## Facts

- The Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant (Byrne JAG) program is a formula-based grant to state and local governments for criminal-justice purposes, with funding determined largely by population and crime metrics.
- Starting with FY 2017 Byrne JAG awards, the Attorney General required recipients to accept three immigration-related conditions:
  - Advance notice to federal immigration officials of the release of certain noncitizens from local custody (notice condition).
  - Access for federal immigration agents to interview detainees in local custody (access condition).
  - Certification of compliance with 8 U.S.C. § 1373 regarding communication of immigration-status information to federal authorities (compliance condition).
- Chicago maintained policies limiting local participation in federal immigration enforcement and asserted the new conditions conflicted with its local law-enforcement strategy.
- Chicago challenged the conditions as beyond the Attorney General’s statutory authority and inconsistent with structural constitutional limits.
- The district court entered a permanent injunction barring enforcement of the notice, access, and compliance conditions; the federal government appealed.

## Issues

1. Whether the Byrne JAG statutes authorize the Attorney General to impose the notice, access, and compliance conditions.
2. Whether separation of powers and federalism principles limit the executive branch’s ability to attach substantive, policy-driven conditions to federal grants absent clear congressional authorization.
3. Whether injunctive relief should be limited to Chicago or may bar enforcement of the conditions more broadly when the conditions are invalid on their face.

## Decision

- The Seventh Circuit affirmed the permanent injunction.
- The court held the Attorney General lacked statutory authority under the Byrne JAG framework to impose the notice, access, and compliance conditions.
- The court treated separation-of-powers and federalism concerns as reinforcing a narrow reading of executive authority to condition formula grants on immigration-enforcement cooperation.
- The court rejected narrowing or staying the injunction where the conditions were unlawful in general, not merely unlawful as applied to Chicago.

## Legal Principles

- Conditions on federal grant funds must be authorized by Congress; an executive officer may not add substantive funding conditions to pursue executive policy goals without clear statutory authorization.
- A formula-grant scheme designed to provide local flexibility does not implicitly confer broad discretion to impose new, policy-significant conditions unrelated to the grant program’s structure and purpose.
- Federalism limits remain relevant in construing spending conditions: accepting federal funds does not eliminate state and local autonomy over policing, and coercive pressure to implement federal enforcement priorities raises serious constitutional concerns.
- When an agency condition exceeds statutory authority on its face, a court may enjoin its enforcement without limiting relief to a single applicant if the defect is categorical.

## Conclusion

The Seventh Circuit concluded that the Attorney General could not lawfully condition Byrne JAG funds on local cooperation with federal immigration enforcement absent congressional authorization, and it upheld a permanent injunction barring enforcement of the notice, access, and compliance conditions.


City of Chicago v. Barr, 961 F.3d 882 (7th Cir. 2020)