Judge rules against Trump EPA efforts to terminate Solar for All program

A federal court ruled that the Environmental Protection Agency illegally terminated a Biden administration program aimed at helping low-income communities install solar panels. Rhode Island District Court Judge Mary McElroy, a Trump appointee, on Friday vacated the EPA’s move to end the Solar for All program. The EPA in August 2025 said it would cancel $7 billion from the program. The agency argued that Congress repealed the program’s authorization and funding as part of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. But McElroy wrote that “while grant funding from the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund was to no longer be available following the OBBBA, already existing grant awards were to remain in place, subject to the residual statutory authority under which they were originally obligated.” “The OBBBA did not convert SFA funding into a lump-sum amount subject to EPA’s discretion,” she continued. “Instead, Congress’s clear intent was that EPA continue to administer the already obligated SFA grants. Defendants acted contrary to this intent, and with no other statutory authority, when they terminated the SFA program.” The Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund is a Biden administration program that was established as part of the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. The fund included three programs, including Solar for All, which awarded funding to 60 states and nonprofit groups to help install solar energy and storage across the nation. The lawsuit was filed by the Rhode Island AFL-CIO labor organization and the public interest law center Rhode Island Center for Justice, as well as the nonprofit organization Solar United Neighbors and other groups. In a statement, the EPA said it is reviewing the decision and considering options for appeal.The EPA’s attempt to repeal the Solar for All program was part of a broader effort to dismantle the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund. Last year, the agency attempted to cancel $20 billion from the fund’s two other clean energy initiatives, the National Clean Investment Fund and the Clean Communities Investment Accelerator.FEDERAL APPEALS COURT SAYS EPA CANNOT TERMINATE $20 BILLION IN CLEAN ENERGY GRANTSThe EPA froze the grants and attempted to terminate them, arguing that the Biden administration improperly distributed them by routing them through Citibank. The agency was quickly met with litigation from three climate grantees: Climate United, Coalition for Green Capital, and Power Forward Communities. Last month, a federal appeals court ruled that the EPA cannot suspend $20 billion in grants. Six of the 10 panel judges agreed that the EPA likely violated the law when it sought to terminate the grants and claw back funds that were already distributed “based solely on a policy disagreement.”