Judge John McConnell blocks Trump's freeze on federal grants and loans, citing the executive's usurpation of Congress' power of the purse

 

A second federal judge indefinitely blocked President Trump’s blanket freeze on federal grants and loans, saying the administration “put itself above Congress.” 

U.S. District Judge John McConnell’s preliminary injunction in favor of Democratic state attorneys general adds to a near-identical block imposed by a federal judge in the nation’s capital late last month. 

Both lawsuits commenced after Trump’s Office of Management and Budget (OMB) issued a now-rescinded memo that instructed federal agencies to pause grants and loans, a sweeping freeze that covered trillions of dollars of federal spending. 

Under McConnell’s order, the Trump administration is indefinitely prohibited from implementing an across-the-board funding freeze under a different name. Agencies can still limit funding access on an individualized basis under applicable laws and regulations. 

“The Executive’s categorical freeze of appropriated and obligated funds fundamentally undermines the distinct constitutional roles of each branch of our government,” wrote McConnell, an appointee of former President Obama. 

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Our servile GOP senators, who have been completely by-passed by DOGE, try to tell Elon Musk that he can't do that lol, now have to ask pretty please from White House chief of staff Susie Wiles

 

What an absolutely contemptible lot.

GOP senators tell Musk DOGE actions will require their votes 

Republican senators told tech billionaire Elon Musk at a closed-door meeting Wednesday that his aggressive moves to shrink the federal government will need a vote on Capitol Hill, sending a clear message that he needs to respect Congress’s power of the purse. ...

Paul and other Republican senators said Musk appeared open to the idea but didn’t seem to expect DOGE’s cuts and workforce reductions would need to come back to Congress for ultimate approval. ...

GOP lawmakers say Musk’s failure to brief them in advance about impending cuts and funding freezes — or to respond to their questions and concerns about actions taken by DOGE — reflected his belief that he thought the administration could largely bypass them by simply impounding funds lawfully appropriated by Congress. ...

Several GOP senators vented their frustrations over Musk’s operating style — especially his team’s failure to respond promptly to their concerns — at a meeting last week with White House chief of staff Susie Wiles.

Wiles told frustrated senators they should contact her directly with their concerns over funding freezes and reductions in force pushed by Musk and his team of young engineers.

Sources familiar with Wednesday’s meeting said the GOP senators who complained about Musk and his methods last week were much more cordial when they met with him face-to-face in the wood-empaneled Mansfield Room just off the Senate floor. ...

Hakeem Jeffries should welcome a government shutdown on March 14 because Trump is now a bad faith president who oversteps Congress' power of the purse and can't be trusted

Really, Democrat leadership is looking at it all wrong.

Just shut it down and go home. That's what Democrat legislators have had to do in many states. Might as well try it in Washington.

In fact, put out a general call for all Democrats to refuse to cooperate everywhere in the country, like the communists do in Italy and France.

Don't go to work at the factory. Don't go to work at the school. Shut down all the government offices everywhere. Don't go to work anywhere. Snarl transportation on land, sea, and air. Empty the shelves at the grocery stores. Cancel all the doctor appointments. Let 911 ring and ring and ring.

Call a general strike.

Shut the whole goddamn country down until Trump agrees to play by the rules. Get mad as hell and refuse to take it anymore!

 

... House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries and his Senate counterpart, Chuck Schumer, have been in talks about how best to use the funding deadline to counter Trump. But some top Democrats worry that even if they won policy concessions, Trump would only ignore the law — as they believe he has in some of his initial assaults on federal agencies — so a knockdown, drag-out battle and potential shutdown could be all for naught.

“If the foundational role of Congress is the power of the purse, why would we ever believe them again on an appropriations deal?” said Sen. Chris Coons, a Democrat from Delaware. “It’s going to be harder for us to work together because it’s harder for us to trust each other.” ...

“We’re not going to keep on bailing him out,” added Rep. Jim McGovern of Massachusetts, who is among a growing faction of Democrats who are ready to stare down Trump in a shutdown fight. “We’re not a cheap date.” ...

“If Senate Democrats don’t have the gumption to do what is necessary in this moment, I believe that House Democrats will,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York said. Asked whether the confrontation could lead to a shutdown, she insisted her party wouldn’t be to blame and the price of Democratic votes should be “very high.”

