The Trump administration wants to cut health care funding by $600 million to four states

The Trump administration plans to cut $600 million in public health funding from four Democratic-led states because it believes the grants are “contradictory to agency priorities,” according to documents reviewed by The New York Times.

The programs that will be cut are in California, Colorado, Illinois and Minnesota. This includes grants to state and local health departments and some non-governmental organizations. A list of the cuts was presented to the relevant congressional committees on Monday.

The funds are administered by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This includes grants to states for a variety of purposes, including hiring staff, modernizing data systems and managing disease outbreaks. Some programs are designed to meet the needs of specific communities.

Some of the cuts will be completed this week and others in the coming weeks, totaling about $600 million. The number was first reported by the New York Post.

Nearly two-thirds of the funding is unspent money allocated to state and local health departments in California.

“These grants are being discontinued because they do not align with the agency’s priorities,” said a spokesperson for the Department of Health and Human Services. About two dozen of the grants were aimed at controlling HIV and other sexually transmitted infections.

Dr. Deb Houry, who served as the CDC’s chief medical officer before resigning in August, noted that Congress had already appropriated the funding.

“It is concerning that in the midst of a measles outbreak and other health threats, HHS is cutting public health funding for local communities that provide core functions,” she said. “This coupled with major federal public health staffing cuts is leaving communities less prepared.”

Much of the withdrawn funds were large grants to health authorities. Cuts at partner organizations included:

• $7.2 million from the American Medical Association of Illinois, which supports gender transition in children;

• $5.2 million from Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago to improve HIV prevention therapy for Black women;

• $876,000 from the Prevention Research Center at the University of California, San Francisco, to address “reducing social isolation among LGBTQ older adults”;

• $371,000 from Colorado Health Network Inc. to focus on “engaging Latino and African American” men who have sex with men.

In September, the CDC website was overhauled to detail the agency’s new priorities, including moving away from focusing on diseases that predominantly affect certain populations.

That focus “has not resulted in measurable improvements in the health of minorities and, in many cases, has undermined America’s core values,” the agency now says.

Last month, Health and Human Services told state health departments that public health infrastructure grants totaling $5 billion would be suspended and reviewed to ensure they were “consistent” with the administration’s goals. The pause was lifted within 24 hours.

Tony Romm contributed reporting.