Shapiro
HARRISBURG – A federal judge says he doesn’t have the authority to order the federal government to give Pennsylvania money for a program that buys food from local farmers in order to feed the hungry.
Harrisburg judge Joseph Saporito, Jr. on Wednesday tossed the case brought by Gov. Josh Shapiro, who filed suit after the Trump administration ended a Biden-era program in what Shapiro called a “surprise” move that threatened the federal balance with state governments. But Saporito wrote the lawsuit belongs in the court that handles contract disputes with the feds.
Shapiro and state Agriculture secretary Russel Redding sued earlier this year after federal USDA secretary Brooke Rollins canceled the Local Food Purchase Assistance 2025 Cooperative and another program that used federal funds to buy food from local farmers. That round of funding from the LFPA was to provide $13 million to buy food for food banks, and the other program purchased food for schools.
Saporito wrote that, despite the complaint not asking specifically for that $13 million but instead requesting an injunction because the feds’ didn’t follow proper rulemaking, the case was about money and “foreclosed” by recent U.S. Supreme Court precedent.
“(T)he APA claims asserted by the plaintiffs in this case are essentially contractual, rather than based on federal statute or regulation, and thus they belong in the Court of Federal Claims,” Saporito wrote.
“At bottom, the source of the rights the plaintiffs seek to vindicate is the LFPA25 cooperative agreement itself, not any statute or regulation.”
Earlier this year, the U.S. Supreme Court held the Court of Federal Claims is the proper forum for a case involving the termination of federal grants. That's where Pennsylvania should have filed, the USDA said.
Pennsylvania had received $30 million in two prior rounds of funding for food banks that served more than six million households, but the USDA utilized a stipulation in the LFPA that allowed it to cancel the contract within 60 days.
Shapiro and Redding called the move unlawful and worried about its impact on farmers. Their lawsuit said the termination was arbitrary and capricious, in violation of the APA. If any agency action reflects a changed position, that agency must acknowledge and display awareness of the change, they say.
Redding had written the USDA to ask why LFPA was no longer a priority but received no response.
In arguing that “money is finite,” the USDA said Pennsylvania’s claims masked the true intent of the lawsuit: Second-guessing the federal government’s financial decisions.
