No. of Recommendations: 10
Where's that say SNAP? Or Medicaid? It doesn't.
Right. It says "all Federal financial assistance." So people naturally read that to mean, you know, all Federal financial assistance.
The original memo carved out only Social Security and Medicare explicitly. It specifically included everything else - any assistance received by recipients or subrecipients of any type - except for assistance received directly by individuals:
For the purposes of this memorandum, Federal financial assistance includes: (i) all forms of assistance listed in paragraphs (1) and (2) of the definition of this term at 2 CFR 200.1; and (ii) assistance received or administered by recipients or subrecipients of any type except for assistance received directly by individuals
...which is why everyone went nuts. And why the Press Secretary couldn't confirm that it didn't apply to Medicaid. Social Security sends checks to individuals - but Medicaid doesn't work that way. It pays providers, not individuals.
The initial memo explicitly said that the freeze didn't apply to Social Security and Medicare - and explicitly didn't say that Medicaid was also exempt from the freeze, even though Medicaid clearly falls within the definition of programs that are subject to the freeze. Which is why their clean-up document had to specifically call out that "in addition to Social Security and Medicare, already explicitly excluded in the guidance, mandatory programs like Medicaid and SNAP will continue without pause." Because they didn't make it clear that Medicaid was excluded, and the plain language of the memo specifically included Medicaid.
And student loans that might be argued to be inconsistent with the EO as well, for that matter. That's why the clean-up memo had to change that policy as well - directing that student loans that conflict with the EO's are not to be paused, but are to continue until the agency can "begin to unwind" the policies that so conflict.
It was a poorly-drafted policy, either unintentionally (or deliberately) over-inclusive, because the Administration has adopted a specific strategy of not vetting these things before doing them. There are benefits to not vetting them - everyone is surprised and can't prepare to fight you! But there are also downsides to not vetting them - everyone is surprised and can't warn you of the unintended consequences of the language you use!
