By Eric Vandenbroeck and co-workers

It is Going to Get Bumpy

President Donald Trump threw the nation into chaos once again on Monday night with his order declaring a “pause” of indefinite length on $3 trillion in federal grants and loans. Among the government programs facing an immediate cutoff: Meals on Wheels, Head Start, school lunches, child-care help, student loans, disaster relief, crime-fighting assistance and Medicaid, which provides health care to 82 million Americans.

This is, at any rate, what people think is happening, because no one has any idea — including the Trump administration.

The day after Trump’s bombshell, and just four hours before the funding was set to cease, Karoline Leavitt, the 27-year-old White House press secretary, strode onto the podium to give her first briefing. It quickly became apparent that she had no clue about the crisis her boss had created.

“There’s no uncertainty in this building,” she informed the Associated Press’s Zeke Miller, blaming the chaos in the nation on the news media, which had “confused” people. She promised Americans that Social Security and other “assistance that is going directly to individuals will not be impacted” — small reassurance, because most such federal assistance goes through states.

How long would the cutoff be? Leavitt could only say that it was “temporary” and that Russell Vought, Trump’s nominee to run the Office of Management and Budget, “told me to tell all of you that the line to his office is open for other federal agencies.” So the guy directing this cataclysmic “pause” is an unconfirmed nominee who doesn’t even work for the federal government? (Later on Tuesday, a federal judge delayed the freeze until at least Feb. 3.)

Peppered with questions about which programs were being cut off, she could offer only to “get you the full list after this briefing,” though she acknowledged that such a list had not yet come to “fruition.”

“Are you guaranteeing here,” asked David Sanger of the New York Times, “that no individual now on Medicaid would see a cutoff because of the pause?”

Replied the press secretary: “I'll check back on that and get back to you.”

Foreign journalists and others jammed into the aisles in advance of Leavitt’s appearance, forcing the regular correspondents to shove their way to their seats in the overheated room: “Excuse me! ... Make a hole! ... The circus is back!” An aide came out before Leavitt to give preflight instructions to the aisle standers. A reporter asked whether there was any guidance about seatbelt use.

“Fasten your seat belts,” she suggested. Good advice. It was going to get bumpy.

Leavitt was asked why charities and service providers weren’t given more warning. “There was notice,” Leavitt said. Yep — about 20.

Peppered with questions about which programs were being cut off, she could offer only to “get you the full list after this briefing,” though she acknowledged that such a list had not yet come to “fruition.”

“Are you guaranteeing here,” asked David Sanger of the New York Times, “that no individual now on Medicaid would see a cutoff because of the pause?”

Replied the press secretary: “I'll check back on that and get back to you.”

In just eight days on the job, Trump has taken a wrecking ball to the federal government, and he and his aides apparently couldn’t be bothered to give any thought to the damage and chaos that would ensue. It’s not just the spending freeze. It’s the willy-nilly, and probably illegal, firing of federal employees, the federal hiring freeze, the moratorium on foreign aid, the threats and bullying unleashed on allies, and the moves to muzzle government agencies to eliminate accountability. The sheer volume of executive orders and actions stunned critics into silence. But, as the scene in the briefing room illustrated on Tuesday, reality is already beginning to catch up with Trump.

Foreign journalists and others jammed into the aisles in advance of Leavitt’s appearance, forcing the regular correspondents to shove their way to their seats in the overheated room: “Excuse me! ... Make a hole! ... The circus is back!” An aide came out before Leavitt to give preflight instructions to the aisle standers. A reporter asked whether there was any guidance about seatbelt use.

“Fasten your seat belts,” she suggested. Good advice. It was going to get bumpy.

Leavitt appeared wearing a purple jacket and a gold cross, of a size commonly associated with the warding off of vampires. She revealed several helpful nuggets, including that “President Trump has always been the hardest-working man in politics,” that “the golden age of America has most definitely begun” and that Europe has “no greater ally” than Trump. She also disclosed the “news” that Trump had determined that those drones in New Jersey were hobbyist and commercial aircraft and “not the enemy” — precisely the same news that the Biden administration announced on Dec. 17. She volunteered her view that all undocumented immigrants “are criminals” and, asked about Black History Month, said “we will continue to celebrate … the contributions that all Americans, regardless of race,” have made.

Leavitt told reporters she would “commit to telling the truth from this podium every single day,” then broke the vow with almost every sentence that followed.

The Post’s Isaac Arnsdorf asked what Trump had meant by his social media post saying, “The United States Military just entered the Great State of California and, under Emergency Powers, TURNED ON THE WATER.” (The California Department of Water Resources felt compelled to rebut this: “The military did not enter California. The federal government restarted federal water pumps after they were offline for maintenance for three days. State water supplies in Southern California remain plentiful.”)

Leavitt repeated the fiction that “the water was turned on” because of Trump’s “pressure campaign” on state officials.

The Washington Examiner’s Christian Datoc pointed out that “egg prices have skyrocketed since President Trump took office. So what, specifically, is he doing to lower those costs for Americans?”

Leavitt offered nothing other than an attack against former president Joe Biden for “sleeping” and for “the mass killing of more than 100 million chickens” — the monster! — which caused “a lack of chicken supply in this country, therefore lack of egg supply.” Ah, the old chicken-and-egg response. In reality, the cause of high egg prices under both presidents has been avian flu, but this didn’t stop Trump from blaming Biden during the campaign. What’s sauce for the goose …

The press secretary also dutifully relayed her boss’s view that the law is whatever he says it is. The Friday night massacre of inspectors general without the legally required 30-day notice and the firing of career prosecutors at the Justice Department, in violation of civil-service protections? Leavitt said, “it is the belief of this White House ... that the president was within his executive authority to do that.” The order abolishing the constitutional guarantee of birthright citizenship? “This administration believes that birthright citizenship is unconstitutional.”

And, of course, she parroted Trump’s routine attacks against the press, saying “Americans’ trust in mass media has fallen to a record low.” She awarded the second question of the briefing to right-wing Breitbart News and, a few questions later, went to Brian Glenn from the MAGA outlet Real America’s Voice.

“You look great,” Glenn informed her. “You’re doing a great job.” The questioner then went on to praise “how just transparent President Trump has been the last five or six years” and the “global powerful respect” world leaders have for him, “not only to engage in economic diplomacy with these countries but also world peace.”

Do we have to listen to this Dear Leader drivel while Trump disembowels Medicaid, Meals on Wheels, and Head Start?

I’ll check back on that and get back to you.

 

 

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