The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is ordering an administration-wide review of federal funding for over a dozen states, the vast majority of which are led by Democratic governors.
The review will focus on federal funding for the states of California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Virginia, and Washington, all of which are led by Democrats. Washington, D.C. will also face a review from OMB.
The memo only orders the review of one Republican-led state, Vermont. Even that inclusion, however, comes with a caveat: While Vermont has a Republican governor, its state legislature is controlled by Democrats, meaning its purse strings are largely controlled by that party.
The review is ostensibly meant to root out “fraud” in those states, and will likely target the supposed misuse of federal funds by immigrants in particular. Although state investigators have been tackling such fraud in Minnesota for months, the Trump administration has exaggerated the scale of the fraud, seemingly in order to scapegoat immigrants and justify attempts to block billions of dollars in federal funding to states.
According to the memo, the reporting request aims “to collect a detailed spending report on Federal funds,” and will “be used to better understand the scope of funding in certain States and localities in order to facilitate efforts to reduce the improper and fraudulent use of those funds through administrative means or legislative proposals to Congress.”
A response from the states is due by the end of this month.
“We are moving forward with taking fraud seriously,” a spokesperson from OMB said.
That statement, however, is doubtful, given that all but one of the states OMB is targeting with its inquiry are controlled by Democrats.
Democratic lawmakers panned the OMB memo for being blatantly politically motivated.
“OMB has no goodwill. They never say what they mean. They never mean what they say,” said Rep. Joe Morelle (D-New York). “I have zero doubt that they intend to withhold funds and they intend to punish people who have different views than they do.”
“We have to fight it in the courts because it is all illegal, and the courts have shown they’re not going to tolerate the disregard for the law,” Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Connecticut) said.
The OMB memo seeks to disrupt any legal recourse relating to its investigation.
“This is a data-gathering exercise only. It does not involve withholding funds, and therefore does not violate any court order,” the memo stated.
It’s possible, though, that a legal challenge could still block the inquiry from moving forward, as the results of the OMB investigation could be used to unfairly block Democratic-led states only, since it includes just one GOP-led state.
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