Tom Breen File Photo
AG Tong: "We need big-brain constitutional knife fighters."
Connecticut’s “people’s lawyer” is putting out a call for reinforcements.
State Attorney General William Tong put out that call — for new state money to boost his office’s ability to fight Trump administration edicts in court — during an appearance Thursday on WNHH FM’s “Dateline New Haven” program.
He noted that California’s legislature this week approved a gubernatorially requested $25 million supplement for that purpose to its state attorney general’s office.
“We need more big brain lawyers. Everybody in my office is really smart, but we need big-brain constitutional knife fighters,” said Tong, whose 220-lawyer staff handles civil ligation on behalf of the state. He did not name a specific dollar figure he’s asking for.
In addition to all its other work, Tong’s staff has been busy researching and filing lawsuits in conjunction with colleagues in other Democrat state AG offices the past two weeks in response to a flood of executive orders from President Donald Trump and his appointees.
Tong, the president-elect of the National Association of Attorneys General, has been at the forefront of some of those suits. He’s a co-plaintiff, for instance, in a suit challenging Trump’s order to end birthright citizenship based on a reinterpretation of the phrase “subject to the jurisdiction” in the 14th Amendment.
That case is personal for Tong, the son of Chinese-American immigrants.
“You see this chair I’m sitting in?” Tong said. “If the 14th Amendment doesn’t mean what it says — that if you’re born on American soil, you’re a citizen — I’m not sitting here. I’m not having this conversation with you, because I’m not a citizen and I’m not attorney general.
“My parents were not citizens. I do not derive my citizenship from them. My citizenship is birthright by right of my birth in Hartford, Connecticut. My parents knew at that moment that I would have all the privileges and immunities of being an American citizen, all the rights, and that gave them the freedom to invest everything they could in me and my sisters.” A federal judge has put an indefinite hold on that order while it works its way, presumably, to the Supreme Court.
He has also taken a lead on plans to challenge two Trump executive orders this week regarding transgender rights. One would cut federal funding for communities whose schools allow transgender girls or women to play on female sports teams. Another would cut federal funding for institutions that provide gender-affirming care for young people.
Those challenges fit in with a suit Tong and other AGs filed last week to stop a $3 trillion federal spending freeze, another order currently on hold en route to the Supreme Court, with a constitutional fight brewing over separation of powers and Congressional power of the purse. Tong is also preparing to reprise a fight he participated in during Trump’s first term, against defunding local police departments as punishment for not participating in federal immigration raids.
Gov. Ned Lamont’s proposed budget announced this week does not include an increase in the attorney general’s budget.
But New Haven State Senate President Pro Tem Martin Looney told the Independent Thursday that he plans to pursue the increase Tong is seeking. He, too, did not name a specific figure.
“I certainly agree we should be adding staff to help him. He’s going to be the point person,” Looney said of Tong.
Looney said he and House Speaker Matt Ritter have spoken with Tong about not just the funding request but also legal strategy in efforts to resist Trump edicts that could cost Connecticut hundreds of millions of dollars at the least, just for the 2,500 state employees whose positions are substantially federally funded.
They discussed an irony in that strategy: AGs will be basing their arguments to protect state decision-making authority on 10th Amendment-based anti-commandeering decisions by Republican-appointed Supreme Court justices Sandra Day O’Connor, Antonin Scalia, and Samuel Alito in three separate cases involving gun control, sports betting, and waste management.
Asked about Tong’s request, the governor’s office issued a statement to the Indepdendent about the need to balance fiscal priorities.
“The Governor’s budget development process began in October, before the election of President Trump, and we must propose a balanced budget,” read the statement.
“Over the next few months, the Appropriations Committee will listen to testimony from agencies, including Constitutional officers about their budgets, prior to the final passage of a budget for FY 26/27. Potential responses to actions by the federal government will need to be assessed for their resource implications, and to the extent that new or additional resources are needed, the administration will work with the General Assembly on a path forward.”
Click on the video below to hear the full conversation with Connecticut Attorney General William Tong on WNHH FM’s “Dateline New Haven.” Click here to subscribe or here to listen to other episodes of “Dateline New Haven.”