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Repealing the 22nd Amendment is a great idea, but not Republican Andy Ogles' (TN-5) idea of revising it to allow Trump a third term but not Clinton, Bush 43, nor Obama

 Constitutional amendment to allow Trump third term introduced in the House

Ogles' idea that Trump was denied the power inherent in two successive terms is an admission that the 22nd Amendment limits the power of the executive.

Is the Congress so limited? No.

Is the Judiciary so limited? No.

The 22nd Amendment is an unfair limitation on the power of the executive. 

That is why we have dueling tyrannies, one of the legislative, and one of the judicial.

The one has put us $36 trillion in debt because it has the power of the purse. The other has jammed a code down our throats from time to time because in Marbury vs. Madison the Supremes arrogated to themselves the final say on the meaning of the constitution.

The founders intended the three branches to be separate, contending, equal powers.

The 22nd Amendment prevents the executive from contending beyond two terms, and so we are condemned to focusing unnaturally on who will be president every four years, which has the ironic effect of exalting the presidency to the point that there is all this hubbub all the time about the imperial presidency when our real masters are others, a neat trick those masters work like mad to pull and pull and pull.

Term limit everybody, or term limit no one.

"Improper" drawing of congressional districts is not the problem, improper restriction of the number of districts is

To Fix Our Democracy, First End Gerrymandering:

Gerrymandering, the pervasive practice of drawing congressional districts for political purposes, owns a great deal of responsibility for the dysfunction of our government and the loss of trust among Americans in their government.

This story is a smokescreen obscuring the real problem, which is that Congress voted decades ago to stop the growth of representation. Gerrymandering is simply the problem you face after committing the offense of fixing the number of districts.

By 1930 the number of congressional districts had grown to 435, more or less naturally as required by the Constitution and the Census every ten years. The number would have kept growing, but the natural process was halted, by a bigoted, power hungry Congress.

The very people who are supposed to represent us stopped the growth of representation and fixed it at 435 in the 1920s, because they could.

The original First Amendment, never ratified with the rest of the Bill of Rights for want of but one vote, would have ensured the natural growth of representation with the natural growth of population in perpetuity by a formula. The argument was over the formula, so our forebears punted the problem, and the issue was never settled. Post-WWI, however, alarums began to sound over the expansion of the Congress to include lots of new representatives for America's burgeoning German-American population, so the Congress voted to fix representation at its then current level, 435, so they didn't have to sit next to the evil Hun in their own Capitol. (The Congress also effectively halted immigration, but that's another story).

So in 1930 one US representative held the power of the purse over 283,000 Americans, on average. Fast forward to today and a US representative can steal from 757,000 of us at a stroke, on average. How their power has grown, and how coveted the seats! Now you know why it takes $10 million to win one.

Just to get the ratio back down to 1930 levels, we'd have to have 1,163 congressional districts today instead of the 435 we do have.

Adding them would dramatically reduce the power the current 435 have over us, which is why it doesn't happen. Nancy Pelosi would have to herd 582 cats to get anything done instead of 238. And with 1,163 representatives, it's unlikely Nancy Pelosi would be the Speaker in the first place.

Redrawing the lines of this tyranny which they exercise over us isn't the solution. That's simply rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

The power hungry House is the biggest impediment to our democracy. Ironically, a bigger House is the answer, because it returns power to the people.

Matthew Continetti is delusional, imagines Republicans after 2010 "overreached", thinks Democrats might after 2018

Here, when in reality the so-called Tea Party Congress utterly capitulated.

It continued to ratify the new level of Obama's spending from fiscal 2009 onward, increased 25% overnight and kept there through the end of his presidency.

The Congress wasn't supine just in respect of the spending, either. John Boehner explicitly ceded the agenda to Obama after his reelection in 2012. Congress did nothing to hamstring an imperial president bent on ruling by decree. It was the Supreme Court which had to repeatedly rebuke the Obama administration, which simply ignored the court and kept on doing it.  

One can only wonder what Continetti would call it if Congress had actually exercised its constitutional power of the purse instead of lining up at the hog trough to lap it up with the rest of the pigs. Probably something about the tyranny of the legislative, or some such rot.