Four Democratic-led states that have become frequent targets of President Donald Trump sued Wednesday to try to block his administration from cutting off hundreds of millions in public health grants.

The Department of Health and Human Services told Congress on Monday that it planned to withhold about $600 million in grant funding allocated to the four states: California, Colorado, Illinois and Minnesota. Their attorneys general argue the cuts are backlash for the states’ opposition to Trump’s immigration crackdown.

The lawsuit says the cuts violate the Constitution by imposing retroactive conditions on funding and asks a federal court in Illinois to block them from taking effect.

Some grants could be terminated as soon as Thursday, and others in the coming weeks, Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser said.

Health officials have said the grants — several focused on LGBTQ+ people and communities of color — are “inconsistent with agency priorities” as the Trump administration has shifted away from supporting programs for specific populations. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention revised its priorities in September, dubbing health equity an “ideologically-laden” concept that “has undermined core American values.”

Health department officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the lawsuit.

The administration also plans to pull hundreds of millions in transportation funding from the same four states.

Courts have temporarily blocked similar efforts by the administration to restrict federal funds.

A judge last week ruled that, for now, the administration cannot cut off billions in child care subsidies and other social service programs for lower-income people in those four states plus New York.

Several of the largest planned health funding cuts are to programs aimed at preventing the spread of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections in Chicago and Los Angeles, with a focus on adolescents, ethnic minorities and gay men.

Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker called the funding cuts “a slap in the face” to public health leaders who have stepped up as the Trump administration “takes a sledgehammer to public health infrastructure.”

The administration is also targeting a $7.2 million grant for the Chicago-based American Medical Association, noting its support for gender-affirming care for minors, which a Trump executive order opposes.

Other grants help the states track disease outbreaks and collect public health data that the CDC also uses.

California faces the largest share of the planned cuts, which Attorney General Rob Bonta said will “irreparably harm” public health in the state.

“President Trump is resorting to a familiar playbook. He is using federal funding to compel states and jurisdictions to follow his agenda,” Bonta said. “Those efforts have all previously failed, and we expect that to happen once again.”

WASHINGTON (AP) — The House voted Wednesday to slap back President Donald Trump’s tariffs on Canada, a rare if largely symbolic rebuke of the White House agenda as Republicans joined Democrats over the objections of GOP leadership.

The tally, 219-211, was among the first times the House, controlled by Republicans, has confronted the president over a signature policy, and drew instant recrimination from Trump himself. The resolution seeks to end the national emergency Trump declared to impose the tariffs, though actually undoing the policy would require support from the president, which is highly unlikely. It next goes to the Senate.

Trump believes in the power of tariffs to force U.S. trade partners to the negotiating table. But lawmakers are facing unrest back home from businesses caught in the trade wars and constituents navigating pocketbook issues and high prices.

“Today’s vote is simple, very simple: Will you vote to lower the cost of living for the American family or will you keep prices high out of loyalty to one person — Donald J. Trump?” said Rep. Gregory Meeks of New York, the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, who authored the resolution.

Within minutes, as the gavel struck, Trump fired off a stern warning to those in the Republican Party who would dare to cross him.

“Any Republican, in the House or the Senate, that votes against TARIFFS will seriously suffer the consequences come Election time, and that includes Primaries!” the president posted on social media.

The high-stakes moment provides a snapshot of the House’s unease with the president’s direction, especially ahead of the midterm elections as economic issues resonate among voters. The Senate has already voted to reject Trump’s tariffs on Canada and other countries in a show of displeasure. But both chambers would have to approve the tariff rollbacks, and send the resolution to Trump for the president’s signature — or veto.

Six House Republicans voted for the resolution, and one Democrat voted against it.

From Canada, Ontario, Premier Doug Ford on social media called the vote “an important victory with more work ahead.” He thanked lawmakers from both parties “who stood up in support of free trade and economic growth between our two great countries. Let’s end the tariffs and together build a more prosperous and secure future.”

Trump recently threatened to impose a 100% tariff on goods imported from Canada over that country’s proposed China trade dealintensifying a feud with the longtime U.S. ally and Prime Minister Mark Carney.

GOP defections forced the vote

House Speaker Mike Johnson tried to prevent this showdown.

Johnson insisted lawmakers wait for a pending Supreme Court ruling in a lawsuit about the tariffs. He engineered a complicated rules change to prevent floor action. But Johnson’s strategy collapsed late Tuesday, as Republicans peeled off during a procedural vote to ensure the Democratic measure was able to advance.

“The president’s trade policies have been of great benefit,” Johnson, R-La., had said. “And I think the sentiment is that we allow a little more runway for this to be worked out between the executive branch and the judicial branch.”

Late Tuesday evening, Johnson could be seen speaking to holdout Republican lawmakers as the GOP leadership team struggled to shore up support during a lengthy procedural vote, but the numbers lined up against him.

“We’re disappointed,” Kevin Hassett, the director of the White House’s National Economic Council, told reporters at the White House on Wednesday morning. “The president will make sure they don’t repeal his tariffs.”

Terminating Trump’s emergency

The resolution put forward by Meeks would terminate the national emergency that Trump declared a year ago as one of his executive orders.

The administration claimed illicit drug flow from Canada constitutes an unusual and extraordinary threat that allows the president to slap tariffs on imported goods outside the terms of the U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade agreement.

The Republican chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Rep. Brian Mast of Florida, said the flow of fentanyl into the U.S. is a dire national emergency and the policy must be left in place.

