U.S. Rep. Derrick Van Orden tours Gilbertson's Dairy in Dunn County. (Henry Redman | Wisconsin Examiner)

When he was campaigning for Congress in western Wisconsin, Republican U.S. Rep. Derrick Van Orden talked about growing up “in abject rural poverty,” raised by a single mom who relied on food stamps. As a result, he has said, he would never go along with cuts to food assistance. 

“He sat down in my office when he first got elected and promised me he wouldn’t ever vote against SNAP because he grew up on it, supposedly,” Democratic U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan said in a phone interview as he was on his way home to Wisconsin from Washington this week.

But as Henry Redman reported, Van Orden voted for the Republican budget blueprint, which proposes more than $200 billion in cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in order to make room for tax cuts for the very wealthy.

Still, after that vote, Van Orden issued a public statement warning against reckless cuts to SNAP that place “disproportionate burdens on rural states, where food insecurity is often more widespread,” and saying it is unfair to build a budget “on the backs of some of our most vulnerable populations, including hungry children. Period.”

Van Orden sits on the House Agriculture Committee, which was tasked with drawing up a specific plan to cut $230 billion from food assistance to pay for tax cuts. Van Orden reportedly balked at a cost-sharing plan that shifted 25% of the cost of the program to states, saying it was unfair to Wisconsin.

But then, on Wednesday night, Van Orden voted yes as the committee passed an unprecedented cut in federal funding for SNAP on a 29-25 vote.

Van Orden took credit for the plan, which ties cuts to state error rates in determining eligibility and benefit amounts for food assistance. According to WisPolitics, he declared at a House Ag Committee markup that “states are going to have to accept the fact that if they are not administering this program efficiently, that they’re going to have to pay a portion of the program that is equitable, and it makes sense and it is scaled.” 

But states, including Wisconsin, don’t have money to make up the gap as the federal government, for the first time ever, withdraws hundreds of millions of dollars for nutrition assistance. Instead, they will reduce coverage, kick people off the program and hunger will increase. The ripple effects include a loss of about $30 billion for farmers who supply food for the program, Democrats on the Ag Committee report, and damage to the broader economy, since every $1 in SNAP benefits generates about $1.50 in economic activity. Grocery stores, food manufacturers rural communities will be hit particularly hard. 

Wisconsin will start out with a bill for 5% of the costs of the program in Fiscal Year 2028, according to a bill explanation from the Agriculture Committee. But as error rates vary, that number shifts sharply upward — to 15% when the error rate goes from the current 5% to 6%, to 20% if we exceed an 8% error rate, and so on.  

And there are other cuts in the bill, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minnesota) points out, including stricter eligibility limits, work requirements that cannot be waived in times of economic hardship and high unemployment, and reductions in benefits that come from eliminating deductions for utility costs. 

More than 900,000 children, adults, and seniors count on Wisconsin’s SNAP program, known as FoodShare, according to an analysis of state health department data by Kids Forward. The same analysis found that covering the costs of just 10% of SNAP benefits would cost Wisconsin $136 million. 

Alaska and Texas have higher error rates than Wisconsin, and so they — and their hungry kids — are stuck with the biggest cuts. Even if you accept that that is somehow just, the people who are going to pay for this bill in all the states, including ours, are, as Van Orden himself put it, “the most vulnerable populations, including hungry children. Period.”

“He says one thing and does another,” Pocan says of Van Orden’s flip-flopping on SNAP. “He’s gone totally Washington.”

That’s too bad for the people left behind in rural Wisconsin, who will take the brunt of these unnecessary cuts. 

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A “SNAP welcomed here” sign is seen at the entrance to a Big Lots store in Portland, Oregon. (Getty Images)

The U.S. House Agriculture Committee approved, 29-25, Wednesday evening its portion of Republicans’ major legislative package that includes a provision that would shift to states some of the responsibility to pay for a major nutrition assistance program.

The bill would require states, for the first time, to cover part of the cost of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, benefits that provide $100 billion per year to help 42 million Americans afford groceries. The measure would also shift more of the administrative cost to states and increase work requirements for recipients.

Republicans are planning to combine the measure with legislation from 10 other committees in a budget reconciliation package that allows the Senate to avoid its usual 60-vote threshold.

House Agriculture Chairman Glenn “GT” Thompson said the panel’s bill and its estimated $290 billion deficit savings over a 10-year budget window were necessary for the larger legislative package to extend tax cuts and increase border security and defense spending.

