[It was the day that Donald Trump’s new strongman presidency crashed into reality. His latest attempt to wield vast and questionable executive power – this time by temporarily halting federal aid – sparked nationwide confusion and fear with programs including Meals on Wheels and low-income housing assistance suddenly in limbo.
The methodical approach that characterized the intense opening week of Trump’s presidency yielded to chaos – reminiscent of the uproar that characterized his first term and helped him lose the 2020 election. But most profoundly, the drama set off a momentous legal battle over the scope of presidential authority, which will shape the new administration and the separation of powers and is almost certain to land in the Supreme Court.
Trump’s brand as a bombastic disrupter reflects the disdain many Americans have for the Washington establishment. And he can fairly argue he has a mandate for change after an impressive election victory. Democratic claims that he’s bent on becoming a dictator have often been alarmist. But the spending freeze – along with other key moves early in this presidency, including the firing of Justice Department prosecutors and a bid to repeal birthright citizenship – also reflects Trump’s view that the presidency has almost unlimited power and he can simply decide what is legal and what isn’t.
The Office of Management and Budget set off a storm Monday night with a memo ordering a temporary pause in “all activities related to obligation or disbursement of all Federal financial assistance.” The memo, obtained by CNN, made Medicare benefits or assistance to individuals exempt. But uproar ensued, leaving lawmakers, state governments, local leaders and NGOs scrambling and unsure which programs were included and which were safe.
Attempts by Trump’s team to explain that the freeze was not as broad as it seemed, and that it was intended to allow officials to scrub funding for conflicts with his new policies – including on outlawing diversity, equity and inclusion – only made the situation worse. Leavitt couldn’t specify, for instance, in her debut briefing whether Medicaid was blocked. She later clarified that it was not, but the critical program’s portal was down in many states for much of the day.
By evening, a federal judge imposed a short-term halt on the aid freeze until Monday. US District Judge Loren L. AliKhan summed up a surreal and baffling day after pressing a Justice Department attorney, saying: “The government doesn’t know the full scope of the programs that are going to be subject to the pause.”
Trump’s “shock and awe” approach has made it almost impossible for Trump’s critics to focus on individual items designed to quickly transform the nation. But the haste seemed to catch the OMB unprepared for disastrous consequences. The president’s core support after an election in which he won all seven swing states is unlikely to be shaken. But Trump has only limited time to effect the massive change he seeks, and he lacks unlimited political capital, so perceptions of his presidency after a largely error-free start remain very important.
The deepest questions raised by the now partially stayed funding freeze arise from Trump’s latest attempt to wield unrestrained authority in a new presidency already characterized by dubious power grabs. In seeking to freeze loans and grants and align them with his priorities laid out in a blizzard of executive actions, Trump was seeking to redirect or halt funding already appropriated by Congress.
“It is a direct challenge against Congress and its ability to be able to approve and authorize its expenditure of money,” said Donald Kettl, former dean of the University of Maryland School of Public Policy. “What democracy requires isn’t that as soon as the president comes into power, they could wipe away everything that came before,” said Corey Brettschneider, author of “The Presidents and the People: Five Leaders Who Threatened Democracy and the Citizens who Fought to Defend it.” “The idea of a democracy is that when laws are passed, take the 1964 Civil Rights Act or environmental protection, that those laws bind not just citizens, but bind even the president.”
Tuesday further clarified that Trump intends to push presidential power to the limit. And there are growing suspicions that the administration is initiating political battles and legal fights specifically to get the conservative Supreme Court to further expand the scope of the presidency. The confluence of a president who believes in his own unrestrained power and the recent weakening of restraints on the executive suggest he may get a long way toward his goal.
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