Between this and his comments to the governor of Maine it looks clear that he is using unconstitutional coercion/extortion to compel policy outcomes at the state level that his office doesn’t give him the authority to dictate. - ThreadSky

figgityfigs.bsky.social • 13 hours ago

Between this and his comments to the governor of Maine it looks clear that he is using unconstitutional coercion/extortion to compel policy outcomes at the state level that his office doesn’t give him the authority to dictate.

Reposted from Chris Ingraham

NEW: The Trump administration has locked Minnesota out of $200 million in federal food and climate grants awarded last summer. Projects breaking ground this year were depending on that money. minnesotareformer.com/2025/02/21/t...

Comments

geegee24.bsky.social•13 hours ago

It’s time to impeach dude.

figgityfigs.bsky.social•13 hours ago

It was time before he even assumed office, given that he’s constitutionally disqualified from holding it.

bananapantz.bsky.social•13 hours ago

I don’t understand how this stuff especially passes the courts.

suannelqr.bsky.social•13 hours ago

It doesn’t. This won’t. Federal funds are appropriated by Congress. If Trump wants to take away funds, he has to go through Congress. But he never does that. He can’t govern like a president so he has to rule like a king: with blustering EOs that ultimately fail because each is shown to be illegal.

rsgreacen.bsky.social•13 hours ago

Decades of FedSoc preparation

figgityfigs.bsky.social•13 hours ago

If they feel bound by their own precedent especially, which said giving states more Medicaid money was unconstitutionally coercive.

icefire9atla.bsky.social•13 hours ago

It won't. But court orders won't stop him from doing it anyway.

bam5.bsky.social•11 hours ago

Courts are slow but the courts orders are having an effect. I don’t see why we should concede otherwise. https://www.wgbh.org/news/local/2025-02-21/trump-administration-restores-environmental-grants-but-advocates-remain-worried

bananapantz.bsky.social•11 hours ago

I don’t think it’s clear yet that all of these things are being stopped by the courts.

bam5.bsky.social•11 hours ago

Not sure I follow

bananapantz.bsky.social•11 hours ago

There’s a mass of cases and rulings, and I’m saying it’s too early to be conclusive, but it doesn’t seem clear to me that courts are uniformly stopping freezes and layoffs.

unhipcat.bsky.social•11 hours ago

trump et al will systematically reduce/eliminate funding for blue states and continue/increase funding for red states.

suannelqr.bsky.social•13 hours ago

He can’t go through normal legislative processes to push his agenda. Instead he has to craft EOs that he can sign with a flourish and declare THIS IS A THING! or THIS IS NO LONGER A THING! And then they all ultimately fail in court because, shocker, they’re all illegal.

suannelqr.bsky.social•13 hours ago

Likewise he can’t garner respect, so he has to compel it.

He can’t foster loyalty, so he has to demand it.

He can’t retain respect or loyalty, so he has to threaten retaliation if its compelled, demanded existence is removed.

He’s weak and incompetent and extremely fragile.

He crumbles easily.

piattodelgatto.bsky.social•13 hours ago

Right, remember when Obamacare medicaid expansion being conditional was deemed unconstitutionally coercive by SCOTUS?

figgityfigs.bsky.social•13 hours ago

That decision was so fucking stupid. “The mandate is functionally a tax so it’s fine” passed muster, but “the Medicaid expansion is functionally a repeal of Medicaid as it existed and the passage of an expanded Medicaid” didn’t because they needed a pound of flesh somewhere.

globalatl.bsky.social•13 hours ago

How can I find out (research) how many jobs were lost as a result of these funds being withheld?

erikgunderson.bsky.social•12 hours ago

Remember when the feds offered extra money to states if they did Medicaid expansion? That was unconstitutional coercion. And that's not such a long time ago. National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, 567 U.S. 519 (2012).

figgityfigs.bsky.social•12 hours ago

I do!

melico.bsky.social•13 hours ago

What is he actually demanding from MN?

figgityfigs.bsky.social•13 hours ago

Not sure in this case, don’t know that it’s clear. Just that they’re flexing the “shut off the spigot” tool.

jnoodles24.bsky.social•12 hours ago

Can states withhold federal tax money? I mean if we're going to start blocking the funding for things...

supremerobo.bsky.social•13 hours ago

This is the kind of thing that gets GOP seats wiped out in places they've been winning for decades and I'm kinda shocked nobody in the white house realizes this

figgityfigs.bsky.social•13 hours ago

I *think* they feel like if they target blue states and municipalities, people will blame the local leadership for not just doing what the president says and turning the money back on.

