The People's Line

The People's Line

How to talk about Trump's spending freeze

There's a liberal critique and a materialist critique. Which one will people care about?

Carl Beijer's avatar
Carl Beijer
Jan 28, 2025
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PHOTO CREDIT: SLR Jester. Licensed under Creative Commons 2.0.

Donald Trump has ordered a pause on all grants and loans from the federal government — all of them. How this order will impact various programs is still unclear, but the language is breathtaking in scope and catastrophic in implication. In the most pessimistic assessment I’ve seen, Indivisible’s Leah Greenberg claims it will impact “Medicaid, ESSA funds, IDEA, SNAP, school meals, WIC, head start grants, child care block grants, pell grants, student loans, higher ed grants, housing vouchers, [and] CTE”.

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