Attorney General Bob Ferguson speaks during a rally in Olympia Monday.
Attorney General Bob Ferguson filed a lawsuit this week to block the Trump administration’s plan to “reprogram” funding for more than $3.6 billion in congressionally approved military construction projects to help build a wall along the U.S. southern border with Mexico. The plan diverts nearly $89 million from the Kitsap Peninsula’s Bangor submarine base.
“President Trump’s misuse of his presidential emergency powers to accomplish an ideological political goal is an egregious abuse of power that should concern all Americans, regardless of how you feel about Donald Trump or immigration,” Ferguson said. “Our nation’s founders enshrined our system of checks and balances in our Constitution. President Trump’s actions threaten to undermine that system. We will not allow that to happen.”
Ferguson filed the lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington. Ferguson also intends to ask the court for injunctive relief in the near future to immediately block the Administration’s attempt to divert the congressionally appropriated funds.
“The president’s actions demonstrate a clear disdain of Congressional authority and are a serious breach of constitutionally established powers,” Gov. Jay Inslee said. “The president promised that Mexico would pay for his vanity border project, but instead it is U.S. military members, their families and their communities who are paying for it. I support Attorney General Ferguson’s actions and I stand with him on this, as I have with every other lawsuit his office has filed, and won against this president.”
In February, President Trump declared a “national emergency” to reallocate funds for his long-promised border wall despite the fact that Congress has repeatedly refused to approve the funding he requested.
Congress voted to overturn President Trump’s “emergency” declaration with bipartisan support, but President Trump vetoed their legislative action.
Ferguson has filed 48 lawsuits against the Trump Administration and so far has had Ferguson 21 legal victorie. Thirteen of those cases are finished and cannot be appealed.
