A federal judge in Rhode Island issued a temporary restraining order on Jan. 31 preventing the Trump administration from freezing federal financial assistance.
“The Executive’s action unilaterally suspends the payment of federal funds to the States and others simply by choosing to do so, no matter the authorizing or appropriating statute, the regulatory regime, or the terms of the grant itself,” Judge John J. McConnell wrote.
“The Executive cites no legal authority allowing it to do so; indeed, no federal law would authorize the Executive’s unilateral action here.”
McConnell said the restraining order is in effect until further order from the court.
In the directive, OMB Acting Director Matthew Vaeth told federal agencies that they should implement various executive orders from Trump by temporarily pausing “all activities related to obligation or disbursement of all Federal financial assistance.”
“The substantive effect of the directive carries on,” he said.
He pointed to a social media post in which White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said that Trump’s executive orders “on federal funding remain in full force and effect.”
McConnell said the states were likely to succeed in their lawsuit and that President Donald Trump violated the Administrative Procedures Act by imposing conditions on funding that Congress instructed the executive to provide to them.
“Congress has not given the Executive limitless power to broadly and indefinitely pause all funds that it has expressly directed to specific recipients and purposes and therefore the Executive’s actions violate the separation of powers,” McConnell said.