 The package would “prevent the largest tax increase in American history on our families, farmers and small businesses, and (would) deliver critical funding necessary for the Trump administration to continue their work keeping Americans safe,” the Pennsylvania Republican said in an opening statement.

“Our reconciliation instructions provide the opportunity to restore integrity to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, to make sure that this essential program works for the most vulnerable and functions as Congress has intended.”

Republicans on the panel said throughout a marathon committee meeting, which started Tuesday night and wrapped up more than 26 hours later following an overnight break, that the added work requirements and accountability measures for state governments were overdue reforms.

The panel’s GOP majority approved the bill over unified opposition from Democrats, who argued that the measure would unfairly cut benefits to needy families to pay for tax cuts for high earners, undermine the panel’s bipartisan tradition of fusing crop subsidies with nutrition assistance and overburden state governments that can’t afford to take on the additional cost.

Ranking Democrat Angie Craig of Minnesota called the measure “the largest rollback of an anti-hunger program in our nation’s history” which would be felt deeply across a broad swath of recipients.

“We will see children going to bed without dinner, more seniors skipping meals to afford their medicine, more parents sacrificing their own nutrition, so their kids can eat,” Craig said. “Every single one of us knows (the cuts) will take food away from families at a time when working folks are struggling with higher costs.”

State contributions

The bill would make states pay for up to 25% of SNAP benefits, which are currently entirely covered by the federal government, starting in 2028.

States would be required to pay at least 5%, with the rate rising with a state’s payment error rate. The highest state cost-share would be triggered by a state reaching a 10% or higher error rate.

Even at the lowest state cost-share, the provision would add $4.7 billion overall to annual state obligations, according to an analysis published Wednesday by the center-left think tank Center for Budget and Policy Priorities.

But only seven states would have qualified for the lowest cost-share in fiscal 2023, the most recent year for which data is available. The national error rate was 11.7% and more than two dozen states and territories had error rates higher than 10%.

That means in practice the costs to states would be much higher. The three most populous states — California, Texas and Florida — alone would have combined to owe more than $5.7 billion under their 2023 error rates and 2024 benefit amounts.

Republican members said the requirement would incentivize states to better manage their programs.

“Unlike every other state-administered entitlement program, SNAP benefit is 100% funded by the federal government, resulting in minimal incentives for states to control costs, enhance efficiencies and improve outcomes for recipients,” Thompson said.

Impact on state budgets

Democrats said states could ill afford to take on additional costs, meaning the bill would result in cuts to the program or other critical services.

“The massive unfunded mandate this bill forces on states just passes the buck onto state legislatures, forcing them to slash local programs and services, cut benefits, kick vulnerable people off SNAP or raise taxes,” Craig said. “We already know states can’t afford it.”

The change would force difficult decisions for states, several Democrats said.

In Ohio, the state would be on the hook for an additional $534 million annually, Democrat Shontel Brown said.

“That’s not to expand benefits or improve outcomes, that’s just to maintain the status quo.” she said. “To cover the costs, Ohio, along with every other state, is going to have to make brutal tradeoffs. It’s going to mean cutting K-12 education funding, scaling back opioid and mental health treatment programs, reducing Medicaid coverage or putting off critical infrastructure repairs.”

Republicans countered that the provision would bring much needed accountability to state administrators, which would make the program fairer overall.

Alaska had an error rate of nearly 60% in fiscal 2023. Without mentioning that state, Derrick Van Orden, a Republican whose home state of Wisconsin was among the few states with error rates under 6%, said the costs associated with such numerous errors shouldn’t be covered by states with lower rates.

“Overpayments, waste, fraud and abuse have plagued programs like SNAP,” he said. “There is a state that has a 59.59% overpayment rate and my Wisconsinites are not going to pick up that slack.”

States’ error rates include fraud, but it makes up a small share of a category that also includes inadvertent underpayments and overpayments, Michigan Democrat Kristen McDonald Rivet said.

SNAP has a fraud rate of less than 1% and work requirements already exist, McDonald Rivet said. Republicans’ efforts to target fraud and add work requirements wouldn’t reach the cost savings they sought, she said.

“Are there error rates in the states? Sure,” she said. “Should we address it? Absolutely. But the idea that we are going to find $300 billion of cuts — $300 billion of cuts — on that small percentage of people who are not working that are already required to or error rates in the states is just a flat-out lie. What we are really doing is cutting food for people.”

