We KNEW THIS was coming…..
“A federal judge has temporarily blocked a Trump administration freeze on federal grants and loans that could total trillions of dollars,” the AP reports.
“The administrative stay pauses the freeze until Monday.”
Washington Post: “The decision arrived on a day of vast confusion and chaos in Washington, where few appeared to understand the scope and intention of a White House memo that had directed agencies to ‘temporarily pause’ the disbursement of key funds.”
“Even before it officially took effect at 5 p.m. Tuesday, thousands of government services — totaling billions of dollars and dedicated primarily to Americans’ health, safety and well-being — appeared to be at risk of shutting down, at least temporarily.”
Uodates….
More fundamentally, the freeze threatens to permanently alter the balance of power between the White House and the Capitol — with the Office of Management and Budget declaring in a memo Monday that “financial assistance should be dedicated to advancing Administration priorities.” And some recipients may not know for a week or longer if their promised dollars from Washington were getting the ax.
Those alarms remained even after a federal judge temporarily blocked the freeze late Tuesday.
“It may be depicted as temporary but it’s going to do permanent harm,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal said earlier in the day about the spending halt. “No one can plan when their funding is on the chopping block.”
The Connecticut Democrat said the lack of clarity is “creating chaos and confusion” in every aspect of grants and funding. “[I am hearing from] addiction programs, veterans programs, road building, just across the board. Nobody knows what will be funded,” he said.
Even some Republicans expressed confusion….
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Updates….
Education programs across the country were plunged into uncertainty and chaos Tuesday after the Trump administration announced a federal spending freeze and government officials tried to soften the blow of a directive that started paralyzing agency functions.
Before a judge intervened later on Tuesday, Head Start providers were temporarily locked out of essential digital systems. Colleges and universities worried about the status of research grants and funding for minority-serving institutions. And lobbyists warned a lack of clarity could extend well beyond a Feb. 10 deadline for agencies to submit detailed information to the Office of Management and Budget about programs affected by the spending hold.
“One thing I’m trying to stress to people is that this is not necessarily a two-week funding pause, this is an indefinite funding pause,” said Sarah Abernathy, a veteran education funding advocate who has worked in roles at the Education Department and the Democratic staff of the House Budget Committee.
“This could potentially be months of funding illegally being withheld contrary to the laws that authorized or appropriated that funding,” said Abernathy, the executive director of the Committee for Education Funding. “There’s real-world implications that we’re going to see, and there’s also the panic that’s causing those real-world implications.”…
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