Vindictive Federalism
By
Excerpt:
In January the Trump administration informed five states—Minnesota, New York, California, Illinois, and Colorado—that it was freezing more than $10 billion in social service and child-care funding, citing “credible concerns about fraud and misuse.” The freeze was accompanied by a request for states to supply “the complete universe” of documents relating to program eligibility and benefits within two weeks. The data demand was both utterly unrealistic and an apparent “fishing expedition to find a post hoc rationalization for the Freeze itself,” according to a lawsuit filed by the five states against the federal government.
Even for this administration, the freeze was, in the words of the Center for Law and Social Policy, startlingly “illegal, reckless, and cruel.” It made poor children and families collateral damage in a political standoff. It threatened not just a loss of federal funds, but devastating economic consequences as families lost child care and employers lost workers.