General Enforcement Page
https://oag.ca.gov/privacy/privacy-enforcement-actions
"sued the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)"
"violate the Administrative Procedure Act, the Separation of Powers, and the U.S. Constitution’s Appropriations Clause and Spending Clause"
"broad requests for data and documents related to the states’ use of the funding, including the personally identifiable information of millions of residents"
Attorney General Weiser joined a coalition of attorneys general in suing to block new unlawful conditions on Title X funding imposed by HHS, which would penalize states and providers that refuse to abandon nondiscrimination initiatives or conform to the administration's ideological vision of family planning. The lawsuit argues the conditions conflict with federal law, violate the Administrative Procedure Act, and are unconstitutionally vague.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta sent a letter to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services opposing a proposed rule that would eliminate model card requirements for AI tools in healthcare, warning that such rollbacks could lead to biased and unsafe healthcare decisions by reducing transparency.
Civil rights and health enforcement action where Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield, joined by 11 other states, sued the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) over a policy that conditions federal health, education, and research funding on states' agreement to discriminate
The California Privacy Protection Agency announced that the California State Legislature approved the Expanding Privacy Rights Act (SB 923), which expands the CCPA's right to delete to cover all non-exempt personal information a business holds about a consumer, including data originally collected from third parties. The bill also requires online-only businesses with a direct relationship to consumers to provide online methods, such as webforms, for submitting access, deletion, and correction requests, and expressly permits businesses to retain suppression lists so deleted information stays deleted. The bill, authored by Senator Becker and sponsored by CalPrivacy, now goes to the Governor for consideration.
A bipartisan coalition of 33 state attorneys general, led by Minnesota AG Keith Ellison, began trial against Meta Platforms, Inc., alleging the company knowingly designed and deployed harmful features on Facebook and Instagram that drive children and teens to use the platforms compulsively, while falsely assuring parents and the public that its platforms were safe for young users. The states also allege Meta illegally collected personal information from children under 13 without parental consent, violating COPPA. The trial opened before Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, with the states seeking monetary penalties and injunctive relief.
A coalition of 12 state attorneys general, led by Colorado AG Phil Weiser, obtained a temporary restraining order from a federal court in California to halt the proposed $110 billion merger of Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc. by Paramount Skydance Corporation. The lawsuit alleges the merger violates Section 7 of the Clayton Act by substantially lessening competition in film distribution, anticipated blockbuster film distribution, and licensing cable TV channels.