Nineteen states and the District of Columbia have filed a new lawsuit against HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in hopes of preventing the dismantling of the agency.
The states argue that the recent restructurings and mass layoffs are unconstitutional and illegal, according to court documents filed May 5 in Rhode Island U.S. district court.
“In its first three months, this administration systematically deprived HHS of the resources necessary to do its job,” reads the complaint.
Besides listing RFK Jr. and the HHS as defendants, the plaintiffs are also suing acting CDC director Susan Monarez, Ph.D., and FDA Commissioner Martin Makary, M.D., among others. All three leaders were nominated for their current roles by the Trump administration.
The states suing the federal health agency leaders are Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington, Wisconsin and Washington, D.C.
The complaint begins with a reminder that all of HHS is a manifestation of Congress, which is authorized to pass laws and approve financing for the agency. For the 2024 fiscal year, Congress authorized $1.5 trillion in funding for the department.
In turn, the plaintiffs argue that RFK Jr. has “dismantled the department in violation of Congress’s instructions, the U.S. constitution, and the many statutes that govern the department’s programs and appropriate funds for it to administer.”
On March 27, HHS said it would send termination notices to 10,000 employees, collapsed 28 agencies into 15, and closed half of the HHS’ 10 offices as part of RFK Jr.'s plan to “Make America Healthy Again.”
On April 1, employees were immediately expelled from their work emails and offices, leaving critical agency offices unable to perform statutory functions, according to the lawsuit.
Factories were shut down, labs stopped testing for infectious diseases and partnerships were suspended, the plaintiffs write, adding that the FDA missed a vaccine application deadline and cancelled a key test for the bird flu virus.
While the layoffs hit HHS staffers of all stripes, the cuts didn’t fall evenly across the department, with the states claiming that the Trump administration targeted “disfavored work and programs.”
These sectors include the CDC, the FDA, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) and the Administration for Community Living (ACL), according to the plaintiffs.
The states argue that the March 27 directive was designed to abandon HHS’ core functions and that “incapacitating one of the most sophisticated departments in the federal government implicates hundreds of statutes, regulations and programs.”
HHS Secretary RFK Jr. “refused to undertake this restructuring legally or carefully,” the court documents read. The plaintiffs point to the leader’s later statements that he knew 20% of the layoffs were going to be “mistakes” even before they were rolled out.
RFK Jr. said he skipped a line-by-line review of who should be fired because it would’ve taken too much time and he would lose “political momentum,” according to the lawsuit.
The March 27 directive followed job cuts for probationary health staffers who were laid off earlier in the year, plus employee buy-out offers.
In total, 20,000 full-time employees—almost 25% of HHS' headcount—are expected to be terminated from the efforts, in a move that will, by the defendants’ own estimate, save less than 1% of HHS’ expenditures.
None of these layoffs were needed to accommodate a funding shortfall, according to the plaintiffs, who explain that Congress’ appropriations to HHS have remained stable or increased in recent years.
Meanwhile, the plaintiffs say they are already suffering the consequences of the restructuring.
“Those employees who remain at HHS have been prevented from collecting and reviewing new applications; designing, distributing and implementing new policies and guidance; collecting and distributing scientific data; issuing obligated funds to the plaintiff states and others; investigating for program integrity; and responding to any manner of public inquiry,” the plaintiffs write.
The states are now seeking declaratory and injunctive relief to stop the changes at the HHS.
The lawsuit was filed a few days after Trump shared his so-called skinny budget proposal for 2026 that would slash funds for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) by $17.97 billion.
Of course, it’s not the first lawsuit to be filed against the Trump administration.
At the beginning of April, the American Public Health Association and several researchers sued the NIH and HHS in an effort to reverse and prevent further cancellations of federal research grants.
A few days later, 16 state attorneys general filed suit against the HHS and NIH over the same research grant terminations.
And on April 4, a federal judge permanently blocked the NIH from implementing indirect cost caps on research grants, a move the NIH is now appealing.