Judge blocks Trump’s federal funding freeze

(CN) — A federal judge in Rhode Island on Friday blocked President Donald Trump’s freeze on federal aid, granting a temporary restraining order that prevents Trump from implementing the controversial pause until further notice.

“During the pendency of the temporary restraining order, defendants shall not pause, freeze, impede, block, cancel, or terminate defendants’ compliance with awards and obligations to provide federal financial assistance to the states, and defendants shall not impede the states’ access to such awards and obligations, except on the basis of the applicable authorizing statutes, regulations, and terms,” U.S. District Judge Jack McConnell, a Barack Obama appointee, an order Friday.

McConnell is overseeing a lawsuit against Trump filed by 23 state attorneys general, who are claiming that the president’s announcement that he would be curbing federal aid for a wide array of programs and organizations is unconstitutional, “reckless and dangerous.”

Trump’s plans became public in a leaked memo earlier this week from the White House Office of Management and Budget. Stoking widespread confusion and panic among recipients of federal aid, the memo insinuated that any programs inconsistent with Trump’s cultural platform may no longer be eligible for government funding:

“The use of federal resources to advance Marxist equity, transgenderism, and green new deal social engineering policies is a waste of taxpayer dollars that does not improve the day-to-day lives of those we serve,” the memo read.

The White House has since rescinded the memo, which Department of Justice lawyers say should render the 23-state lawsuit moot, despite the Trump administration insisting that it would still be freezing aid pursuant to the president’s executive orders.

McConnell disagrees.

“The evidence shows that the alleged rescission of the OMB directive was in name only and may have been issued simply to defeat the jurisdiction of the courts. The substantive effect of the directive carries on,” the judge ruled Friday.

McConnell took things one step further by prohibiting the Trump administration from “reissuing, adopting, implementing or otherwise giving effect to the OMB directive under any other name or title or through any other defendants.”

The judge agreed with the states’ assertion that Trump’s far-reaching bid to freeze federal aid likely violates the Constitution. He pointed to the Impoundment Control Act of 1974, which specifies that the president may ask Congress to rescind approved aid.

But Trump’s White House budget memo tried to bend the law in his favor by claiming that the president has a duty “to align federal spending and action with the will of the American people as expressed through presidential priorities.” McConnell found that argument to be “constitutionally flawed.”

“The executive branch has a duty to align federal spending and action with the will of the people as expressed through congressional appropriations, not through ‘presidential priorities,’” McConnell concluded.

New York Attorney General Letitia James, one of the leaders of the multi-state coalition, hailed McConnell’s ruling in a statement Friday.

“I led a coalition of attorneys general in suing to stop this cruel policy, and today we won a court order to stop it,” James said. “The president cannot unilaterally halt congressional spending commitments.”

The freeze was initially set to take effect at 5 p.m. Tuesday, until a batch of nonprofit groups — who filed their own lawsuit — won a temporary block. Without the block, the freeze was expected to disrupt health research, education programs and other initiatives to the tune of trillions of dollars.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt claimed that the individual federal assistance, such as Social Security and food stamps, would have been unaffected. But the day after the freeze was announced, all 50 states were frozen out of their Medicaid systems.

McConnell indicated that there is much more at stake in this case than “monetary harm,” however.

“As Justice Anthony Kennedy reminds us, ‘Liberty is always at stake when one or more of the branches seek to transgress the separation of powers,’” he wrote.

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