“Let’s be clear again about what this resolution is and what it’s not. It’s not a debate about tariffs. You can talk about those, but that’s not really what it is,” Mast said. “This is Democrats trying to ignore that there is a fentanyl crisis.”

Experts say fentanyl produced by cartels in Mexico is largely smuggled into the U.S. from land crossings in California and Arizona. Fentanyl is also made in Canada and smuggled into the U.S., but to a much lesser extent.

Torn between Trump and tariffs

Ahead of voting, some rank-and-file Republican lawmakers expressed unease over the choices ahead as Democrats — and a few renegade Republicans — impressed on their colleagues the need to flex their power as the legislative branch rather than ceding so much power to the president to take authority over trade and tariff policy.

Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb., said he was unpersuaded by Johnson’s call to wait until the Supreme Court makes its decision about the legality of Trump’s tariffs. He voted for passage.

“Why doesn’t the Congress stand on its own two feet and say that we’re an independent branch?” Bacon said. “We should defend our authorities. I hope the Supreme Court does, but if we don’t do it, shame on us.”

Bacon, who is retiring rather than facing reelection, also argued that tariffs are bad economic policy.

Other Republicans had to swiftly make up their minds after Johnson’s gambit — which would have paused the calendar days to prevent the measure from coming forward — was turned back.

“At the end of the day, we’re going to have to support our president,” said Rep. Keith Self, R-Texas.

Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., said he doesn’t want to tie the president’s hands on trade and would support the tariffs on Canada “at this time.”

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Associated Press writers Rob Gillies in Toronto and Seung Min Kim contributed to this report.

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — United States Energy Secretary Chris Wright arrived Wednesday in Venezuela for a firsthand assessment of the country’s oil industry, a visit that further asserts the U.S. government’s self-appointed role in turning around Venezuela’s dilapidated energy sector.

Wright met Venezuela’s acting President Delcy Rodríguez at the Miraflores presidential palace in the capital, Caracas. He is expected to meet with government officials, oil executives and others during a three-day visit to the South American country.

Wright’s visit comes as the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump continues to lift sanctions to allow foreign companies to operate in Venezuela and help rebuild the nation’s most important industry. It follows last month’s enactment of a Venezuelan law that opened the nation’s oil sector to private investment, reversing a tenet of the self-proclaimed socialist movement that has ruled the country for more than two decades.

“I bring today a message from President Trump,” Wright told reporters as he stood next to Rodríguez with flags from both countries behind them. “He is passionately committed to absolutely transforming the relationship between the United States and Venezuela, part of a broader agenda to make the Americas great again, to bring our countries closer together, to bring commerce, peace, prosperity, jobs, opportunity to the people of Venezuela.”

Rodríguez was sworn into her new role after the brazen Jan. 3 seizure of then-President Nicolas Maduro in a U.S. military attack in Caracas. She proposed the overhaul of the country’s energy law after Trump said his administration would take control of Venezuela’s oil exports and revitalize the ailing industry by luring foreign investment.

Rodríguez on Wednesday acknowledged that Venezuela’s relationship with the U.S. has had “highs and lows” but said both countries are now working on a mutually benefiting “energy agenda.”

“Let diplomatic dialogue … and energy dialogue be the appropriate and suitable channels for the U.S. and Venezuela to maturely determine how to move forward,” she said.

Rodríguez’s government expects the changes to the country’s oil law to serve as assurances for major U.S. oil companies that have so far hesitated about returning to the volatile country. Some of those companies lost investments when the ruling party enacted the existing law two decades ago to favor Venezuela’s state-run oil company, PDVSA.

The new law now grants private companies control over oil production and sales, ending PDVSA’s monopoly over those activities as well as pricing. It also allows for independent arbitration of disputes, removing a mandate for disagreements to be settled only in Venezuelan courts, which are controlled by the ruling party.

Foreign investors view the involvement of independent arbitrators as crucial to guard against future expropriation.

Wright told reporters the reform “is a meaningful step in the right direction” but “probably not far and clear enough to encourage the kind of large capital flows” the U.S. would like to see in Venezuela.

Wright planned to visit oil fields Thursday.

Venezuela, which has the world’s largest proven oil reserves and produces about 1 million barrels a day, has long relied on oil revenue as a lifeblood of its economy.

Trump imposed crippling sanctions on Venezuela’s oil industry during his first term, locking out the state-owned company Petróleos de Venezuela S.A. of the global oil markets in an attempt to topple Maduro. That pushed his government to rely on a shadowy fleet of unflagged tankers to smuggle deeply discounted crude into global supply chains.

In December, Trump ordered a blockade of all “sanctioned oil tankers” entering or leaving the South American country, ramping up pressure on Maduro in a move that seemed designed to put a tighter chokehold on Venezuela’s economy. U.S. forces that month also began seizing oil tankers off Venezuela’s Caribbean coast.

Since Maduro’s Jan. 3 ouster, the Trump administration set out to control the productionrefining and global distribution of Venezuela’s petroleum products and oversee where the revenue flows. The administration also began lifting broad sanctions, but also continued seizing tankers — now in agreement with Venezuela’s government — including one this week in the Indian Ocean after it was tracked from the Caribbean Sea.

Wright on Wednesday told reporters the blockade is “essentially over” as the U.S. is “flowing Venezuelan crude out, selling it at a much higher price than Venezuela was selling it before,” and the revenue is being used in specific projects benefiting Venezuelans.

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Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america