BREAKING: Federal judge temporarily blocks Trump plan to pause federal aid spending

6

For ads-free news, click here.

From NBC News: A federal district judge on Tuesday granted an administrative stay in a case challenging the Trump administration’s planned freeze of federal aid, pausing the plan for a week and setting a hearing for further arguments next Monday morning.

The order only applies to the pause of disbursements in open grants, Judge Loren AliKhan said. And it doesn’t get into the legality of the freeze, instead just giving the judge time to hear more fleshed-out arguments from a coalition of nonprofits about why she should issue a temporary restraining order that could block the freeze for an addition two weeks. That hearing will take place at 11 a.m. on Monday.

The stay was issued only minutes before the freeze was scheduled to begin Tuesday at 5 p.m.

During a hastily assembled Zoom hearing late this afternoon, AliKhan heard brief arguments from lawyers for the Justice Department and the National Council of Nonprofits, who sued earlier in the day alleging the funding freeze would cause irreparable harm to their members.

“This is the end of the month. Nonprofits and grant recipients are facing down payroll, they’re facing down rent payments and there are people who depend on these services, not just my clients and their members, but also members of the public who are downstream from this,” Jessica Morton, a lawyer for the nonprofits said during the hearing. “The chaos caused by the complexity and the ambiguity of OMB’s supposed guidance has already caused questions in the public.”

READ MORE from NBC News.

According to Fox News, AliKhan ordered the pause on disbursements be stayed until Feb. 3 at 5 p.m.  The judge also scheduled a hearing on the matter for Feb. 3, at 11:00 a.m. ET.

Just prior to the judge’s ruling, attorneys general from at least six Democrat-led states — California, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York and Rhode Island — had announced they were going to file lawsuits to challenge the hold.

New York AG Letitia James had declared, “My office will be taking imminent legal action against this administration’s unconstitutional pause on federal funding. We won’t sit idly by while this administration harms our families.”

James added: “This administration has unleashed mayhem with its latest illegal action, affecting kids who rely on federal funds for their next meal, seniors on Medicaid, and law enforcement fighting drug and gun crime. These chaos cuts jeopardize resources that millions of Americans rely on.

“Together with a coalition of attorneys general, I’m suing the administration to uphold the law and ensure that essential services across our country will continue.”

CLICK HERE to read the actual memorandum released by the Trump administration.

The memo calls for each agency to “complete a comprehensive analysis of all of their Federal financial assistance programs to identify programs, projects and activities that may be implicated by any of the President’s executive orders. 

The memo also note that this applies to executive orders including, but not limited to, financial assistance for foreign aid, nongovernment organizations, DEI, woke gender ideology, and the green new deal.

However, liberal media outlets and Democrats, including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, claimed that the order would cut funding for disaster assistance, local law enforcement, schools, rural hospitals, aid to the elderly, food for people in need and more.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt debunked those wild claims in a White House press briefing Tuesday afternoon, saying, “This is not a blanket pause on federal assistance and grant programs from the Trump Administration. Individual assistance that includes…Social Security benefits, Medicare benefits, food stamps, welfare benefits, assistance that is going directly to individuals will not be impacted by this pause.”

She clarified that the funding pause was directed toward spending for woke programs such as DEI programs, transgenderism, the Green New Deal and more.

Leavitt also explained that DOGE and the OMB just discovered there was a whopping $37 million about to go the door to the World Health Organization, and another $50 million was about to go out the door to fund condoms in Gaza.

Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) commented, “A federal judge has temporarily blocked President Trump’s executive order to freeze federal grants and loans and also a Transgender advocacy group is suing Trump administration over executive order ending transgenderism in the military.

“The Democrats are going to fight President Trump’s GREAT executive orders with lawfare.

“But this is why the Republican controlled House and Senate need to pass legislation to make President Trump’s policies law. We can’t expect President Trump to do everything with executive orders, we have to do our part!”

NEWS ALERT: Trump administration pauses all federal spending on woke grants and loans, Schumer goes on a rampage

Follow us on X (Formerly Twitter.)
The DML News App: www.X.com/DMLNewsApp

The Dennis Michael Lynch Podcast archive is available below, with the most recent on top. Never miss an episode. Subscribe to the show by downloading The DML News App or go to Apple Podcasts.

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

CLICK HERE FOR COMMENTS SECTION