President Donald Trump’s administration sent conflicting signals Wednesday over whether, or to what extent, the president’s plans to freeze vast swaths of federal funding were still in effect.
Meanwhile, in Vermont, uncertainty over the impacts of those plans was on full display at a meeting of a task force co-chaired by state Treasurer Mike Pieciak, which Pieciak set up earlier this month to assess the downstream impacts of Trump’s sweeping policy changes.
And Vermont Attorney General Charity Clark, who joined her counterparts in 22 other states in a lawsuit challenging Trump’s plans, said in a statement Wednesday that a second federal judge was leaning toward issuing a decision in that case to block the proposal in the coming days.
News broke that the Trump administration had rescinded an order freezing federal funding — which set off a wave of chaos in state governments and other organizations on Tuesday — just hours before Wednesday’s task force meeting in Vermont focused on the same topic.
But Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, posted on X later on Wednesday that even with the order rescinded, a “federal funding freeze” would still “be rigorously implemented.”
The initial order, from the federal Office of Management and Budget, directed agencies to “temporarily pause” all financial assistance “and other relevant agency activities that may be implicated by (Trump’s) executive orders, including, but not limited to, financial assistance for foreign aid, nongovernmental organizations, DEI, woke gender ideology, and the green new deal.”
It was set to take effect at 5 p.m. Tuesday, but a decision — in a case separate to Vermont and the other states’ — by Judge Loren AliKhan of U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia is set to delay implementation until at least Feb. 3.
In Clark’s case, which was filed in federal court in Rhode Island, a judge said Wednesday that he was “inclined” to grant the states’ request to block Trump’s order, at least temporarily, and seemed “receptive” to their arguments, Clark said in a statement Wednesday afternoon.
Clark said the judge has asked the states to prepare a proposed order, “which is common practice,” after which the federal government will have 24 hours to review that order.
“We should know more in the coming days,” Clark said in an email. “I want to reassure Vermonters we will not stop fighting until federal funding is restored.”
Several members of the Vermont task force said they’d heard widespread anxiety this week from leaders of nonprofits and other organizations in the state about the potential impacts of losing some, if not all, of their federal funding. Exactly what areas and which grant programs the spending pause would apply to has been unclear.
On Tuesday afternoon, Leavitt, the White House press secretary, said the pause would not extend to “Social Security benefits, Medicare benefits, food stamps, welfare benefits, assistance that is going directly to individuals.” It also would not apply to student loans or Pell grants, according to The New York Times.
“I’ve received calls, texts, emails of panic from direct service providers, from legislators — from all kinds,” said Sue Minter, who co-chairs the task force with Pieciak, at Wednesday’s meeting. The last two days, the treasurer noted, have been “very chaotic.”
Pieciak said that the possibility of a federal funding freeze — combined with Trump’s recent suggestion that he could do away with the Federal Emergency Management Agency — has also prompted his office to consider creating a new state reserve fund to support natural disaster recovery.
The state already has seven reserve funds that support government operations in its general fund, transportation fund and education fund. The new reserve fund could be created without the Legislature’s input, Pieciak said, though he’s also considering including the proposal in an omnibus treasury bill to be introduced this year.
The task force on Trump’s administration is set to workshop the proposal further, members said Wednesday.
Read the story on VTDigger here: White House’s mixed messages on federal funding spark more uncertainty for Vermont officials.