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Trump Targets Bail Reform in Latest Threat to New York’s Federal Funding

New York’s bail reform law didn’t eliminate cash bail and hasn’t led to increased crime or recidivism. The Trump administration is still targeting it.

Chris Gelardi · August 26, 2025

President Donald Trump has New York's bail reforms in his sights. | Photo: The White House; Illustration: New York Focus

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On Monday, President Donald Trump signed an executive order threatening to withhold federal funding from states and localities that have enacted “cashless bail policies.” The order instructs Attorney General Pam Bondi to compile a list of jurisdictions that have “substantially eliminated” their cash bail systems, which require criminal defendants who can’t afford court-imposed collateral to sit in jail while awaiting trial.

The administration could move to suspend or terminate those jurisdictions’ federal grants and contracts, the order said.

Trump signaled that he has New York in his sights, even though the state allows cash bail for almost all of the offenses the order describes. That could put the state’s 2019 pretrial detention reforms at risk — though similar moves by the Trump administration have met hurdles in federal courts.

Few jurisdictions across the country have outlawed or nearly outlawed cash bail; among them are Washington, DC, where Trump is attempting to federalize local law enforcement, and Illinois, the first state to fully do so. New York is not on that list. The 2019 overhaul of the Empire State’s bail statute barred judges from demanding cash collateral from people charged with most misdemeanors and some nonviolent felonies, but it left the option in place for a majority of felony cases.

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Tough-on-crime politicians from both major parties have repeatedly sought to dismantle the reforms, and bail has remained one of New York’s most salient political issues. Democratic Governor Kathy Hochul has spent considerable political capital rolling back bail reform, forcing through legislation that gave judges greater discretion to keep defendants incarcerated and made new types of charges, including some misdemeanors and nonviolent felonies, bail-eligible. Still, many critics have remained unsatisfied — including the president.

Earlier this month, Trump incorrectly claimed that the “radical left [New York] City Council” (bail reform is a state law) “adopted no-cash bail” (cash bail still exists in New York) and “started the [crime] problem” (research has found that bail reform has not measurably increased crime rates). A White House press release accompanying the executive order said that bail reform laws have turned “cities into hunting grounds for repeat criminals who mock our justice system by committing crime after crime without consequence,” listing seven instances of New York judges releasing the so-called repeat criminals or those accused of serious crimes pending their trials.

Trump’s allies in New York celebrated the order. US Representative Elise Stefanik, a northern New York Republican who’s reportedly planning to challenge Hochul in the 2026 gubernatorial election, released a statement Monday arguing that “Kathy Hochul and NY Democrats [sic] failed bail reform has been a catastrophic disaster leading to a crime crisis in New York making every family and community less safe.”

Studies show that bail reform has so far had either positive or no effects on recidivism, noted Michael Rempel, director of the Data Collaborative for Justice at John Jay College, which has closely tracked the effects of bail reform in New York. One data analysis showed that, over two years, bail reform contributed to lower rearrest rates in New York City. A similar study on suburban and upstate areas showed that bail reform had no statistically significant impact on recidivism, while a statewide study from University at Albany scholars uncovered no significant impact on reported crime rates.

Studies of Harris County, Texas, which also enacted limited reforms for misdemeanor charges, and New Jersey, which more severely restricted cash bail and implemented a risk-based system for determining whether to jail people pretrial, yielded similar results. Research in other jurisdictions generally shows that pretrial detention increases the risk of new arrest, Rempel pointed out.

Trump’s executive order gave the attorney general 30 days to identify states and localities to target. The order offered discretion, requiring a list of jurisdictions that, in the attorney general’s “opinion,” “substantially eliminated cash bail … for crimes that pose a clear threat to public safety and order, including offenses involving violent, sexual, or indecent acts, or burglary, looting, or vandalism” — almost all of which remain bail-eligible in New York.

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If New York state ends up on Bondi’s list, Albany will find itself in familiar territory facing cuts to federal programs — a central policy objective for the Trump administration and its go-to threat for states and localities that don’t bow to its demands. Such ultimatums have wreaked havoc in statehouses and local legislative chambers, though some courts have ruled that a majority of congressionally approved federal spending is immune from unilateral action by the White House.

In New York, federal judges have repeatedly blocked the Trump administration’s attempts to withhold federal funding unless the state kills its congestion pricing program for lower Manhattan tolls. Other cases have seen courts block Trump administration attempts to cut funding to so-called sanctuary cities and to schools over their diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives.

When it comes to bail, key officials in New York’s Democratic majority are so far defending it against Trump’s forthcoming attacks.

“President Trump has no concept of how the law works in New York,” Jen Goodman, a spokesperson for Hochul’s office, said in a statement. “New York has not eliminated cash bail. His reckless threat to withhold federal funds would only undercut law enforcement and make our communities less safe.”