Administrative costs

The bill would also increase states’ share of the cost of administering the food assistance program.

Under current law, states and the federal government evenly split the cost of administering the program. The bill would have states shoulder 75% of administrative costs.

Democrats, including the ranking member of the panel’s Nutrition, Foreign Agriculture, and Horticulture Subcommittee, complained that would compound the problems created by the new cost structure for SNAP benefits.

“States will be forced to budget more for SNAP benefits with less for administrators,” Rep. Jahana Hayes of Connecticut said. “With fewer administrative staff, it is inevitable that errors will increase.”

Work requirements

Another section of the bill would expand the number of participants subject to work requirements to receive SNAP benefits.

The proposal would raise from 54 to 64 the age at which a person no longer has to meet work requirements. It would also lower from 18 to 7 the age at which caring for a child exempts a person from work requirements.

Democrats raised and introduced several amendments meant to address the provision, but were outvoted each time.

Kansas Republican Tracey Mann said the changes were not only about improving SNAP efficiency, but would make the program’s rules fairer for those it was meant to serve.

“It is wrong to jeopardize the benefits of the single mom taking care of kids too young to be in school or the disabled or elderly in order to subsidize someone who is perfectly capable of making an honest income but isn’t willing to join the workforce,” Mann said.

“These changes will ensure that individuals are served by the program as it was intended — not as a couch that you can sit on as long as you want, but as a true safety net that gets you back on the ladder of opportunity and back into a job.”

Apprentice Josh Ermeling of Laborers Union Local 330 strips forms used to pour concrete for a box culvert. A report from the Midwest Economic Policy Institute says Wisconsin's apprenticeship programs could grow faster with some changes in state laws. (Photo courtesy of the Wisconsin Laborers' District Council)

Wisconsin saw the number of construction apprentices grow in the last decade, but a new report suggests that growth might have been stronger with some changes in Wisconsin law.

One change would be to restore the state’s prevailing wage law on government construction projects. The other would be to repeal Wisconsin’s “right-to-work” law — a measure that prevents unions from requiring all workers that they represent to pay union dues.

The report was produced by the Midwest Economic Policy Institute, based in  La Grange, Illinois, and conducted jointly with the Project for Middle Class Renewal at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

“While increased public investment in the construction sector is having a positive impact on the apprenticeship system, it is clear that state policy interventions that erode workforce institutions that prioritize training have had the opposite effect,” U of I professor Robert Bruno, director of the Project for Middle Class Renewal, said in a statement.

Bruno said that in addition to reinstituting Wisconsin’ prevailing wage law and repealing the right-to-work law, states can increase their investment in pre-apprenticeship programs to boost the foundational skills for skilled trades workers. He also has suggested tax credits to give more employers an incentive “to invest in our long-term domestic labor supply.”

Looking at data from 2022, the study’s authors found that unionized construction companies account for 22% of the construction market in Wisconsin. Despite that, apprenticeship programs operated jointly by employers and unions enroll 77% of construction apprentices and account for 96% of the money spent in Wisconsin on apprenticeship programs.  

When it comes to training, “the unionized segment of the construction industry punches above its weight by a great deal,” MEPI economist Frank Manzo IV told the Wisconsin Examiner.

Funding advantage

Wisconsin also has certified construction apprenticeship programs operated by employers alone, but MEPI found that they enrolled only 23% of apprentices.

The investment in apprenticeship programs was similarly lopsided, the report finds. The spending on joint union-management programs totaled $64.3 million in 2022, compared with $2.9 million spent on the employer-only programs.

One reason for that gap is funding, Manzo said. Construction union labor agreements include a provision to cover the cost of apprenticeship programs as part of each worker’s total hourly wage and benefits.

“They’re funded by cents-per-hour contributions from employers that are used to train the next generation of skilled trades people,” Manzo said. “So, there’s always money for registered apprenticeship programs.”

By contrast, employer-only programs “rely entirely on voluntary contributions from those employers,” he said.

The study comes as the administration of Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers is proposing an administrative rule requiring that contractors employ apprentices as 10% of their workforce on state projects.

“These are all areas right now when we’re looking at how we can provide quality, middle class jobs,” said Kent Miller, president of the Wisconsin Laborers’ District Council. The union represents a broad cross-section of construction workers.

