President Donald Trump’s first weeks in office have brought about a change in funding freezes and crackdowns from tariffs to diversity efforts. The courts have suspended some of them, but small businesses face higher costs, with rapid interest rates and more cautious consumers sharing a similar message. This is useless.
David Funk said he was unsure when the USDA rejected a $65,000 bill since October for the work his company has completed.
Funk, the founder of Zero Emissions Northwest, a consulting firm based in Spokane, Washington, will link farmers with federal grants to subsidize equipment purchases and energy bills. A week after the invoice rejection, agency representatives confirmed that it was due to Trump’s “unleashing American energy” order and halted many projects funded through the Inflation Reduction Act .
“What’s happening is lost jobs, projects have been cancelled and more jobs have been lost,” Funk, who destroyed all three employees about two weeks ago. said. Many of his clients are stuck on equipment they cannot fund themselves. “It’s shocking to some of them who voted for Trump and realized that this could have a direct impact on them,” he added.
Shaundell Newsome, founder of Sumnu Marketing in Las Vegas, said weeks after the management and the Budget Office cancelled the cleaning of grants and loans issued days ago, his agency’s internship could still be in the chopping block. He said it was sexual. The program features space for four interns a year and is maintained by a Labor Bureau grant.
“There’s a lot of confusion about what’s not real in the real world,” he said of the federal order. “If you don’t have the dollars to offset your training right now, you need to make business decisions.”
Newsom is scheduled to make his next employment in March after the funding agency said he was on track to get to him on a schedule. However, he is worried about funding for the remainder of the year, including a summer program for high school students.
Funk shared that sense of urgency. “Not receiving payments for a cancelled contract and not receiving payments for a suspended contract will have the same consequences. We are not receiving compensation,” he said.
While small businesses remain broadly optimistic about the coming months, the latest survey from the National Federation of Independent Business also found that member uncertainty has reached the third highest level on record. Many have reported cuts to invest in their businesses, cautiously in stealing cash reserves if the economic situation worsens.
Not receiving payments for a cancelled contract and not being paid for a suspended contract will have the same consequences. We are not paid.
David Funk, founder of Zero Emissions Northwest
Meanwhile, leaders of major tech companies are personally sought the favor of the president, with warming cadres in managers who promise deeper tax cuts and deregulation. However, 33 million small businesses in the country, which employ almost half of the US workforce and account for more than 43% of economic output, are usually the influence or influence of lobbying to adapt to federal policy changes. They have margins, supporters say.
“We want to see more parity,” said Richard Trent, executive director of the Main Street Alliance, a coalition of over 30,000 small businesses. Trent criticised “oligarcharchic Acolites,” which he said were in Trump’s “inner circle,” and called for a more “subtle conversation that includes everyone.”
A White House spokesman did not respond to a request for comment.
Trump’s business-friendly reputation was one of the major factors that helped him return to the White House. The US used an average of 443,302 monthly business applications in the first three years of the Biden administration, compared to 282,362, the equivalent of Trump’s first term, but many start-ups The house recalls positively the early hours of the current president. The NFIB’s optimism index rose sharply at the time, partly supported by Trump’s tax cuts, and interest rates and inflation both remained historically low until the pandemic hit.
Still, some small business owners are taking steps to assert themselves from the potential negative impacts of recent White House efforts.
Shortly after the election, Beatrice Barba told NBC News that she was about to purchase regular stock worth $200,000 in advance of Trump’s promised tariffs. The sippy cups she sells at Tabor Place, a San Francisco Bay Area e-commerce line for children’s goods, rely on durable borocate glass from Chinese manufacturers.
However, in recent weeks, Barba has chosen to gamble with less cash-intensive measures. She reduced the order to $100,000 to avoid the product being too idle. Also, some of the other items will need to be refilled at the expected cost of $50,000, but she is holding back for now. Barba said he suspects Trump’s 10% additional tariffs on China could change or disappear in trade negotiations.
“It’s an extra $5,000. I don’t have to spend it,” she said. “There’s a lot of 10%. There’s no retail or any other company. It doesn’t force you to pass that margin to your customers.”
Barba could potentially rely less on components made overseas, so the administration would have the power to offer small and medium-sized businesses, including providing loans to build more US factories. He said there are ways to directly assist. She also wants to see tariff exemptions for employers of less than 50 people.
The full impact of Trump’s economic policies has yet to be seen. In a note to clients this month, JPMorgan analysts raised the question, “Is this business-friendly management?”
They highlighted the potential economic drag caused by sudden and widespread changes in U.S. policies, including the massive deportation that the White House is trying to strengthen. They say the impact of such a move can be escalated “through labor market tightening, which limits labor market easing.”
According to Joe Seydl, senior market economist at JP Morgan Private Bank, a rapid borrowing cost can lead to main street entrepreneurs suffering from unbalanced narrowing.
“Small businesses tend to be utilized more than large companies,” he said. “They tend to borrow more on the shorter end of the yield curve rather than on the long end, and tend to have significantly fewer cash holdings.”
“I have an extra layer of concern because I don’t have access to capital,” said Corine Hendrickson, owner of a daycare center in Newgralls, Wisconsin. She began scrambling when she learned to freeze funding last month. I don’t know if I can maintain my business without a childcare and development block grant that subsidizes the care of many clients.
“(One parent) saw the news and was worried that she wouldn’t be able to get the funds, and how they’ll pay me next month and what that means. I didn’t know if that was the case. Will I banish him?” she said.
Hendrickson said grants reopened on February 1, shortly after the White House lifted the funds’ freeze following the court’s ruling that stopped it. But we are nervously watching Republicans pursue deep spending cuts to accommodate Trump’s agenda. One proposal called for potential reductions in the supplementary nutrition support program that helps healthy diets from Hendrix is
She also worries that the childcare grant itself, which operates through the Department of Health and Human Services, could be found in the chopping block. Hours after confirmation as division chief this week, HHS Director Robert F. Kennedy Jr. suggested the shooting in a televised interview.
A representative from the HHS said in an email that “there are no current cuts, suspensions, or disruptions in the childcare and development block grants.”
Still, Hendrickson said he was thinking, “Are you continuing this or are you looking for another job?” She added:
Fixed: (February 16, 2025, 11:40am ET): An earlier version of this article misinterpreted the last name of the owner of Little Explorers in Corrine. She’s not Hendrix, she’s Corine Hendrixon.
