‘Follow the damn law’: Washington leaders have terse words for Trump

Top Washington state officials joined together Thursday, Feb. 13 to push back on what they consider an unconstitutional siege on federal funding meant for the state and immoral attacks on vulnerable communities.

In his first formal press conference in Olympia as governor, alongside many state agency leaders, Bob Ferguson issued a wide-ranging defense of Washington’s values against an onslaught of controversial actions from the country’s chief executive.

The governor, no stranger to taking on President Donald Trump, reiterated he’d be willing to work with the president. “But you’re making it tough,” he said.

“I’m still committed to that, I really am, but if you overstep your authority, we will stand up to you,” Ferguson said.

After several directives seeking to halt federal funding to states, Washington still has $162 million stalled, Ferguson said. Of that total, $156 million is for a solar power program that has been in flux for weeks. The rest is for wildfire preparedness and pollution reduction work.

In the last fiscal year, federal funding accounted for about $27 billion, or roughly a third, of Washington’s state budget, according to the state’s Office of Financial Management.

Ferguson said the president has given him no other choice but to spend time focused on the other Washington.

“We’re going to deal with what’s coming in from Washington D.C., that’s harming Washingtonians, that’s impacting our budget, that’s impacting jobs in a negative way,” he said.

Attorney General Nick Brown had a simple message for the president.

“Follow the damn law,” he said. “It’s not that hard, But time and time again, this president has exhibited his disdain for the U.S. Constitution. And we cannot let that happen.”

Moments after the press conference, the attorney general’s office announced that Brown was joining more than a dozen states in suing the Trump administration over delegating power to billionaire Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency, which has been moving to slash federal agencies.

Protecting the vulnerable

In the first few weeks of the second Trump presidency, Brown has taken cues from his predecessor’s playbook, leading two lawsuits against the administration and joining coalitions of attorneys general on at least three others.

Brown’s lawsuit over Trump’s effort to restrict birthright citizenship earned the first rebuke of the policy from a judge.

Another over the administration’s threats to halt funding for gender-affirming care for transgender youth is set for its first hearing Friday in federal court in Seattle. In a separate case, a federal judge in Maryland temporarily blocked Trump’s executive action on that issue.

Ferguson also announced a push this week to process changes to sex designations on birth certificates within three days. He said this process used to take as long as 10 months.

Trump has said he would withhold federal funding from cities and states that don’t cooperate with his vision of rampant deportations. U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi has sued New York and Illinois over their so-called sanctuary policies toward immigrants.

Ferguson noted the Keep Washington Working Act, passed by state lawmakers in 2019, prohibits local police from helping federal authorities with immigration enforcement. But he said the law complies with Bondi’s directive, leaving no basis to withhold federal dollars.

At the same time, the law has exceptions for those held in state prisons, allowing the Department of Corrections to ask about immigration status and tell U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement when people will be released from custody.

Ferguson said advocates have asked him to change this, and to stop Corrections from providing any information to the feds.

“I will not do that,” he said. “My direction is that the Department of Corrections continue to lawfully work with federal immigration authorities regarding those individuals.”

In one of his first responses to the Trump administration, Ferguson created a task force to help children separated from their parents who get deported under the president’s aggressive immigration policies. The group must deliver a report with strategies to help these children to the governor by the end of April.

Trump has also bemoaned diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, saying they discriminate against white Americans. Ferguson acknowledged the federal government could withhold funding for this work aiming to give better access to opportunities to communities often left out.

“However, the president cannot stop Washington state from using our resources to advance our values,” the governor said.

Green money

Ferguson told reporters on Thursday to expect announcements on investments for clean energy in the coming weeks. It’s yet another contrast between Washington and the federal government, he said.

This comes after the federal Environmental Protection Agency chief on Wednesday announced plans to claw back $20 billion for climate projects.

This money includes the $7 billion Solar for All endeavor to bring the power source to low-income communities across the country. Washington state’s $156 million chunk from the program has been up in the air for weeks, after the president signed an executive order seeking to freeze funding for environmental projects.

Last Friday, the solar money was available again, but the latest action refroze it, state Department of Commerce Director Joe Nguyen said Thursday. Nguyen said $450 million in federal energy funding for Washington was threatened by the executive order and other directives.

This includes $166 million for rebates on energy-efficiency upgrades for homes, $47 million for weatherization and tens of millions aimed at electricity grid upgrades for utilities.

The move by EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin comes despite numerous legal challenges to previous Trump administration efforts to freeze funding, especially for climate projects. On Monday, a judge in Rhode Island ruled Trump was flouting a previous court order forcing the White House to reopen federal dollars. Washington is one of 22 states involved in this litigation.

Nguyen noted Washington has received over $1.2 billion from the Inflation Reduction Act and the bipartisan infrastructure law signed by former President Joe Biden. Commerce isn’t sure what the next steps are with that money given the administration’s actions, he said.

Last week, the U.S. Department of Transportation indefinitely blocked a $5 billion program to build electric vehicle chargers on highways nationwide. Washington was set to dole out $71 million from this pot. State officials this week committed to continue using state dollars to build out the state’s EV charging infrastructure.

Meanwhile, nine EPA employees who worked on environmental justice in the agency’s Seattle office were placed on administrative leave last week, part of a nationwide purge of such workers, said Helen Bottcher, a union leader and retired EPA staffer. The Seattle office is the regional headquarters serving Alaska, Idaho, Oregon and Washington.

“The agency is not broken yet, but boy, it feels like the wrecking ball is at the door,” Bottcher said Tuesday.

Jake Goldstein-Street is a reporter for Washington State Standard, which is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Washington State Standard maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Bill Lucia for questions: info@washingtonstatestandard.com. Follow Washington State Standard on Facebook and Twitter.