“I’ve heard many times from members how an apprenticeship helped them get their first home,” Miller said. “As much as we can invest in Wisconsin workers it pays dividends down the road. That’s why the private sector union construction industry is making these investments in worker apprenticeship programs.”

Demands for skilled labor

MEPI’s study grew out of the nonprofit institute’s review of how states are responding to an increasing need for skilled labor.

“The construction industry is facing high demand for qualified tradespeople to modernize infrastructure, energy systems, domestic manufacturing facilities, and that’s really happening across the Midwest — across the Rust Belt,” Manzo said.

The research team expected to see Wisconsin among faster-growing states in apprenticeship enrollment. But while apprenticeship numbers have increased by nearly 50% from 2016 to 2024 in the state, “we found that this growth has actually lagged neighboring states that maintained policies that promote workforce training investments and policies that promote workers’ rights,” Manzo said.

The clearest correlation the researchers found was whether states required contractors to pay prevailing local wages on state-funded construction projects.

Just as a federal law known as the Davis-Bacon Act requires construction projects on federal facilities to pay prevailing wages, a number of states have similar laws for state and local government projects.

Contractors are hired for government projects typically based on the lowest bid. Prevailing wage laws require bidders to meet local wage standards, keeping them from cutting wages in order to win the contract.

The requirements “level the playing field,” said Miller, the Laborers union president. “It prevents out-of-state contractors from coming into Wisconsin, low-bidding taxpayer-funded projects, doing shoddy work and taking taxpayer dollars that we’d like to see stay here in Wisconsin.”

Wisconsin repealed its state prevailing wage law in 2017, however.

Encouraging training investments

The MEPI researchers found that in four nearby states — Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota and Ohio — the number of construction apprentices increased by just over 63% from 2016 to 2024. All four states have maintained their state prevailing wage laws in that period, according to the report.

Prevailing wage laws “ensure that all firms — regardless of union status, by the way — would commit to these cents-per-hour contributions into registered apprenticeship programs while performing work on public works projects,” Manzo said.

Wisconsin’s “right-to-work” law, enacted in 2015, might also be holding down apprenticeship growth, the study’s authors suggest. Such laws forbid employers and unions from negotiating contracts that require all union-represented employees to either pay union dues or pay a fee towards the costs of the union’s work representing employees.

The law “is a government regulation that forces unions to represent nonmembers for free and erodes worker bargaining power by reducing the resources that unions would otherwise have to organize and provide resources and advocate for investments in training, job site safety and job quality,” Manzo said.

As he has in every budget he proposed, Evers included in his 2025-27 budget plan provisions to restore the state prevailing wage and end the right-to-work law. Both were among more than 600 items that the Republican majority of the Legislature’s Joint Finance Committee removed on their first day of budget deliberations Thursday.

Restoring Wisconsin prevailing wage law and repealing the right-to-work law would create an economic environment in which skilled trades workers know they will be supported, said Jacob Heger, an MEPI research analyst and coauthor of the report.

“They can go into these apprenticeship programs, they can get the quality training that they need and then they know that in public policy they’re backed up by what’s on the books [in state law], and that the people in their state capitols have their backs,” Heger said.

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President Donald Trump's budget request, released on May 2, 2025, proposes slashing $21 billion in unspent funds from the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law for renewable energy, electric vehicle charging infrastructure and other efforts to cut climate-warming carbon dioxide emissions.  Shown are solar panels and wind turbines. (Photo by Marga Buschbell-Steeger/Getty Images)

President Donald Trump’s budget request for the next fiscal year proposes deep cuts to renewable energy programs and other climate spending as the administration seeks to shift U.S. energy production to encourage more fossil fuels and push the focus away from reducing climate change.

The budget proposes slashing $21 billion in unspent funds from the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law for renewable energy, electric vehicle charging infrastructure and other efforts to cut climate-warming carbon dioxide emissions. The request also targets climate research spending and initiatives meant to promote diversity.

“President Trump is committed to eliminating funding for the globalist climate agenda while unleashing American energy production,” a White House fact sheet on climate and environment spending said. The budget “eliminates funding for the Green New Scam.”

The president’s budget request is a wish list for Congress, which controls federal spending, to consider. Even with both chambers of Congress controlled by Republicans who have shown an unusual willingness to follow Trump’s lead on a host of policies, it is best understood as a starting point for negotiations between the branches of government and a representation of the administration’s priorities.

