Amid all the intentional chaos and spite since Trump's return to the White House, there's at least one Constitutional crisis that is straightforward to communicate: Trump, the authors of Project 2025, and now Elon Musk are repeatedly attempting to stop federal funding of obligated programs.
These funds are mandated by Congress — the executive branch cannot arbitrarily pause or revoke them. And many of these funds are under signed contracts to cities, states, non-profits, and universities — it is illegal for the United States to break those contracts.
City, county, and state-level elected officials and their staff advisors: You are all in unique positions to take action. No, you can't solve the problems of the nation directly. What you do have are two key elements:
- examples of federally-funded programs and projects that we — your constituents — depend upon and take for granted
- communication channels to reach us — your constituents — including mailing lists, social media accounts, and contacts at news outlets from journalists to columnists to editorial writers
Now is the moment to use the tools at your disposal to tell stories that are concrete and compelling. Tell your constituents about specific public services that are being illegally targeted. (You know your constituents and can be strategic about which programs you highlight. But don't be overly strategic — an imperfect message is better than no message. Many messages of mixed quality are probably better than one message of overly refined quality.) Use your communication channels and your relationships to spread these stories.
Regardless of whether Dems are in disarray in DC (and regardless of whether the Republicans "leading" Congress will do their Constitutionally mandated duties), there is work to do here in the Bay Area and across California. Both in defending the most vulnerable and building for the futures. So get to it and meet the moment.
But the bad news is an unknown amount of ongoing covert actions by Trump, Musk, and associates, as well as Senate votes to come on some truly nasty appointments. So all the more reason to be bold and creative at breaking as many stories out to the mainstream as possible.
Transportation has been on the "cutting edge"
This crisis has been quite clear in the transportation and infrastructure sectors, in part because that's the area I follow — but also because that's where Trump first launched this attack on Congress's funding authority:
- On January 20 — upon entering the White House at mid-day — the Trump administration released an executive order titled "UNLEASHING AMERICAN ENERGY" directed agencies to hold funds on any and all projects funded under the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA). This immediately halted funds going to Interstate paving projects, bridge rebuilding projects, a huge range of other infrastructure projects across the country...
- Enough confusion and consternation resulted that on January 21 the acting director of the federal Office of Management and Budget (who is warming the chair until they can try to get the author of Project 2025 confirmed) issued a memo to clarify: Transportation and infrastructure projects are only being halted if they meet the criteria listed under the executive order's section titled "Terminating the Green New Deal."
What the Trump White House wants to illegally cull is the "Bipartisan Infrastructure Law" (which is the official nickname for the IIJA, since it was crafted and adopted by both Democratic and Republican senators) and the capital investments in sustainability in the (oddly named) Inflation Reduction Act.
That is exactly the approach of creating news stories this blog post is suggesting for our leaders in the City of Alameda, Alameda County, special districts across the Bay Area, and the State of California.
- Few outside of the transportation and infrastructure sectors seemed to pay attention to this mess until the evening of January 27 — a whole 7 days after the first executive order — when the acting director of the OMB followed up with that memo ordering a temporary halt to "all federal financial assistance."
What an unnecessary mistake by Padilla and Schiff. While it's true that Sean Duffy is probably one of the least objectionable nominees, the Trump administration was still at this point trying to illegally cull all the IRA/BIL/IIJA projects. Even if they couldn't have stopped the nomination, they could have used "no" votes to call more attention to the illegal action.
- That memo is finally what got the attention of the wider public. (For example, this OMB memo prompted an email from Alameda Unified's superintendent to all families.) The backlash was sufficiently fierce that the OMB rescinded the memo on Wednesday, January 29.
- Also on January 29, the newly appointed Secretary of Transportation Duffy issued a signed memo titled "Ensuring Reliance Upon Sound Economic Analysis in Department of Transportation Policies Programs and Activities." Besides trying to remove all greenhouse gas emission assessments, the memo directs USDOT to — going forward — score capital investment grants more favorably for communities with higher marriage and birth rates, as well as to
"require local compliance or cooperation with Federal immigration enforcement and with other goals and objectives specified by the President of the United States or the Secretary."
That seems like a prescient analysis given this new USDOT memo, which mixes not-unreasonable proposals (like a "user-pay model" which could mean charging drivers by the mile to use the Interstate system) together with promoting more baby-making.
Streetsblog has further coverage specifically about the traffic safety programs and projects under threat.
While I'm most familiar with the transportation sector, I imagine there are many much more compelling examples related to health, education, public safety, and most every other facet of supporting and delivering critical public services.
In this fog of confusion, it's all the more important that our local and state leaders be nimble. Pick a diverse sampling of services. Tell compelling stories. Use your contact lists and your relationships. Instead of just waiting for the news to happen to us, drive the news.
And maybe in the process we can show the Dems in DC how to develop spines and tactics and strategies to meet this moment as well.