Scrambling to respond to the Trump administration’s late Monday night directive to pause a wide, but as-yet-unspecified, swath of federal spending programs, California’s Democratic elected officials and agency heads offered two consistent responses today:
- We don’t know what this means yet and;
- It’s almost definitely illegal.
Leading the charge out of Sacramento is Attorney General Rob Bonta who, along with 22 other Democratic state attorneys general filed a lawsuit challenging the ordered funding freeze and asking a court to block it from going into effect.
“This directive is unprecedented in scope and would be devastating if implemented,” Bonta said in a statement.
In a two-page memo, the president’s acting director of the Office of Management and Budget ordered federal agencies to “temporarily pause” all financial assistance that could be “implicated” by any of the president’s prior executive orders. Since taking office just more than a week ago, President Trump has issued a flurry of edicts to remake federal policy and governance.
The White House held a press briefing on Tuesday to emphasize that this was simply a temporary pause on spending and that individual financial assistance programs like Social Security, Medicare, food stamps, Pell Grants and rental assistance would not be affected by the order.
“The reason for this is to ensure that every penny that is going out the door is not conflicting with the executive orders and actions that this President has taken,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters.
Nobody knows which specific programs will be affected and for how long.
On Tuesday, the administration sent a follow-up memo to all federal agencies with a list of more than 3,200 federal spending programs. Agency staff were asked to provide the White House with budgetary details about each program and answer a series of questions, including whether the program might support undocumented immigrants, impose an “undue burden” on domestic energy exploration or promote “diversity, equity and inclusion” efforts, abortion or “gender ideology.”
Programs listed include those that provide aid for disaster victims, housing for low-income resident and farm workers, foreign aid, air and water pollution monitoring and early childhood education.
Even top state officials are not sure how this will affect Californians.
“We’re currently reviewing the OMB memo and working with our federal counterparts to get clarity,” said H.D. Palmer, a spokesperson for the state’s Department of Finance. “While this is clearly a fluid situation, we remain confident in our ability to continue serving Californians.”
Many of California’s elected Democratic officials insisted that the results of this order were more dire.
Newly elected U.S. Sen. Adam Schiff warned that the order “will have immediate and deeply destructive consequences for recovery efforts, law enforcement funding, health care access, and so much more.”
U.S. Congressman Jared Huffman of California warned that “millions of students relying on Pell grants, federal student loans, and federal work study will have their plans to pursue postsecondary education and further their careers thrown into chaos as federal financial aid disbursements are paused.“
Meanwhile, some states have reported issues accessing funds from Medicaid, the public health insurance program for low-income people, even though the freeze was not supposed to affect this program, according to the Washington Post.
This is an evolving story, check back for updates soon.
Mikhail Zinshteyn, Levi Sumagaysay, Adam Echelman, Ana Ibarra and Jeanne Kuang contributed to this story.
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