Judge extends block on Trump administration’s sweeping freeze on federal funding

A federal judge agreed Tuesday to continue blocking President Donald Trump’s administration from freezing grants and loans potentially totaling trillions of dollars.

U.S. District Judge Loren AliKhan in Washington, D.C., issued a preliminary injunction requested by groups representing thousands of nonprofits and small businesses. It’s the first such order since the Trump administration announced a sweeping pause on federal aid, stirring up a wave of confusion and anxiety across the U.S.

The judge said the administration “cannot pretend that the nationwide chaos and paralysis from two weeks ago is some distant memory with no bearing on this case.”

The administration rescinded a memo outlining its planned funding freeze after AliKhan temporarily blocked it earlier this month. A second judge in Rhode Island also issued a temporary restraining order blocking any pause in federal spending pause in a separate lawsuit filed by nearly two dozen states.

Judge gives Trump administration two days to release billions in blocked foreign aid

A federal judge on Tuesday gave the Trump administration less than two days to release billions of dollars in U.S. foreign aid, saying the administration had given no sign of complying with his nearly two-week-old court order to ease its funding freeze.

The lawsuit was filed by nonprofit organizations over the cutoff of foreign assistance through the U.S. Agency for International Development and State Department, which followed a Jan. 20 executive order by President Donald Trump targeting what he portrayed as wasteful programs that do not correspond to his foreign policy goals.

Nonprofit groups and businesses that receive federal money for work abroad said the freeze breaks federal law and has shut down funding for even the most urgent life-saving programs abroad. Those USAID and State partners say the administration has stiffed them on billions of dollars in money already owed, forcing them to lay off tens of thousands of staffers and pushing some organizations toward financial ruin.

White House says it “will decide” which news outlets cover Trump

The White House said that its officials “will decide” which news outlets can regularly cover President Donald Trump up close — a sharp break from a century of tradition in which a pool of independently chosen news organizations go where the chief executive does and hold him accountable on behalf of regular Americans.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the changes would rotate traditional outlets from the group and include some streaming services. She cast the change as a modernization of the press pool, saying the move would be more inclusive and restore “access back to the American people” who elected Trump.

She spoke a day after a federal judge refused to immediately order the White House to restore The Associated Press’ access to many presidential events.

Federal judge blocks effort to halt refugee admissions system

A federal judge in Seattle blocked President Donald Trump’s effort to halt the nation’s refugee admissions system Tuesday.

The ruling came in a lawsuit brought by major refugee aid groups, who argued that Trump’s executive order suspending the federal refugee resettlement program ran afoul of the system Congress created for moving refugees into the U.S.

— Denver Post wire services