I was very closely watching the saga of OMB’s disastrous effort to freeze funding for a vast number of federal programs, and wrote about why it was actually revoked at New York.
This week the Trump administration set off chaos nationwide when it temporarily “paused” all federal grants and loans pending a review of which programs comply with Donald Trump’s policy edicts. The order came down in an unexpected memo issued by the Office of Management and Budget on Monday.
Now OMB has rescinded the memo without comment just as suddenly, less than a day after its implementation was halted by a federal judge. Adding to the pervasive confusion, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt immediately insisted on Wednesday that the funding freeze was still on because Trump’s executive orders on DEI and other prohibited policies remained in place. But there’s no way this actually gets implemented without someone, somewhere, identifying exactly what’s being frozen. So for the moment, it’s safe to say the funding freeze is off.
Why did Team Trump back off this particular initiative so quickly? It’s easy to say the administration was responding to D.C. district judge Loren AliKhan’s injunction halting the freeze. But then again, the administration (and particularly OMB director nominee Russell Vought) has been spoiling for a court fight over the constitutionality of the Impoundment Control Act that the proposed freeze so obviously violated. Surely something else was wrong with the freeze, aside from the incredible degree of chaos associated with its rollout, requiring multiple clarifications of which agencies and programs it affected (which may have been a feature rather than a bug to the initiative’s government-hating designers). According to the New York Times, the original OMB memo, despite its unprecedented nature and sweeping scope, wasn’t even vetted by senior White House officials like alleged policy overlord Stephen Miller.
Democrats have been quick to claim that they helped generate a public backlash to the funding freeze that forced the administration to reverse direction, as Punchbowl News explained even before the OMB memo was rescinded:
“A Monday night memo from the Office of Management and Budget ordering a freeze in federal grant and loan programs sent congressional Republicans scrambling and helped Democrats rally behind a clear anti-Trump message. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer blasted Trump as ‘lawless, destructive, cruel.’
“D.C. senator Patty Murray, the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee, warned that thousands of federal programs could be impacted, including veterans, law enforcement and firefighters, suicide hotlines, military aid to foreign allies, and more …
“During a Senate Democratic Caucus lunch on Tuesday, Schumer urged his colleagues to make the freeze “relatable” to their constituents back home, a clear play for the messaging upper hand. Schumer also plans on doing several local TV interviews today.”
In other words, the funding freeze looks like a clear misstep for an administration and a Republican Party that were walking very tall after the 47th president’s first week in office, giving Democrats a rare perceived “win.” More broadly, it suggests that once the real-life implications of Trump’s agenda (including his assaults on federal spending and the “deep state”) are understood, his public support is going to drop like Wile E. Coyote with an anvil in his paws. If that doesn’t bother Trump or his disruptive sidekick, Elon Musk, it could bother some of the GOP members of Congress expected to implement the legislative elements of the MAGA to-do list for 2025.
It’s far too early, however, to imagine that the chaos machine humming along at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue will fall silent even for a moment. OMB could very well issue a new funding-freeze memo the minute the injunction stopping the original one expires next week. If that doesn’t happen, there could be new presidential executive orders (like the ones that suspended certain foreign-aid programs and energy subsidies) and, eventually, congressional legislation. Democrats and Trump-skeptical Republicans will need to stay on their toes to keep up with this administration’s schemes and its willingness to shatter norms.
It’s true, nonetheless, that the electorate that lifted Trump to the White House for the second time almost surely wasn’t voting to sharply cut, if not terminate, the host of popular federal programs that appeared to be under the gun when OMB issued its funding freeze memo. Sooner or later the malice and the fiscal math that led to this and other efforts to destroy big areas of domestic governance will become hard to deny and impossible to rescind.
I really wish Kerry had made a strong statement warning the republicans against election fraud. Perhaps he will do so before the election. Let’s hopeand pray for America’s sake that the election is clean.
The other possibility, of course, is that maybe Dowd knows that the wheels are in motion for electronic theft of the election results, a possibility that scares the bejeezus out of me and one that I’m not convinced is being sufficiently managed by the DNC and the Kerry Camp.
makes sense given the administration’s adversion tofacts and insistence on “faith-based” approaches to the creation of their own realities (see kevin Drum).
The polls are encouraging one day, discouraging the next. Thanks, Tex, for at least trying to make some sense of it all.
It may come down to the ground game, after all. Especially to those of you in swing states…….call your local Dem HQ and volunteer some time. Most still need more people to work in a GOTV (Get out the vote) effort on Nov. 2.
Given the wide discrepancies in LV and RV results we’ve seen, and how much the LV polls differed from the actual result in 2000, is anyone prepared yet to state as a general principle either that: (a) Bush’s supporters consistently overstate their enthusiasm for their candidate to pollsters; or (b) that Democrats tend to understate their enthusiasm?
We can overthink this, or we can take it at face value. Either way
1. It’s a dodge
2. It’s true, because he’s complimenting Gallup on its work.
3. It’s true, because he believes it.
If it’s #3 then I’m thrilled, because the BC’04 campaign will feel great about an oversampled GOP poll, not a real reflection of actual voter thought (remembering of course the last Gallup poll before Election Day 2000….)
Must be “faith-based” polling . . .
This is not the first time that Republicans have cited Gallup as the authority. Dailykos has a broadcast e-mail from the Republicans that also relies on Gallup. Remember that Gallup is still building its models based upon the assumption of low turnout: 50-55%. This means that they take for granted a wildly successful suppression of the vote.
Let them go by Gallup! They did in 2000 and that’s why Bush and Rove were walking around like two peacocks as if they had already won. They slowed down campaigning at the end as well. I am afraid they are smarter this time but I truly wish they would believe the Gallup numbers for then there is absolutely no need for an October surprise since they have already won — right?
Wouldn’t surprise me: it fits the Administration’s delusional and sanguine view of the world and this election that runs contrary to reality. If you will New Jersey in play, it can be so!
Zogby has Bush with an approval rating of 44-46 %. Historically, this is bad news for the incumbent at this time. My hopeful hunch is that this election will mimic that of 1980. Carter and Reagan were in a close race, Carter had low approval ratings, and the undecideds did not turn until the last weekend. Watching the daily Zogby tracking polls – they don’t move much – I see the same thing happening. The polls will move Kerry’s way, but not until the last weekend. Karl Rove believes that Bush must be up by 4 points going into the last weekend in order to win. Historical trends are probably the best predictors at this point.
Amazing…
Well, I suppose that’s good news for us.
Would anyone take that comment seriously? I have a hunch he is just saying that because Bush is up in the Gallup.