A federal judge used an episode from “The Simpsons” to illustrate her ruling that prevents the Trump administration from withholding money approved for states to build charging networks for electric vehicles.
Colorado is one of 16 states that recently sued the administration for not releasing billions of dollars authorized under the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act to build charging stations for EVs. U.S. District Judge Tana Lin in Washington state granted a preliminary junction Tuesday to the states, finding that the administration overstepped its constitutional and statutory authority and attempted “to override the express will of Congress.”
The decision lifts the freeze on federal funds while the case moves forward. The administration can appeal the ruling, but cannot withhold or revoke previously approved funds without following the federal act’s requirements, Lin wrote.
The $5 billion National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure program was championed by the Biden administration to provide the charging networks to substantially boost the number of EVs on the nation’s roads. Lin referred to a 1995 episode of “The Simpsons” in which Homer has to cut short a reunion with his long-lost mother because her traveling companies are worried their electric van has only “20 minutes of juice left.”
“Some 26 years later, Congress sought to address the phenomenon that has come to be known as ‘range anxiety,’” the concern about finding the next charging station, Lin wrote.
While the NEVI funding was intended to build out a national EV charging network, President Donald Trump issued an executive order on his first day in office to pause the money. The order said the goal was to ensure “a level regulatory playing field for consumer choice in vehicles” and directed agencies to review their processes for awarding the grants, loans and contracts.
Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser said the state could lose tens of millions of dollars under the administration’s actions.
“In Colorado, we relied on millions in congressional funding and our federally approved plans to build out electric vehicle charging stations for residents throughout our state,” Weiser said in a statement Wednesday. “Many of those projects are already underway but the administration refuses to release the congressionally mandated funds needed to complete construction.”
Lin’s ruling is “a win for Coloradans, for clean air, and for our clean energy economy,” said Weiser, who has joined other states in a series of lawsuits targeting other Trump administration executive orders and funding cutbacks as well as actions on immigration and tariffs.
The EV charging infrastructure program was intended to allocate $5 billion over five years. The Associated Press reported that an estimated $3.3 billion had been made available.
Lin’s ruling didn’t apply to the District of Columbia, Minnesota and Vermont. She said they didn’t provide enough evidence of the impacts on them.
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