The US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled Wednesday that the Department of Justice (DOJ) can withhold Bryne Program grant money from cities that refuse to comply with three immigration related conditions imposed by the DOJ.

Congress created the Bryne Program Criminal Justice Assistance grants in 2006 to provide additional funding to crime fighting measures taken by state and local governments. Through the fund Congress has supplied recipients with millions of dollars. The funds are used for everything from 911 operators to reentry programs for people released from prison. When applying for the funds the applicant must meet a host of statutory requirements to qualify.

In 2017 the Attorney General imposed three additional requirements involving providing citizenship or alien status information to federal immigration authorities. When the plaintiffs on this case, the states of New York, Connecticut, New Jersey, Washington, Massachusetts, Virginia, Rhode Island and New York City, refused to comply with the requirements, the DOJ withheld the funding. In response, the plaintiffs sued on the grounds that the requirements violated federal statutes. They also argued that the denial of the funding was arbitrary and capricious because it would adversely impact their crime fighting programs. Prior to the addition of the immigration related requirements, all of the plaintiffs had received funding through the Bryne grants.

The court held that the Attorney General had the statutory authorization necessary for imposing the conditions, and that the Attorney General had not acted arbitrarily or capriciously.

The Ninth, Third and Seventh Circuits have upheld injunctions preventing the enforcement of some or all of the challenged conditions in lawsuits brought by other recipients of the Bryne grants.

Given the disagreement between the Circuit Courts the issue may end up before the Supreme Court.