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3:05 PM ET, January 29, 2025

memeorandum

 Top Items: 
Washington Post:
Trump White House reverses course, rescinds freeze on federal grants  —  The budget office came under immense pressure over the impacts on a sudden pause in key government spending  —  The White House budget office on Wednesday rescinded an order freezing federal grants …
RELATED:
Zachary Basu / Axios:
White House rescinds Trump's funding freeze after massive backlash  —  The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) rescinded a memo Wednesday that had ordered a “temporary pause” on federal funding and unleashed major confusion across the country.
Discussion: The Hill and NOTUS
NBC News:
Trump administration rescinds order attempting to freeze federal aid spending  —  The move comes just one day after the order was issued and a federal district judge temporarily halted it.  —  President Donald Trump's administration on Wednesday rescinded an order that attempted to freeze …
NPR:
New memo, White House response adds to confusion on federal funding freeze
Matthew Yglesias / Slow Boring:
Throw Biden under the bus  —  Sleepy Joe landed us in this mess with bad, selfish decisions  —  When Joe Biden stepped aside in favor of Kamala Harris, the overwhelming majority of Democrats praised him for the decision and painted an overall flattering portrait of Biden's presidency and his career.
Discussion: New Jersey Online
RELATED:
Greg Sargent / New Republic:
Trump's First Big Fiasco Triggers Stephen Miller's Rage—Take Note Dems  —  Admitting failure is anathema to the authoritarian leader, who is perpetually in danger of being diminished by those who are resentful of his glory—which is why White House adviser Stephen Miller is frantically searching …
Shane Goldmacher / New York Times:
Powerless, Democrats Debate Just How Deep in the Wilderness They Are
Discussion: HotAir
Politico:
DOJ moves to drop charges against former GOP lawmaker in case criticized by Trump  —  The step likely ends a legal saga that drove ex-Rep. Jeff Fortenberry from Congress over foreign donations.  —  The Justice Department has moved to drop its criminal prosecution of former Rep. Jeff Fortenberry …
RELATED:
Politico:
DOJ moves to drop prosecution of former Trump co-defendants in classified documents case  —  The request offered no explanation for the Justice Department's decision to abandon the case against the two Trump allies.  —  The Justice Department on Wednesday moved to drop its effort …
Daniel Payne / Politico:
Senate Democrats rip into RFK Jr.  —  Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee went on offense against Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s past statements about vaccines, infectious disease and other health-related conspiracy theories.  In a heated exchange, Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) …
RELATED:
The Hill:
Democrats hammer RFK Jr. on shifting vaccine, abortion views
Hailey Fuchs / Politico:
RFK Jr. is in the hot seat
Don Moynihan / Can We Still Govern?:
Compelling Mass Civil Servant Resignations Will Create Chaos  —  Elon Musk's role at Twitter represents a Rorschach test for how people think he will fare in restructuring government.  For fans, he was able to cut the majority of the employees, and the site continued to run more or less as before.
RELATED:
Vittoria Elliott / Wired:
Elon Musk Lackeys Have Taken Over the Office of Personnel Management
Andrew Prokop / Vox:
Trump and Musk's plan for a massive purge of the federal workforce, explained
Rachael Levy / Reuters:
USDA inspector general escorted out of her office after defying White House  —  Security agents escorted the inspector general of the U.S. Department of Agriculture out of her office on Monday after she refused to comply with her firing by the Trump administration, sources familiar with the matter told Reuters.
New York Times:
Which Federal Programs Are Under Scrutiny?  The Budget Office Named 2,600 of Them.  —  A Trump administration memo sent to U.S. federal agencies Monday night ordered temporary freezes in funding for programs across the government.  It caused widespread confusion among agency officials …
RELATED:
Popular Information:
New Trump memo claims authority to ignore Congress
Timothy Noah / New Republic:
The Reason Why Donald Trump Shut Down His Government
Jason Koebler / 404 Media:
OpenAI Furious DeepSeek Might Have Stolen All the Data OpenAI Stole From Us  —  The narrative that OpenAI, Microsoft, and freshly minted White House “AI czar” David Sacks are now pushing to explain why DeepSeek was able to create a large language model that outpaces OpenAI's while spending orders …
RELATED:
Financial Times:
OpenAI says it has evidence China's DeepSeek used its model to train competitor
Brad Reed / Raw Story:
‘Written by children’: Critics slam New York Times' glowing coverage of Trump official  —  White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt received glowing coverage from the New York Times for her press briefing debut despite delivering a performance that other observers have described as an “embarrassment.”
RELATED:
Shawn McCreesh / New York Times:
White House Press Secretary Makes Steely and Unflinching Debut
Amanda Marcotte / Salon:
“Trump is trying to collapse our economy”: War on “woke” revealed as a war on all Americans  —  Christian nationalists behind the spending shutdown aim to punish everyone, not just imaginary Marxists  —  Initially, the most striking detail in the White House Office of Management and Budget memo …
RELATED:
Brianne Pfannenstiel / Des Moines Register:
Iowa Democrats flip Senate seat in special election to cut into Republican majority  —  Iowa Democrats have flipped a state Senate seat vacated earlier this year by Chris Cournoyer, who resigned to become the state's new lieutenant governor.  —  Democrat Mike Zimmer has defeated Republican Kate Whittington …
RELATED:
MPR News:
Doron Clark wins Senate special election, DFLers take back the Minnesota Senate
NBC News:
Defense secretary revokes Mark Milley's security detail and orders IG review  —  Pete Hegseth told Milley, a critic of Trump, that he had ordered an investigation to determine whether his rank should be re-evaluated.  —  WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has told former Joint Chiefs …
RELATED:
Cybele Mayes-Osterman / USA Today:
Pete Hegseth tells Mark Milley the Pentagon is pulling his security detail and clearance
Andrea Shalal / Reuters:
Trump administration to cancel student visas of pro-Palestinian protesters  —  U.S. President Donald Trump will sign an executive order on Wednesday to combat antisemitism and pledge to deport non-citizen college students and others who took part in pro-Palestinian protests, a White House official said.
Discussion: Jewish Insider
RELATED:
Lauren Weber / Washington Post:
RFK Jr. sought to trademark MAHA for vaccine marketing, transferred to ally  —  Robert F. Kennedy Jr. transferred ownership of the trademark application in December and its abbreviation — MAHA — to an LLC managed by Del Bigtree.  —  Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the nominee for the nation's top health post …
Discussion: Breitbart
NBC News:
Fed holds interest rates steady despite Trump's calls for a cut  —  Policymakers left rates unchanged amid signs that the economy is humming along, defying the president's tradition-bucking pressure on the central bank.  —  Federal Reserve officials held interest rates steady after emerging …
David Corn / Mother Jones:
SCOOP: RFK Jr. Secretly Recorded Second Wife During Divorce and Acknowledged Being “Polygamous”  —  One recording might have violated state law.  It was part of a messy saga that ended with her suicide.  —  In the early 2010s, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. went through a contentious divorce with his second wife, Mary Richardson Kennedy.
Discussion: Page Six and New York Post
Sara Weissman / Inside Higher Ed:
Governor Leaves Indiana's Predominantly Black University Out of Budget  —  Martin University had a short-lived burst of state funding.  But those funds disappeared in Governor Mike Braun's budget proposal, unveiled on the heels of an anti-DEI executive order.  One lawmaker calls it racist.
New York Times:
At Gabbard's Confirmation Hearing, Edward Snowden May Loom Large  —  Senators are expected to ask about her defense of the former government contractor, who released reams of data on U.S. surveillance programs and fled to Russia.  —  Tulsi Gabbard's past statements on Syria, Russia …
Wall Street Journal:
As a Rising Political Star, Gabbard Paid to Mask Her Sect's Ties to Alleged Scheme  —  Years before Tulsi Gabbard became Trump's pick to coordinate U.S. spy agencies, she tried to evade unwanted scrutiny
The Guardian:
Trump revokes temporary protected status for 600,000 Venezuelans  —  New DHS secretary Kristi Noem ends extension that allows people to stay if they cannot return safely to home country  —  The Trump administration has revoked an extension of deportation protections that the previous Biden …
Erica Orden / Politico:
Trump hires new lawyers to appeal his hush money conviction  —  The lawyers will replace Todd Blanche and Emil Bove, who represented Trump during the trial last spring.  —  NEW YORK — President Donald Trump has hired the elite white-shoe law firm Sullivan & Cromwell to appeal his criminal conviction in the Manhattan hush money case.
 
