ORLANDO, Fla. – Dr. Marni Stahlman first heard about the memorandum from the White House Office of Management and Budget while watching late-night television.
A guest on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” said memo M-25-13, “Temporary Pause of Agency Grant, Loan, and Other Financial Assistance Programs,” had been released, but nobody really knew about it. You can read the memo at the bottom of this story.
"I didn’t really, quite frankly, digest the whole thing while that was happening at 12 a.m. at night. But certainly by about 9:15 the next morning, it was very clear as it started to trickle down through groups that I was associated with," Stahlman said.
While Stahlman’s Mental Health Association of Central Florida doesn’t rely on federal government funding, MHA works with a wide variety of groups that do, like the Primary Care Access Network, which helps uninsured patients, and the Homeless Services Network of Central Florida.
“They were issued a directive that the funding for that grant was going to pause at 5 p.m. (Tuesday) evening,” she said.
Early Wednesday afternoon, the Trump administration rescinded M-25-13, a day after a federal judge temporarily halted the order.
Stahlman said those concerns remain, despite the rollback of the memo. She’s also concerned it will come back in some form.
“It caused a great deal of fear and anxiety about what could have happened. And I think it’s a wake-up call for the (nonprofit) sector and for the country to understand how much just would have come to a halt and the ramifications economically and socially that we are intertwined together with these funding sources from both federal, state and local resources as well as private donors and foundations,” Stahlman said.
State Sen. Randy Fine, R-Brevard County, was at the News 6 studios and shared his perspective on the situation.
“Well, you know, you can’t necessarily solve the problem with the wave of the pen. Clearly, it seems in this freeze there’s a lot of stupid things, but there may have been some things that you couldn’t afford to freeze. And you have to have a little bit more of a scalpel,” Fine said.
There was confusion over what benefits would be cut also alarmed seniors. Social Security and Medicare were never affected by the freeze, but nonprofits that help seniors may have been affected.
News 6 spoke with Sen. Rick Scott, R-Florida, on Wednesday just before the order was rescinded. He is now the Chairman of the Special Committee on Aging and emphasized that their benefits are a priority.
“If there are savings in Medicare, which there should be, we need to keep it in the program because Medicare will go bankrupt,” Scott said. “We’ll run out of money in the trust fund in about, I think, six years. Social Security in about 13 years. We’ve got to figure out how to make sure we stop fraud and abuse. If we can provide things more efficiently, we’ve got to protect all those benefits.”
During the White House briefing Wednesday, Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt was asked about the OMB memo.
Reporter: “It’s caused a lot of confusion around the country among Head Start providers, among providers — from services to homeless veterans, provid- — you know, Medicaid providers, states saying they’re having trouble accessing the portal. Could you put — help us clear up some confusion -"
MS. LEAVITT: “Yes.”
Reporter: “- Give some certainty to folks? And then also, is that uncertainty — how does that uncertainty service the president’s voters?"
MS. LEAVITT: “Well, I think there’s only uncertainty in this room amongst the media. There’s no uncertainty in this building.”
Stahlman, however, said the media did not cause the confusion and fear some nonprofit workers in Central Florida felt Tuesday.
"It was reading the actual directive and having it be fairly ambiguous in terms of what exactly the individuals were being directed to do at the agencies and which organizations and the constituencies that they serve were going to be directly affected because as soon as they said what was coming, they also said nothing is going to impact individuals with Social Security and Medicaid," Stahlman said.
Leavitt also reiterated in the press briefing that the freeze was meant to line up with President Trump’s desire to make sure the administration is a “good steward of taxpayer dollars.” She also said the pause was meant to target policies that Trump had targeted with previous executive actions against DEI programs and environmental initiatives.
Stahlman hopes this will also lead to more support from private donors so that local nonprofits don’t have to rely on government dollars as much.
"There are lots of ways for you to check out what are good nonprofits that match philosophically and ideologically where you want to go and be involved in," Stahlman said. “But practice some philanthropy at home.”
[READ the original White House memo]
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