The United States District Court for the District of Rhode Island entered a preliminary injunction placing a “categorical freeze” on federal grants and contracts.
Categorical freeze is the main point.
Numerous states sued Trump’s administration over a memo from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) titled “Temporary Pause of Agency Grant, Loan, and Other Financial Assistance Programs.”
The OMB told agencies and departments to “temporarily pause all activities related to obligation or disbursement of all Federal financial assistance.”
Chief Judge John J. McConnell wrote that the Executive Branch “put itself above Congress” when it “imposed a categorical mandate on the spending of congressionally appropriated and obligated funds without regard to Congress’s authority to control spending.”
In government, “categorical” money is money given to states and local governments by the local government, with strict rules on how those officials can spend it.
Therefore, the ruling is narrow, only applying to funding anything under the categorical category.
The House controls the purse. Agencies and departments can spend or suspend money “based only on the power Congress has given to them.” McConnell continued (emphasis mine):
The Executive has not pointed to any constitutional or statutory authority that would allow them to impose this type of categorical freeze. The Court is not limiting the Executive’s discretion or micromanaging the administration of federal funds. Rather, consistent with the Constitution, statutes, and caselaw, the Court is simply holding that the Executive’s discretion to impose its own policy preferences on appropriated funds can be exercised only if it is authorized by the congressionally approved appropriations statutes.
McConnell noted the many statutes that assert Congress’s power over spending, including the Antideficiency Act and Impoundment Control Act (ICA).
“The ICA provides the only legal mechanism for the President to delay or withhold funding, not cancel it,” according to the Government Accountability Office. “This law requires that the President notify Congress before delaying or withholding funds. That notification is called a ‘special message’ and must contain information such as the reason for the impoundment along with the estimated fiscal, economic, and budgetary effects.”
Trump has not sent a message to Congress about why the branch should “impound” those appropriated funds.
McConnell’s preliminary injunction means the defendants cannot impede “the disbursement of appropriated federal funds to States under awarded grants, executed contracts, or other executed financial obligations.”
That is the only money affected by this preliminary injunction.
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