 
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 More Items: 
New York Times:
With Tampons and Code, Silicon Valley Workers Quietly Protest Tech's Rightward Shift
Rebecca Patterson / New York Times:
Listen to the Bond Market, Because It's Flashing a Warning
Discussion: CBS News, New York Post and Raw Story
New York Times:
R.F.K. Jr. Appears Unfamiliar With Key Elements of Medicare and Medicaid
Discussion: Time and NewsNation
Kyle Cheney / Politico:
Ed Martin Jr., a crusader for Jan. 6 defendants, now oversees their absolution
Siobhan Hughes / Wall Street Journal:
Ted Cruz Leads Republican Charge to Defund Consumer-Protection Agency
Dana Goldstein / New York Times:
American Children's Reading Skills Reach New Lows
 Earlier Items: 
William Kristol / The Bulwark:
Congressional Republicans Prefer Being a Doormat
Jennifer Rubin / The Contrarian:
The Human Cost of Frozen Funds
Discussion: The Hill, Ars Technica and STAT
Lisa Rein / Washington Post:
How Trump is stretching laws to make the federal government more political
CNN:
Trump DOJ appointee in DC lashes out after flurry of ‘personally insulting’ leaks in his first week
Discussion: Mediaite
Politico:
‘It was leaked to us:’ Army in chaos over Trump orders
Discussion: Alternet.org, Raw Story and Defense One