White House seeks to tamp down concerns over funding directive - Roll Call

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

59% : Other Republicans were broadly supportive of the funding pause, such as Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis. "I think it's great that we've got an administration that is serious about providing oversight on government spending.
58% : "I think there is benefit in taking a look at federal spending to see if we can be more efficient, to identify duplicative programs," Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins, R-Maine, said.
44% : " However, some grant recipients were reporting their access to grant funding was still frozen -- such as money for Head Start and Medicaid -- despite the clarifying statement from the White House.
42% : [White House sends aid freeze questionnaire to federal agencies] Senate Appropriations Committee ranking member Patty Murray's staff circulated a memo calling attention to their interpretation of key beneficiaries who could be affected, including disaster relief payments from North Carolina to California; money for communities to combat fentanyl addiction; Pell Grants; food stamps; cancer research; and Violence Against Women Act programs, among others.
40% : Medicaid, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, federal student loans, Pell Grants, Head Start, Section 8 rental assistance and aid to small businesses and farmers appear to be exempt, and the official reiterated that Medicare and Social Security would not be affected, nor would "similar" direct benefit programs.

*Our bias meter rating uses data science including sentiment analysis, machine learning and our proprietary algorithm for determining biases in news articles. Bias scores are on a scale of -100% to 100% with higher negative scores being more liberal and higher positive scores being more conservative, and 0% being neutral. The rating is an independent analysis and is not affiliated nor sponsored by the news source or any other organization.