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The federal judge who suggested Trump administration officials could face criminal contempt over the spending freeze on Monday is a Democrat donor... McConnell donated hundreds of thousands to Democratic campaigns and political action committees, including 2008 presidential campaigns of Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden and Barack Obama, according to Federal Election Commission records. He also donated over $8,000 to Democratic Rhode Island Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse’s 2006 senate campaign. McConnell volunteered as director of the Rhode Island branch of Planned Parenthood for four years, according to Roll Call.

Feb 10 (Reuters) - A U.S. judge on Monday ordered the Trump administration to fully comply with a previous order lifting its broad freeze on federal spending, after a group of 23 Democratic state attorneys general last week said that some funds remained frozen. U.S. District Judge John McConnell in Providence, Rhode Island, ruled that, opens new tab all funding must be restored at least until he can hold a hearing on the states' motion for a longer-term order. The Trump administration had told states that it believed the order did not apply to certain environmental and infrastructure spending, and...

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) – A Rhode Island federal judge on Monday found the Trump administration in violation of a court order, telling the new president to “immediately restore frozen funding.” U.S. District Chief Judge John McConnell granted a “motion for enforcement” of a temporary restraining order, or TRO, he signed last month, blocking President Donald Trump’s freeze of Congress-approved funds across the country. “The states have presented evidence in this motion that the defendants in some cases have continued to improperly freeze federal funds and refused to resume disbursement of appropriated federal funds,” McConnell wrote in his decision Monday. “These...

Per the X account of Trump's Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt: The spending freeze has NOT been rescinded.The media is reporting it as recission of the federal funding freeze in order to build their narrative that President Trump's actions are confusing. They're not. The media is puprosely making it seem that way. https://x.com/PressSec/status/1884672871944901034

Connecticut's Attorney General claimed Tuesday that the Trump administration's actions to freeze Federal spending were an "unprecedented and blatantly lawless and unconstitutional attack." Other Democrats also blasted other orders from the president. William Tong, Connecticut's Attorney General, said in a statement, “This is a full assault on Connecticut families-- an unprecedented and blatantly lawless and unconstitutional attack on every corner and level of our government and economy. Attorneys general across the country are preparing imminent legal action to protect our states. Connecticut and my team are front and center in this fight and will provide updates in real time to...

In tonight’s State of the Union Address (join us tonight beginning at 8:45 PM EST for liveblog coverage), President Obama is expected to propose a five-year spending freeze for non-defense discretionary spending. Such a freeze, while a good baby step, will do nothing to reign in the spending spree that Congress has been on since 2008. So, we’d freeze the budget, but not roll back any of the trillions of dollars in additional spending that Obama has added to the federal budget since his inauguration in 2008. Besides, this whole proposal sounds a little too familiar. I feel like we’ve...

Don’t you hate it when you go to a 50% off sale and then realize the store marked up all the prices in order to offer the big savings? Welcome to President Barack Obama’s spending freeze. It’s hard to keep up with the shocking numbers under Obama. Federal spending was up 18% in his first year and the deficit was $1.4 trillion, almost three times greater than it was the previous year. That’s 9.9% of 2009’s GDP, more than three times the post World War II average. (Sorry, Barry, but you can’t blame it all on Bush. That budget was...

Surprisingly, AP does it (credit where credit is due). They cover the “spending freeze” (it would amount to less than 1% of the deficit) which we’ve covered in some detail. They also point out that the nonsense about the health care plan preserving the “right” of Americans to keep their doctor and their plan isn’t exactly true (we’ve covered that before as well). And they take on the claim about lobbyists which Michael has handled quite well below. AP also talks about the deficit commission that Obama covered last night: Obama: “I’ve called for a bipartisan fiscal commission, modeled on...

VIDEO: President Obama has recently announced that there will be a budget freeze on a significant portion of the next 3 years worth of budgets. This video walks through what that budget freeze looks like and how much money is actually saved by implementing this policy.