A White House official speaking on background Friday, though, said the Trump administration is exploring ways to exert more control over the federal spending process, including by potentially refusing to spend funds appropriated by lawmakers.

The first budget request of Trump’s second term calls on Congress to cut non-defense accounts by $163 billion to $557 billion, while keeping defense funding flat at $893 billion.

‘Political talking points’

The proposal drew criticism for a focus on culture-war buzzwords, even from groups that are not always inclined to support environment and climate spending.

The request “is long on rhetoric and short on details,” Steve Ellis, president of the nonpartisan budget watchdog Taxpayers for Common Sense, said in a statement.

“This year’s version leans heavily on political talking points—taking aim at so-called ‘woke’ programs and the ‘Green New Scam,’ while proposing a massive Pentagon spending hike to pay for wasteful fantasies like the Golden Dome and diverting military resources to immigration enforcement missions.”

Renewable energy

The administration proposal would roll back funding Trump’s predecessor, Democrat Joe Biden, championed for renewable energy.

It would cancel more than $15 billion from the 2021 infrastructure law “purposed for unreliable renewable energy, removing carbon dioxide from the air, and other costly technologies that burden ratepayers and consumers,” according to the White House fact sheet.

It would also eliminate $6 billion for building electric vehicle charging infrastructure.

“EV chargers should be built just like gas stations: with private sector resources disciplined by market forces,” the fact sheet said.

And it would decrease spending on the Energy Department’s Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy program, which helps private-sector projects secure financing and conducts research on low-carbon energy sources, by $2.5 billion.

In a statement, Rep. Marcy Kaptur, the ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations subcommittee that writes the bill funding energy programs, slammed the cuts to renewable energy programs, saying they would cost consumers and hurt a growing domestic industry.

“The Trump Administration’s proposal to slash $20 Billion from the Department of Energy’s programs — particularly a devastating 74% cut to Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy — is shortsighted and dangerous,” the longtime Ohio lawmaker said. “By gutting clean energy investments, this budget threatens to raise energy prices for consumers, increase our reliance on foreign energy, and stifle American competitiveness. … We must defend the programs that power America’s future — cleaner, cheaper, and made right here at home.”

Diversity

Throughout the request, the administration targets programs out of line with Trump’s ideology on social issues, including those meant to promote diversity.

For energy and environment programs, that includes spending on environmental justice initiatives, which target pollution and climate effects in majority-minority and low-income communities, and organizations “that advance the radical climate agenda,” according to the fact sheet.

Research and grant funding for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration would be particularly hard hit by the proposal, which would terminate “a variety of climate-dominated research programs that are not aligned with Administration policy of ending ‘Green New Deal’ initiatives, saving taxpayers $1.3 billion.”

The budget also proposes eliminating $100 million from a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency fund dedicated to environmental justice. That funding “enabled a witch hunt against private industry” and “gave taxpayer dollars to political cronies who exploited the program’s racial preferencing policies to advance an anti-oil and gas crusade,” according to the White House.

National Park Service targeted

The budget also proposes cutting $900 million from National Park Service operations, which the administration said would come from defunding smaller sites while “supporting many national treasures.”

The document indicates the administration would prefer to leave responsibility for smaller sites currently under NPS management to states and refocus the federal government on the major parks that attract nationwide and international tourists.

“There is an urgent need to streamline staffing and transfer certain properties to State-level management to ensure the long-term health and sustainment of the National Park system,” according to a budget spreadsheet highlighting major line items in the request.

Despite laws in recent years to boost spending for maintenance at parks, the National Park Service faces a $23.3 billion deferred maintenance backlog, according to a July 2024 report from the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service.

The proposed NPS cut represents the largest single funding change – either positive or negative – of any line item under the Department of Interior, which would receive a funding decrease of more than $5 billion, about 30%, under the proposal.

Jennifer Shutt contributed to this report.

Farm Foundation is proud to announce the second cohort of students selected for the Careers in Ag and Food Exploration (CAFE) Student Workshop. This immersive program offers undergraduate students from 1890 land-grant institutions an exclusive opportunity to dive into the diverse and evolving world of agriculture and food systems. 

Held at North Carolina A&T State University, the CAFE Workshop equips students with professional development tools, career exploration experiences, and networking connections that extend well beyond the classroom. Over the course of the program, participants engage in hands-on sessions and thought-provoking conversations with leaders across the agri-food value chain—helping them better understand the range of impactful careers available in this vital sector. 