supremerobo.bsky.social•13 hours ago

I know this is howling into a windstorm but we have tons of historical evidence that this kind of overt coercive action backfires horribly

figgityfigs.bsky.social•13 hours ago

What you mean if I aim a gun at your head and tell you to do what I say or else I’ll fire it, it doesn’t make your loved ones hate you?

supremerobo.bsky.social•13 hours ago

These chuckleheads claim to be statue posters but this is stuff that got Roman imperial pretenders killed by angry mobs!

bam5.bsky.social•11 hours ago

I imagine Trump could think this. But we have not spent the last several decades bemoaning the nationalization of politics just to assume it works like this.

figgityfigs.bsky.social•11 hours ago

Oh I agree, I didn’t think I had implied here that I agree with this.

bam5.bsky.social•11 hours ago

I figured you did, my comment is more for the broader audience here. Trump’s superpower is, still, making everyone forget how easy he is to stand up to

piggenres.bsky.social•13 hours ago

not if it comes with other things, like farmers being locked out of USDA funds

cstarks.bsky.social•11 hours ago

He wants the governors to yield to him. Which it sounded like Hochul was maybe getting ready to do on the congestion pricing, but then he got cocky and called himself a king. Now that that's out in the open, it's going to be a fight.

cstarks.bsky.social•11 hours ago

And it's a good fight to have! About federalism, and the limits on the executive's ability to compel the states by withholding transfer payments, especially when it's done for arbitrary reasons decided inside the White House and not in response to legislative changes.

jeninmotion.bsky.social•13 hours ago

Republican Congress, googling: "how far can my balls retract when I am avoiding my responsibilities?"

suannelqr.bsky.social•13 hours ago

“How far can I bend over Trump’s desk?”

jeninmotion.bsky.social•13 hours ago

(And yes, yes, I know this is unwoke, but also I think "the GOP is a bunch of cucks" is both an accurate attack AND hits them in their propaganda as Uber Men who are terrified of a dude w/dementia and a meth head destroying America)

zokbar13.bsky.social•6 hours ago

There's a fine tradition of taking this approach with fascists. Listen to how he says, "Super-duper supermen!" at about the 1:00 mark.

https://youtu.be/lWF8iRCan7I?si=_P3PCnD3ftyfkYu5

figgityfigs.bsky.social•13 hours ago

I’m not trying to doom here, just trying to anticipate where this is going. Many have rightfully noted the distributed nature of our elections making them hard to game centrally; this mechanism is the way he’ll try, I think.

conjurial.bsky.social•13 hours ago

If you want secession movements, this is how to get them.

Takes a lot to undermine 250 years of national identity, but he’s off to a fine start

raflw.bsky.social•13 hours ago

If he keeps this up, states like MN, CA, ME and so on will have excellent popular energy for a federal income tax strike.

brentwaggoner.bsky.social•13 hours ago

Federal taxes go straight to the government though, so there's no real way to withhold them.

celticdragon1.bsky.social•12 hours ago

You could see states taking federal property hostage essentially

figgityfigs.bsky.social•12 hours ago

I mean that’s how the civil war proximately started, right?

celticdragon1.bsky.social•12 hours ago

Pretty much, although there are plenty of non military buildings etc for states to just grab or even merely shut off water and power.

dxmnkd316.bsky.social•11 hours ago

I can tell you this is a pretty nice building with an EXCELLENT location. Would fetch top dollar.

eleanor.lockhart.contact•11 hours ago

That’s not dooming, that’s realistically seeing where the fight is going to have to be. The thing is he seems to be doing this to governors who are definitely going to stick up to him - Maine’s to his face, and we know what he thinks of Minnesota’s

eleanor.lockhart.contact•11 hours ago

So like, what this is is setting up Democratic states to have a legal fight with a strong base of evidence for success here

mediawarrior.bsky.social•13 hours ago

Try, but succeed?

figgityfigs.bsky.social•13 hours ago

Not sure! Probably not, not most places, but it’s complicated.

kuriva.im•13 hours ago

and the Eric Adams situation shows he's eager to use the threat of criminal prosecution to commandeer state officials

icefire9atla.bsky.social•13 hours ago

We need Democratic governors with the courage to stand their ground. And we need the messaging to communicate what Trump is doing so that the blame falls on the administration and not the governors.

boulevaardvark.bsky.social•13 hours ago

magat-controlled Congress seems more than willing to allow DonOld to usurp their ''power of the purse".

darthhippy.bsky.social•11 hours ago

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

conspiranon.bsky.social•13 hours ago

https://bsky.app/profile/conspiranon.bsky.social/post/3lirptl2ug22q

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