Immediately upon retaking the Oval Office, President Donald Trump issued an executive order directing federal agencies to withhold funding from healthcare entities that provide gender-affirming medical care to people under 19.

Trump’s order sent shockwaves through the LGBTQ+ community. Some healthcare providers — scared of losing their funding and confused about their legal obligations — stopped treating transgender youth.

Legal experts told New York Focus that even if the federal courts ultimately uphold Trump’s order, the Human Rights Law still requires that healthcare providers supply the same treatment to transgender people as they do cisgender people — including gender-affirming care. But while New York’s law is clear, advocates say, litigation is not a cure-all.

Stop-and-frisks — otherwise known as Terry stops — refer to the police practice of stopping and patting down the outer clothing of individuals cops suspect to be armed and dangerous. During these stops, police may also search individuals’ belongings.

Under Mayor Michael Bloomberg, NYPD officers stopped hundreds of thousands of individuals each year and conducted a record-high 685,724 stops in 2011. Few stops resulted in arrests, and the practice disproportionately targeted Black and Latino individuals.

NYPD stops sharply decreased in the following years. In 2013, a New York federal judge ruled that the practice was ineffectual and, as implemented under Bloomberg, violated the constitutional rights of minorities. By 2021 — Mayor Bill de Blasio’s final year in office — NYPD officers conducted just 8,947 stops.

Three years later, that number has nearly tripled under the Adams administration.

It’s official: New York is being sued over delays in implementing its climate law.

Four environmental and climate justice groups filed a lawsuit Monday in a state court, claiming that New York is “stonewalling necessary climate action in outright violation” of its legal obligations. By not releasing economy-wide emissions rules, the suit alleges, the state Department of Environmental Conservation, or DEC, is “defying the Legislature’s clear directive” and “prolonging New Yorkers’ exposure to air pollution … especially in disadvantaged communities.”

It’s the first lawsuit to charge the state with failing to enforce the core mandate of its 2019 Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, or CLCPA: eliminating nearly all of New York’s greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. The law tasks DEC with crafting rules to get there and to reach an interim target of 40 percent emissions cuts by 2030.

Advocates are urging the governor and legislature to take immediate action during the final weeks of the state’s annual budget negotiations.

Layoffs, program reductions, and closures are on the table for New York’s mental health providers after millions in federal funds were unexpectedly cut last week, jeopardizing an array of services for residents battling addiction and mental illness. The cancellations are part of drastic federal cuts by the Trump Administration’s Department of Government Efficiency, whose headline-making tactics are being challenged in several pending lawsuits.

“You’re going to start to see organizations making the hard decisions, even today, of laying people off,” said Jihoon Kim, the chief executive officer of InUnity Alliance, which represents over 200 substance use disorder and mental health care providers statewide. “People are going to fall through the cracks.”

A key fund that pays for New York City employees’ health benefits has run dry, opening up a $600 million hole in the city budget and threatening potential cuts to public workers’ health benefits.

For years, a cash pot known as the Health Insurance Stabilization Fund has been used to pay some health insurance premiums for city workers and offer supplemental health benefits like coverage for prescription drugs, dental, and vision plans.

But that fund’s balance has been declining for years and hit zero in October 2024, according to the Feb. 25, 2025, meeting minutes of the executive board of a major city workers’ union, DC37, which were obtained by New York Focus.