Chief Judge John McConnell Jr. of the United States District Court in Rhode Island and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy were captured in a photo during a Senate budget hearing in Washington on May 15, 2025 (AP Photo/Kevin Wolf).
A federal judge in Rhode Island declared that the Trump administration’s plan to link the distribution of transportation funds to states complying with its immigration policies is illegal and against the constitution.
Judge John McConnell Jr., the Chief U.S. District Judge, approved a temporary order requested by 20 states to stop the enforcement of the “Duffy Directive.” This directive was issued by Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy in April, instructing states to adhere to federal laws related to cooperating with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement without obstructing them.
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McConnell found on Thursday that the state attorneys general are “likely to succeed” in their argument that such a condition violates the Administrative Procedures Act and the U.S. Constitution.
“The Court finds that the States have demonstrated they will face irreparable and continuing harm if forced to agree to Defendants’ unlawful and unconstitutional immigration conditions imposed in order to receive federal transportation grant funds,” the judge wrote in explaining his granting of the injunction.
Without an injunction, the judge wrote, “there is a substantial risk that the States and its citizens will face a significant disruption in transportation services jeopardizing ongoing projects, ones in development for which resources have been expended, and the health and safety of transportation services that are integral to daily life,” he added.
Shortly after Duffy’s directive, President Donald Trump ordered Attorney General Pam Bondi and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to publish a list of states and municipalities “obstructing federal immigration law enforcement” — threatening that noncompliant sanctuary jurisdictions “may lose federal funding.”
The plaintiffs, however, argued the U.S. Department of Transportation lacks the statutory authority to make an immigration enforcement condition (IEC), given that Congress has not given the DOT any immigration powers. McConnell, a Barack Obama appointee, found that the administration violated the APA “because they acted outside of their statutory authority,” adding that the IEC “is arbitrary and capricious in its scope.”
He further found that the conditions violate the Spending Clause of the Constitution, which gives Congress — not the president — the power to allocate funding.
He wrote, at length:
The Government does not cite to any plausible connection between cooperating with ICE enforcement and the congressionally approved purposes of the Department of Transportation. Under the Defendants’ position, the Executive would be allowed to place any conditions it chose on congressionally appropriated funds, even when it would be entirely unrelated to the Department’s purpose. Such is not how the three equal branches of government are allowed to operate under our Constitution.
In addition to being prohibited from enforcing the “Duffy Directive” and withholding or terminating federal funding based on the IEC, McConnell’s order forbids the administration “from taking adverse action” against any state or local jurisdiction based on the immigration condition, “absent specific statutory authorization.”
Law&Crime reached out to the USDOT for comment on the ruling.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta, who joined the lawsuit along with other attorneys general in May, accused the Trump administration of “a blatantly illegal attempt to bully states” into effectuating Trump’s agenda.
