By Kate Stockrahm

A lot has happened since East Village Magazine (EVM) first reported on the Michigan House Appropriations Committee vote to cancel roughly $645 million in funding from last year’s budget in December.

The State Senate requested an opinion from Attorney General (AG) Dana Nessel on the constitutionality of the mechanism that allowed the House budget committee to conduct that vote, Nessel issued a formal opinion that the mechanism was unconstitutional a little over a week ago, and that sparked the House to sue 16 state departments and challenge the legality of Nessel’s opinion overall.

Michigan Court of Claims Judge Michael F. Gadola is now scheduled to hear arguments from both sides this morning, with the possibility of a 14-day injunction on the table for the grant funds so recently freed back up by the attorney general’s binding opinion on January 7, 2026.

For his part, Senator John Cherry — who represents Flint in Michigan’s 27th District — said he believes that the argument will be raised to the Supreme Court should Judge Gadola decide to grant the injunction today.

“It could be that the judge makes a decision this morning, or it could be the judge listens to the arguments and then does not make a decision on it for a while,” Sen. Cherry told EVM on Jan. 16, adding that since the AG’s opinion came out, he’s been speaking with Flint organizations impacted by the House budget committee’s vote.

As EVM reported in the early days after that vote on December 10, 2025, even legislators weren’t clear on which of their district projects’ funding was cut and by how much.

Senator Cherry said since that time he’s become aware that aside from multiple local youth programs, small business services, and two large development projects in Flint, the NanoGraf development on Flint’s former Buick City site could also be impacted, as it was set to receive some matching funds from a grant that was slashed in the Dec. 10 vote.

While Cherry said he remains hopeful that court outcomes will ultimately be favorable for those fighting to keep dollars already allocated to projects across the state, he worries about what this entire ordeal will mean for Michigan’s future.

“If you look at some of the State’s arguments that they put forward leading into today’s hearing, one of the things they highlighted is [that] we have contracts with organizations, right?” Cherry said. “And so to go through and not follow through with your contracts really hurts the state’s credibility.”

The senator explained that the choice to cancel funding already promised to projects and organizations — some of which had already been publicly announced, started, or were nearing completion at the time their dollars were pulled — doesn’t make Michigan look like a “good partner.”

“You know, it’s going to be tough for organizations to have the same level of confidence in the state, when the state makes a decision, if we’re not following through on the contracts that we sign,” he said.