A federal judge in Rhode Island issued the second court ruling this week blocking the Trump administration’s push for a freeze on distributing federal government spending. The judge sided with 22 states who brought the lawsuit.
In issuing the ruling, Judge John McConnell Jr. wrote, “The Court must act in these early stages of the litigation under the ‘worst case scenario’ because the breadth and ambiguity of the Executive’s action makes it impossible to do otherwise.”
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A different federal judge in Washington, D.C., issued a weeklong administrative stay. It blocked the freeze just before it would have gone into effect Monday, Jan. 27. However, the Rhode Island ruling is a temporary restraining order. It allows for a longer block until courts can rule on it further.
President Trump issued a wide-ranging freeze on government spending in line with an executive order to review government spending for potential funding for programs promoting diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI. Trump said the practices violate civil rights law.
A memo from the White House Office of Management and Budget, or OMB, directed a freeze on all federal grants and financial assistance programs.
While the White House said it rescinded the memo after the first court ruling, it sparked panic from states and groups receiving federal grants.
States said they could not access the federal portal for Medicaid. They were also unsure if they could pay out checks to recipients.
Nonprofits that receive government aid are worried about its effects. Meals on Wheels America warned that the freeze could prevent it from distributing funding to its roughly 5,000 providers.
The White House clarified that it did not intend to halt funding to programs providing direct assistance. Those include Medicare, Social Security, food stamps and student loans.
They added that, although they have rescinded the memo, the plans for a spending freeze are still in effect.
