U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper granted a preliminary injunction on August 19, 2026 in Minnesota v. HHS, blocking the Department of Health and Human Services from forcing recipients of federal teen pregnancy prevention grants to adopt abstinence-only curricula. Coverage of the ruling spread on September 1.
The finding that makes this more than a policy dispute concerns the evidence HHS offered. Cooper wrote that the agency “has offered no explanation or evidence to support its across-the-board mandate that only abstinence strategies be pursued,” and that the notices supporting the policy “remarkably” cited public health studies that appear “either not to exist or not to support the propositions for which they are cited, a hallmark of AI-generated citations.”
That is a federal judge finding that a cabinet department justified cancelling tens of millions of dollars in public health grants using citations that appear to have been fabricated. It is the second such episode at this HHS: the department's “Make America Healthy Again” report was found last year to contain fabricated references.
The underlying program has a bipartisan history. Congress authorized the Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program in 2009 with support from both parties, and teen pregnancy rates have fallen substantially since, according to CDC data. This year HHS issued new funding criteria requiring grantees to adopt abstinence-only and “body literacy” curricula, then cancelled the large majority of active grants 72 hours later, according to court filings. Cooper described “body literacy” as “a nebulous concept that appears to elevate fertility and marital procreation over well-tested forms of contraception and pregnancy prevention,” and found the abstinence-only mandate likely “arbitrary and capricious.”
The limits of the ruling belong on the record. Cooper did not restore the roughly $67 million in grants HHS had already cancelled, saying he was uncertain he had the authority to do so. The injunction pauses the mandate going forward; the money already withdrawn stays withdrawn. Plaintiffs were Hennepin County, Minnesota; King County, Washington; Planned Parenthood of the Heartland; and SIECUS, represented by Democracy Forward, the Public Citizen Litigation Group, and Planned Parenthood. They argued Congress never authorized the new conditions and that HHS skipped the notice-and-comment procedures normally required (see A Trump-Appointed Judge Catches the Justice Department Citing a Court Case That Does Not Exist, RFK Jr. Told Senators His Samoa Trip Had 'Nothing to Do With Vaccines.' His Own Letter Asking to Study Samoa's MMR Vaccine Says Otherwise and A Federal Judge Blocks RFK Jr.'s Vaccine Schedule Overhaul, Finding It Likely Illegal and Most of His Vaccine Advisers 'Distinctly Unqualified').
Update (October 18, 2026): Hennepin County filed a bid protest in the Court of Federal Claims on October 14 (Hennepin County v. United States, No. 1:26-cv-01541) alleging that teen pregnancy prevention money meant for local grantees went to a single contractor, NPR reported. A federal spending record shows a Health and Human Services award to Guidehouse, signed September 30, the last day of the fiscal year, worth $86.1 million with options, for what the record calls adolescent social and youth engagement services. NPR reported that Cody Inman, “one of the top people” at the Administration for Children and Families, came to the administration from Guidehouse, and that at least two other HHS officials worked there; no other outlet has confirmed that. Whether the award was paid from the teen pregnancy appropriation is the claim in the lawsuit. HHS declined to comment, citing the litigation.