Leadership: The speaker of the House wants to extend a proposed freeze on domestic programs to include defense spending. In a world of growing threats, perhaps she'd also like to cut her travel and bar bill. Last week the Russian air force celebrated the maiden flight of the Sukhoi T-50, Moscow's version of the American F-22 Raptor stealth fighter. We have shut down the F-22 production line, viewing it as an unaffordable and unnecessary extravagance. (snip) Everybody has to make a sacrifice," Pelosi was quoted as saying in an interview with Politico, shortly before Obama announced his proposed discretionary spending...

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) suggested Thursday morning she could support a version of the president’s proposed spending freeze that included defense spending. Pelosi stressed at her weekly press conference that the entire defense budget “should not be exempted” from the freeze, as proposed by President Barack Obama in his State of the Union address Wednesday night. She added such “drastic action” might be necessary to tame the nation's growing, $1.3 trillion federal deficit. The Pentagon suffers from costly, wasteful programs that could produce savings, Pelosi said. But the Speaker drew a sharp line between support for the troops, and...

A key initiative in Obama’s SOTU speech was a three-year freeze on discretionary government spending. But voters aren't buying it , according to Rasmussen they overwhelmingly believe the freeze will have little or no impact on the federal deficit. In fact only nine percent think the freeze will reduce the deficit a lot. Eighty-one percent disagree, including 42% who say it will have absolutely no impact. Another 39% say the freeze will reduce the deficit a little.

WASHINGTON (AP) - Just days after President Barack Obama endorsed a partial freeze on domestic spending, his Democratic allies in the Senate have rejected a plan attempting to do pretty much the same thing.

A good example of where President Obama's mind is focused can be shown by his recent "jobs", speech given on January 22. (SHORT VIDEO)

With Barack Obama's announcement of a spending freeze on a few government programs, some Republicans and a conservative or two hailed the move as what they've been waiting for. Here's one conservative who is not impressed at all, and here's why.

Barack Obama is up to some spending "freeze" trickery when he claims that he will seek a freeze on a part of the budget for some domestic programs. In reality, the Obama "freeze" will actually lock in an already weighty, 20%, average increase for FY 09 and 10 in the budgets of departments that Obama claims will have their spending "frozen" for three years. These departments exclude the Pentagon, Homeland Security, and others which administer programs like Social Security. According to Charles Krauthammer who appeared on the O'Reilly Factor, what Obama wants to do is to deviously preserve massive increases...

There are more loopholes in President Obama's proposed "spending freeze" than in an Olympic volleyball net. Government entitlements (Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid) are exempt. A half-trillion in unspent stimulus money is exempt, as are foreign aid and the Democrats' proposed $154 billion jobs bill (Stimulus II). Pet federal education programs will be exempt (including $4 billion for the White House "Race to the Top" standards initiative and $1.35 billion more he just requested in the 2011 budget). Green-jobs spending will be exempt. Electorally driven tax-credit expansions will be exempt. The health-care plan isn't included. As even The New York...

Americans for Limited Government President Bill Wilson today called upon the U.S. Senate to reject a $1.9 trillion increase in the national debt ceiling, which would bring the national debt limit to $14.29 trillion...

So the rumor is, in his State of the Useless address Wednesday night, Dear Reader will call for a three-year freeze in discretionary spending. Now if Hal the Teleprompter doesn't misbehave, and that indeed turns out to be the case, does that mean Conman O'Bama has suddenly made a right turn? No, of course not. For several reasons: 1) It's an election year, and this is political posturing; 2) The Dems have already jacked up spending so much that to freeze it is simply to keep it at astronomical levels; and 3) The discretionary spending to be frozen represents...

The word is that during his State of the Union Address the POTUS will announce a three year spending free on non essential discretionary spending (about 25 billion in savings out of a trillion dollar plus budget/a year). It brings up the question, if he is so gung-ho about freezing spending why did he wait a whole year to do it? Forget about freezing, why did he increase spending by so much? Another question is why did he fight against a freeze so hard? The video below shows the POTUS attacking John McCain during the campaign over, and over regarding...