BOSTON — This week, Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Campbell joined an effort to force the Trump administration to restart a program that provided funding to states for disaster preparation.
Her office also filed a brief with an appellate court considering an appeal by the Trump administration to remove the temporary protected status for certain Haitians living in the country, an issue that affects the state’s human services and health care industries.
These are two of the latest legal moves that Campbell’s office has taken to oppose actions by the Trump administration.
Regarding the disaster funding, Campbell joined a group of 23 states on Tuesday to ask a court in Massachusetts to enforce an order directing the Trump administration to restart the Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities program.
The judge hearing the case ruled in December that the Trump administration needed congressional approval before shuttering the program, which provides billions of dollars to communities to prepare for their next big disaster. Two months have gone by, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency has not taken any steps to resume the program, according to a statement from the Attorney General’s Office.
“Our municipalities cannot wait any longer, as critical projects across the commonwealth remain unfinished and on pause,” Campbell said in the statement. “The Trump administration must comply with the court order and resume the operation of this lifesaving program.”
The funds have helped pay for hazard mitigation planning, and the disaster preparedness funding is set to pay for upgrades to bridges in Manchester-by-the-Sea and flood protection for a tunnel on the Blue Line in Boston, according to the attorney general.
A spokesperson for the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency, which helps manage the program in the state, said in October there were 56 open projects across the state that used federal disaster preparedness funding from the program.
In Western Massachusetts, federal funds were obligated for a hazard mitigation plan update in Northampton, and in Orange, the funds were going toward building code manuals, MEMA spokesperson Robert Burgess said last year.
Migrant workforce could be affected
Meanwhile, Homeland Security’s move would have taken effect on Feb. 3 and would have prevented thousands of Haitians living in the state from working.
Campbell joined a group of 18 attorneys general who submitted an amicus brief in the case, arguing the move would hurt their states’ economies and “inflict irreparable harm on families.”
In Massachusetts, the brief said, about 40% of the people working as nurses, housekeepers and in dining services in nursing homes were born outside the U.S.
“Haitians are essential to the fabric of our communities, contributing every day as neighbors, workers, caregivers and leaders,” Campbell said in a statement announcing the filing of the brief.
