A federal judge in Illinois quickly issued a restraining order after the Trump administration slashed more than $600 million in CDC grants

It was deja vu from 2025: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention this week announced more than $600 million in cuts to public health grants in California, Illinois, Colorado and Minnesota — four Democratic-led states.

Right away, attorneys general in the affected states filed their lawsuit late Wednesday in a federal district court in Illinois asking for the temporary restraining order.

And the next day, a federal judge blocked the Trump administration’s action with a temporary restraining order released late Thursday.

In an opinion accompanying the order, U.S. District Judge Manish S. Shah wrote that even though the stated reason for the cancellations was that the grants did not align with the priorities of the CDC, “recent statements plausibly suggest that the reason for the direction [to cut the funds] is hostility to what the federal government calls ‘sanctuary jurisdictions’ or ‘sanctuary cities.'”

The whole process aligns with the way the federal government has been operating since President Trump’s second inauguration last year. But the context is new. These grants were not all put in place by a previous, Democratic administration. The $600 million is included in the funding bill that passed with bipartisan support in Congress and was signed into law by Trump himself just weeks ago.

“Integral to keeping people safe”
In Santa Clara County, Calif., the official notice of grant terminations came Thursday morning. “Two large grants that we rely on for core functions in public health to keep people safe and healthy have now been canceled,” says Dr. Sarah Rudman, director of the county’s public health department. “The way these grants are applied throughout our department, they’re integrated with a huge range of activities we sometimes have to do by law and are absolutely integral to keeping people safe.”

As an example, she says, one of the grants pays for a staffer in their public health laboratory. “That staff member is key to our overall capacity to test for things most other labs can’t test for, like Ebola and anthrax and measles,” she says. “We’re not going to stop testing for those diseases today, but our ability to do it as well and as fast as we always do is immediately at risk.”

Santa Clara is just one of dozens of local health departments targeted in the grant cancellations. A joint statement from other affected public health departments said the cuts could affect everything from HIV prevention in Chicago, firearm injury reduction in Denver, and access to affordable, healthy foods in Minneapolis.

Rudman says the feeling is “whiplash” when federal grants can be canceled suddenly with little explanation, although she says she’s relieved the judge stepped in quickly to temporarily block the cuts.