22 States Sue to Block Trump Public Charge Green Card Rule

New York and 21 states sued the Trump administration Monday to block a DHS rule taking effect Friday that could deny green cards to immigrants.

New York and 21 other states, plus the District of Columbia, filed suit Monday to block a new DHS "public charge" rule scheduled to take effect Friday. Attorney General Letitia James announced the states' case at a Manhattan City Hall news conference alongside Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who is leading a separate coalition of cities — New York City, Chicago, San Francisco, Seattle, Santa Clara County, and King County — filing its own lawsuit. Both cases were filed in the Southern District of New York and ask the court to declare the rule unlawful, invalidate it, and prevent DHS from using it; no judge was assigned as of Monday afternoon. Plaintiffs argue DHS exceeded its authority and that the rule is "arbitrary and capricious."

The public charge provision dates to the Immigration Act of 1882, and for years officers counted only cash benefits such as TANF or Supplemental Security Income. The first Trump administration widened the categories in 2020 to include Medicaid, food stamps, and housing vouchers, but the Biden administration reverted to the narrower practice in 2022. The new rule rescinds the Biden-era version and is more expansive than the first Trump rule: rather than naming specific programs, DHS says it "will consider the receipt of any means tested public benefits," and officers may also weigh benefits applied for on behalf of family members, including US citizen children. The rule targets people with legal status; undocumented immigrants are not eligible for public benefits.

The states say they would bear the cost if immigrant families — especially mixed-status families — disenroll out of fear, rippling through public health, local economies, schools, and public safety. The lawsuit cites defendants' own estimate that states nationwide would lose about $4.05 billion in annual federal Medicaid and CHIP transfer payments, of which plaintiff states would lose roughly $2.2 billion; CNN reported those figures from the legal filing. Advocates including Make the Road New York's Arline Cruz said families are already confused about whether to unenroll citizen children from SNAP. Mamdani said some New Yorkers not even covered by the rule are unenrolling from "life-saving benefits" in a "climate of fear."

DHS pushed back in an emailed statement, saying "sanctuary states are terrified they will lose federal funds" because hundreds of thousands of people "might remove themselves from American welfare programs." The department has defended the change as restoring self-reliance, posting on X in July that under Trump it is "reaffirming the requirement of self-reliance, protecting public resources, and ending policies that encouraged dependency on hard-working American taxpayers." CNN reported that DHS estimates about 588,000 applicants are subject to public charge reviews annually on average. James countered that "cruelty is the point," saying the rule is designed to chill immigrant participation in benefits.

Unless a court intervenes before Friday, DHS can begin applying the expanded public charge standards. The Manhattan federal court will now consider the states' and local governments' requests to block and invalidate the rule. History offers the plaintiffs a road map: the Economic Times reports that similar lawsuits produced court rulings against the first Trump administration's 2019 policy, which the Biden administration later abandoned before issuing its 2022 rule. The states' suit seeks no monetary damages — only an order preventing DHS from using the rule.