CNN
–
Secretary John Roberts suspended a midnight deadline Wednesday that was imposed by a court that called for the Trump administration to release $2 billion in frozen foreign aid.
The emergency appeal shows that for the first time President Donald Trump is trying to dramatically remake the federal government, including deep cuts across the agency — has reached the nation’s highest courts. The case appears likely to put justice on a clash course with Trump’s drastic efforts to integrate power within the enforcement division.
Roberts’ orders do not resolve the underlying questions raised by the case. Rather, they imposed what is known as “administrative stays,” and gave the court several days to consider written discussions of the case. Roberts is a judiciary designated to handle the emergency situation in the Federal Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C.
The Supreme Court called for a group that had sued the administration by Friday.
The Trump administration competed with the Supreme Court late Wednesday hours before the late night deadline, urging judicialists to step in immediately. Another pending Trump-related lawsuit deals with the dismissal of the president’s leader in the Special Advisory Bureau.
The latest issue of appeals is billions of dollars in foreign aid from the State Department and the US International Development Agency, which has frozen as Trump cracked down on federal spending in January and tried to line it up more with policy positions. President Joe Biden’s nominee, US District Judge Amir Ali, has imposed a temporary order requiring that the money flows while he considers the case.
After plaintiffs alleged that the Trump administration had not properly restored the funds, Ali responded by ordering payments by 11:59pm on Wednesday for all foreign aid completed by the time of his order. The Trump administration told the court it would take “a few weeks” to meet the judge’s request.
“An imminent voluntary deadline for the district court will make full compliance impossible,” Attorney General Sarah Harris, the administration’s top appeals counsel, told the Supreme Court on Wednesday.
In one noteworthy section of the appeal, the administration is taking the constitutional obligation to comply with federal court orders seriously.” The language was clearly a blowback perception that Trump and his allies had received over the past few weeks as they had been cheating on the notion of a court order that they disagree with or to fire each to a judge who issues them.
“Government,” Harris wrote, “we are making significant efforts to review payment requests and release payments.”
The accused group balked these explanations, suggesting that a small number of political appointees within the administration “essentially refuse to approve payments.”
The government could fall into a major problem when the courts begin a more thorough review of the demand. In explaining why the administration would refuse a bid to close the deadline, the U.S. D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals said the enforcement order in question was not initially appealable.
“The appellant has not cited cases where such subsequent upheld orders found to be appealable,” the court said in its unanimous decision.
Steve Vladeck, an analyst for the CNN Supreme Court and a professor at Georgetown University Law Center, said Roberts’ moves do not show how the court will treat Trump and the freeze on foreign aid as a whole.
“It’s really for a period of time, in this case, perhaps just two days, but it’s only for a time to suspend Judge Ali’s decision or to give the government time to sort out whether they’re enforcing funds for foreign aid challenged,” Vladeck said.
Roberts’ suspension shows a court filing on Wednesday says the Trump administration has ended more than 90% of the US International Development Agency’s Foreign Aid Award.
“In total, nearly 5,800 USAID Awards have been concluded and more than 500 USAID Awards have been retained,” the administration’s submission said.
“The total ceiling value of the retained award is approximately $57 billion,” Filing said.
In addition to the termination of the USAID Awards, “approximately 4,100 state awards have been fired and about 2,700 state awards have been retained,” according to the submission.
A significant reduction in foreign aid awards is to hit the work of nonprofits and contractors. Aid programs around the world are based on a halt due to a funding freeze and a review of billions of dollars in support. And it’s coming either that the Trump administration has put a large portion of the USAID workforce on leave or fired them.
This story has been updated with additional details.
CNN’s Jennifer Hansler contributed to this report.