“We are thrilled to welcome this talented group of students to the CAFE Student Workshop,” said Jenna Wicks, program manager at Farm Foundation. “The food and agriculture sector offers a wide range of career opportunities, and we are committed to helping the next generation explore these possibilities.” 

The CAFE Student Workshop is made possible through support from the SAPLINGS (System Approach to Promote Learning and Innovation for the Next GenerationS) grant—an initiative led in collaboration with North Carolina A&T and funded by an $18.1 million award from the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture. 

We are honored to recognize the 2025 CAFE cohort: 

• Randall Gary, South Carolina State University 

• Jeronee Hinton, University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff 

• Gary Jarvis, North Carolina A&T State University 

• William Johnson, Tuskegee University 

• Sahara McMillan, Virginia State University 

• Jerricah Robinson, University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff 

• Cameron Shellman, Fort Valley State University 

• Jayla Silver, Tennessee State University 

• Markayla Watts, Tuskegee University 

These students represent a promising future across a variety of industries—bringing curiosity, passion, and a desire to grow.  

To learn more about the CAFE Student Workshop, visit: farmfoundation.org/cafe-student-workshop 

The post Spotlight on the 2025 CAFE Cohort: Discovering Opportunities in Food and Ag  appeared first on Farm Foundation.

A poll released Thursday, May 1 showed 76% of Americans oppose cuts to Medicaid. (Photo via Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — A majority of Americans, including most Republicans, oppose major cuts in federal funding for Medicaid, according to a poll released Thursday by the nonpartisan health research organization KFF.

The survey shows that 76% of those questioned wouldn’t support  Congress slashing the amount of spending dedicated to the state-federal health program for lower-income Americans and some people with disabilities.

Democrats held the highest rate of opposition at 95%. A small majority of Republicans surveyed, 55%, said they don’t support substantial federal spending cuts for the program.

The breakdown was nearly even among respondents who identified as Make America Great Again supporters — President Donald Trump’s base — with 51% of that group saying they support less federal funding for Medicaid and 49% saying they oppose major cuts to the federal allocation.

The survey comes just days before House Republicans are expected to release a bill that will likely propose cutting hundreds of billions in federal funding for Medicaid.

That legislation, as well as bills from several other committees, is supposed to help Republicans offset some of the $4.5 trillion deficit impact that comes with extending the 2017 tax law.

The KFF poll also showed strong opposition to slashing federal funding to other health care programs — 74% were against cuts to states for mental health and addiction prevention services, 71% didn’t support reducing federal spending to track infectious disease outbreaks, 69% opposed limiting federal dollars for research at universities and medical centers, 65% were against cuts to HIV prevention program allocations and 65% didn’t support reducing federal funding to help people buy health insurance through the Affordable Care Act.

Polling of 1,380 U.S. adults took place from April 8 to April 15 via telephone and online. The margin of error is plus or minus 3 percentage points.

Senate GOP watching House action

Senate Republicans are closely watching how their House colleagues restructure federal funding for Medicaid, and will likely propose changes when the entire 11-bill package comes over from the House later this year.

Several GOP senators told reporters at the Capitol on Wednesday they will judge the package based on how changes to Medicaid will impact their constituents.

Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley said he’s unlikely to support any changes to Medicaid that “will result in cutting benefits or denying eligibility for people who are otherwise working.”

“I’m all for work requirements,” he said. “I don’t think you get any Republican objection to that.”

But Hawley said going beyond that might be pressing the issue too far to get his vote.

“I just met with the governor of my state this morning. He’s in town. We just sat down and we talked about this issue,” Hawley said, adding that Gov. Mike Kehoe, a Republican, was “very worried about” potential changes to federal Medicaid funding.

Maine Sen. Susan Collins said she’s planning to evaluate the House bill once it makes it through that chamber based on “the impact on low-income seniors who are dual eligible, families with children with disabilities, low-income families, our rural hospitals, healthcare providers.”

Dual eligibility refers to people who are on Medicare and Medicaid.

“I am open to carefully crafted work requirements for able-bodied adults who do not have preschool children,” Collins said. “But I have no idea what the package is going to contain at this point.”

Kansas Sen. Jerry Moran said he’s told his chamber’s Republican leadership that “Medicaid is an important issue” for him in determining whether he votes for the entire package once it’s on the floor.

