WASHINGTON — A coalition of 23 states and the District of Columbia are suing the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services over its termination of $11 billion in public health grants, officials said.

The affected funding includes mental health and substance abuse grants, as well as Centers for Disease Control and Prevention grants intended to track and address infectious disease control and vaccinations for children and vulnerable adults, the office of Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel said.

“The Trump administration is now terminating millions in grants being used in our state to support vaccine clinics for kids, crisis mental health services, opioid abuse intervention, and to control disease spread in health care facilities,” Nessel said Tuesday in a statement.

“And once again they’re breaking the law to take money that has been granted to the states.”

The states who sued alongside Michigan were Colorado, Rhode Island, California, Minnesota, Washington state, Arizona, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. The District of Columbia also joined the suit.

The federal Department of Health and Human Services on Tuesday declined to comment on the pending litigation but said that it canceled the $11.4 billion in funding because it stemmed from the COVID-19 pandemic.

"The COVID-19 pandemic is over, and HHS will no longer waste billions of taxpayer dollars responding to a non-existent pandemic that Americans moved on from years ago," the department said in a statement. "HHS is prioritizing funding projects that will deliver on President Trump’s mandate to address our chronic disease epidemic and Make America Healthy Again."

Termination notices started going out to affected agencies on March 24. The agency claimed the funds were largely used for COVID testing and vaccination and other coronavirus-related projects and staffing.

But Nessel's office claimed the grant cancellations are causing "chaos" for state health agencies that rely on the funding for purposes including infectious disease management, help with emergency preparedness and providing mental health and substance abuse services.

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