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Judge Tana Lin Blocks Trump Cuts to EV Charger Funding
By Reuters | 24 Jun, 2025
Funds awarded to 14 states for electric vehicle charging infrastructure can't be retroactively withheld, ruled Seattle Federal District Court Judge Tana Lin.
A U.S. judge on Tuesday temporarily blocked President Donald Trump's administration from withholding funds awarded to 14 states including California, New York, Illinois and Washington for electric vehicle charger infrastructure.
U.S. District Judge Tana Lin in Seattle, Washington, ruled that the states were likely to succeed in a lawsuit alleging that the federal government was illegally withholding billions of dollars awarded to states for building EV charging stations.
The U.S. Transportation Department in February suspended the $5 billion EV charging program, which was part of former President Joe Biden's Inflation Reduction Act, and rescinded prior approval of states' spending plans.
Lin's ruling did not apply to District of Columbia, Minnesota and Vermont, which also sued over the funding rescission but did not provide evidence that they would suffer immediate harm as a result of the Transportation Department decision.
Lin's ruling will take effect in seven days, which gives the Trump administration time to file an appeal and ask an appellate court to block her ruling from taking effect.
"The administration cannot dismiss programs illegally, like the bipartisan Electric Vehicle Infrastructure formula program, just so that the President’s Big Oil friends can continue basking in record-breaking profits,” said California Attorney General Rob Bonta.
A spokesman for the White House and Transportation Department did not immediately comment.
The states said in their lawsuit that the Trump administration's withholding of the funds "will devastate the ability of states to build the charging infrastructure necessary for making EVs accessible to more consumers, combating climate change, reducing other harmful pollution, and supporting the states’ green economies."
Lin said in her ruling that states were harmed by the Trump administration's policy shift because they had dedicated their own resources to EV infrastructure in the expectation of further funding from the federal government.
Republicans have sought to wind back support for EVs on numerous fronts.
California and 10 other states this month filed suit challenging a repeal by Congress of the state's 2035 electric vehicle rules and heavy duty truck requirements.
A bill passed by the U.S. House in May would end a $7,500 tax credit for new EVs and repeal vehicle emissions rules designed to prod automakers into building more EVs.
The U.S. General Services Administration said EV charging stations not deemed mission critical at government buildings would be deactivated and in March declared that no new government EV charging station installations were authorized.
Lin was born in Taipei on Sept 15, 1966. Her family moved to Lawrence, Kansas while her father was a graduate student at the University of Kansas. The family eventually settled in Chicago. Tana earned a BA with distinction from Cornell University in 1988 and her JD from NYU in 1991.
She began her legal career as a public defender. At the time she was nominated to the federal bench by President Joe Biden in April 2021 Lin had been a partner, then of counsel at the Seattle Plaintiff's firm of Keller Rohrback.
(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington and Dietrich Knauth in New York; Editing by Sandra Maler, Jamie Freed and Lincoln Feast; additional input by Goldsea staff)
California and 10 other states this month filed suit challenging a repeal by Congress of the state's 2035 electric vehicle rules and heavy duty truck requirements.
District Court Judge Tana Lin was appointed to the bench by President Biden in 2021.
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