“I’m going to look at overall how it impacts citizens, particularly people with disabilities, and how it impacts my state and the hospitals that provide services to people in Kansas,” Moran said.

North Dakota Sen. John Hoeven said “the challenge is going to be to find savings in line with what the president has described.”

“He said he doesn’t want any cuts to Medicaid,” Hoeven said. “But how do you make sure that you eliminate waste, fraud and abuse? And that the folks that should be getting it are getting it, rather than an able-bodied person who should be out there working and is able to do that and take care of themselves.”

Education Secretary Linda McMahon testifies during her Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee confirmation hearing on Feb. 13, 2025.  (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)

A federal judge in Maryland ordered the Trump administration Thursday to pause enforcement of a new U.S. Education Department ban on diversity, equity and inclusion practices.

The order came as another federal judge in New Hampshire issued a preliminary injunction temporarily blocking the Trump administration from yanking federal funding from many schools.

The New Hampshire order, though, only applied to schools that employ members of the National Education Association — the country’s largest labor union, which brought the case challenging the ban — or the Center for Black Educator Development.

The rulings used different legal logic but arrived at the same conclusion: The administration’s ban on race-conscious practices is not valid.

In Maryland, U.S. District Judge Stephanie A. Gallagher said she ruled not on the merits of the policy, but the way the Trump administration developed it.

“This Court takes no view as to whether the policies at issue here are good or bad, prudent or foolish, fair or unfair. But this Court is constitutionally required to closely scrutinize whether the government went about creating and implementing them in the manner the law requires,” she wrote. “The government did not.”

Gallagher’s order pauses the enforcement of a Feb. 14 letter to school districts from Craig Trainor, the department’s acting assistant secretary for civil rights, that threatened to rescind federal funds for schools that use race-conscious practices in programming, admissions, scholarships and other aspects of student life.

In New Hampshire, U.S. District Judge Landya McCafferty wrote that “the loss of federal funding would cripple the operations of many educational institutions.”

McCafferty’s order has a nationwide effect, but McCafferty limited it to schools that employ NEA members, rejecting the union’s attempt to completely halt the policies outlined in the letter.

Teachers unions sued

The Feb. 14 letter drew swift legal action, and the National Education Association brought the suit in New Hampshire against the administration alongside the Center for Black Educator Development. 

The American Federation of Teachers — one of the largest teachers unions in the country — filed a complaint in February alongside its affiliate, AFT-Maryland. The American Sociological Association and a public school district in Oregon also sued over the letter.

“Today the court confirmed the importance of our job as educators to foster opportunity, dignity, and engagement,” Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, said in a statement after the Maryland ruling.

“The court agreed that this vague and clearly unconstitutional requirement is a grave attack on students, our profession, honest history, and knowledge itself,” she added. “It would hamper efforts to extend access to education, and dash the promise of equal opportunity for all, a central tenet of the United States since its founding.”

NEA also celebrated the preliminary injunction granted in its case Thursday, and the union’s president, Becky Pringle, said in a statement “today’s ruling allows educators and schools to continue to be guided by what’s best for students, not by the threat of illegal restrictions and punishment.”

The statement said President Donald Trump, billionaire head of the U.S. DOGE Service Elon Musk and Education Secretary Linda McMahon were responsible for an “attack” on public education.

“The fact is that Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and Linda McMahon are using politically motivated attacks and harmful and vague directives to stifle speech and erase critical lessons to attack public education, as they work to dismantle public schools,” Pringle said. “This is why educators, parents, and community leaders are organizing, mobilizing, and using every tool available to protect our students and their futures.”

The Education Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday.

Letter raised questions

In the February letter, Trainor offered a wide-ranging interpretation of a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in 2023 involving Harvard University and the University of North Carolina, which struck down the use of affirmative action in college admissions.

Trainor wrote that though the ruling “addressed admissions decisions, the Supreme Court’s holding applies more broadly.”

The four-page letter raised a slew of questions for schools across pre-K through college over what fell within the requirements, and the department later released a Frequently Asked Questions document on the letter in an attempt to provide more guidance.

Earlier this month, the Education Department gave state education leaders just days to certify all K-12 schools in their states were complying with the letter in order to keep receiving federal financial assistance. The department and the groups suing in the New Hampshire case later reached an agreement that paused enforcement. 

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