When a group of Senate Democrats held a press conference Tuesday to denounce President Trump’s pardon of Jan. 6 rioters, there was a slight problem.
They were capitalizing on a news cycle that had since been buried by a week’s worth of other news generated by the White House. Instead, the lawmakers pivoted to pushing back on Trump’s sweeping directive to pause federal loan and grant programs.
Trump’s first week in office has been a clinic in how to flood the zone with actions and statements that outrage the opposition and make it difficult for the public, press or Democrats to focus on any one thing.
First there were the executive orders that reshaped immigration policy. Then Trump suggested overhauling or getting rid of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Just as critics were gathering what that would mean for disaster response, news broke that Trump had fired more than a dozen inspectors general across the government.
That move alarmed his opponents. But just as Democrats and some Republicans were raising concerns, Trump had already changed the news cycle twice, first by suggesting Palestinians be relocated to neighboring Arab nations and then by picking a fight with Colombia over immigration, threatening to spark a trade war.
The Colombia spat was practically old news 24 hours later, when Trump rattled the government by directing a widespread pause of federal loans and grants.
MAGA World loves this sort of thing.
“Essentially they flood the zone, and the chaos causes a lot of journalists to be all over the place, and the Democrats have no idea what to say,” said one Trump ally.
The breakneck pace has put Democrats on the back foot as they scramble to keep up with an onslaught of developments. Trump’s rapid rollout of executive actions and his willingness to talk to the press almost daily can drown out storylines that in another administration would be a days-long controversy.
It’s part of what makes Trump so difficult to counter for his opponents. If everything is cause for outrage, it can be difficult for any particular issue to gain traction with the public.
There is reason to think his administration’s sweeping pause on federal loans and grants may be a storyline that resonates, however. While only temporary, the pause has sparked confusion among nonprofit groups and members of the public about what programs that receive federal money might be affected.
Officials in multiple states had trouble Tuesday accessing the portal used to manage Medicaid spending. The head of the National Council of Nonprofits called the pause a “potential five-alarm fire.”
“This illegal action raises more questions than it answers,” Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said in a statement, asking if grants were paused for community health centers, Head Start programs or heating assistance programs.
“Bottom line: This unconstitutional memo must be rescinded,” Sanders said.
What Ross thinks of Trump 2.0
Perhaps no individual is more familiar with Trump’s penchant for tariffs than Wilbur Ross, who served as Commerce secretary for all four years of Trump’s first term.
Ross spoke with The Hill about Trump’s economic team for his second administration, his outlook on tax legislation and why Trump is more emboldened to use tariffs against allies and adversaries alike.
“I think what has changed is he’s now focusing on using tariffs as a means of getting objectives beyond just reducing the trade deficit,” Ross told The Hill. “We saw that with Colombia. You see it with Mexico with the border conditions with fentanyl. You see it with Canada. So he’s broadening the scope of objectives for tariffs to have. And that’s a very big change.”
Trump has signaled he will use the International Economic Emergency Powers Act, which allows him to impose tariffs during a national emergency. He has already declared a national emergency at the southern border and a national energy emergency, giving him justification to use tariffs to those ends.
After pulling back tariffs on Colombia this week amid an immigration dispute, Trump has signaled he may impose tariffs on Canada and Mexico on Feb. 1. But Ross said he was not concerned about the prospect of setting off a trade war.
“I think [Mexico and Canada] may very well respond with some kind of tariff initially, if for no other reason than the domestic political need the other leaders would have to show they didn’t just give in to Trump,” Ross said. “But I think they will soon recognize they will run out of bullets a long time before he will.”
The question, Ross said, is at what point Trump would be satisfied by other countries’ commitments to stop the flow of migrants or illegal drugs to then pull back tariffs.
Ross praised Trump’s economic team, including Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, and he noted that his pick for Commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, will work closely with the U.S. trade representative.
As for tax policy, Ross said the only certainty at this point was that Republicans would ensure the tax cuts signed into law in 2017 would not expire later this year. But there will otherwise be extensive debate about what will reach Trump’s desk.
“Republicans in both chambers are in line with his program. Whether that will come out to the exact same numbers that he proposes is a different question, because you have the countervailing concern that people have about the national debt level,” Ross said. “So there’s going to be a little tug-of-war between those two parts of the Republican thesis. And it’s very hard to judge exactly what it will turn out to be.”
White House gears up for Gabbard fight
Trump allies are readying for a battle as former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (Hawaii), the Cabinet nominee with likely the toughest road to confirmation, will face senators this week.
Gabbard is Trump’s pick to serve as director of national intelligence. Her controversial views on the war in Ukraine, the Assad regime in Syria and foreign surveillance have led to some Republicans questioning whether she is up for the job.
The Heritage Foundation is spending $1 million on an ad campaign to boost Gabbard, highlighting her military experience and casting her as a reformer.
Gabbard also has the backing of the National Border Patrol Council, the National Sheriffs’ Association and Trump’s former national security adviser Robert O’Brien, who is a respected figure in GOP circles.
Donald Trump Jr. called for any Republican senator who votes against Gabbard to face a primary challenge, and other MAGA figures have embraced Gabbard as the type of disruptive force the intelligence community needs amid claims of weaponization.
“Tulsi Gabbard is a highly qualified, talented nominee for Director of National Intelligence, and President Trump looks forward to swift confirmations on all his nominees,” White House spokesperson Anna Kelly said in a statement to The Hill.
Still, the push among Trump allies to confirm Gabbard feels different from the massive mobilization undertaken when Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s nomination appeared on life support and Trump allies launched a coordinated effort to pressure senators to back him.
One potential problem for such an onslaught is that the senators most likely to oppose Gabbard may not be as vulnerable to attacks from their right flank.
Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) are independent-minded senators with their own brand in their home states. Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who opposed Hegseth, has the kind of clout that allows him to break with the party. And Sen. Todd Young (R-Ind.) is from a deep-red state but has shown a willingness to break with Trump.
“As long as Trump is behind her, she may get over the finish line,” a Trump ally told The Hill. “But I would definitely say that is one where everyone is aware, it’s not that you have to convince the other side, you’re gonna have to convince [Republicans].”
