New York attorney general calls on state health care providers to continue gender-affirming care
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(NEW YORK) — New York Attorney General Letitia James sent a letter to health care providers, calling on medical institutions to continue providing gender-affirming care amid reports, according the attorney general’s office, that several providers in the state had stopped providing treatments following a President Donald Trump executive order.
James reminded providers in a Monday letter “to comply with New York law … [providers] must continue to provide health care services, including gender affirming care, to transgender or gender nonconforming individuals.”
They must provide care regardless “of the availability of federal funding,” James told providers, noting that New York State laws prohibit discrimination, which includes “withholding the availability of services from transgender individuals based on their gender identity or their diagnosis of gender dysphoria, while offering such services to cisgender individuals.”
In a Jan. 28 executive order, Trump threatened to stop providing federal funding and grants to medical institutions that provided gender-affirming care for people under the age of 19.
Trump’s executive order does not restrict puberty blockers, hormone therapies, or surgeries for cisgender patients under the age of 19.
On Jan. 31, a federal judge issued a temporary restraining order to stop Trump’s efforts to freeze federal funding, saying that the freeze is likely a violation of the Constitution.
James’ office told providers in her letter that the temporary restraining order applied to both current and future grants of federal assistance and that funding cannot be frozen or withdrawn as it applies to providing gender affirming care to minors.
The executive order against gender-affirming care is the latest action from Trump that impacts the transgender community, which is estimated to make up less than 1% of the U.S. population over the age of 13.
Trump also recently signed executive orders restricting transgender participation in the military, ending federal legal recognition of transgender people, and restricting gender marker changes on federal documents.
James was one of 22 state attorneys general behind the lawsuit aiming to halt the implementation of the Trump administration’s policies freezing federal agency grants and financial assistance.
(WASHINGTON) — White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, during her first press briefing on Tuesday, faced a barrage of questions on the administration’s freeze on federal financial assistance programs that congressional Democrats called flatly illegal.
Agencies face a 5 p.m. ET deadline to comply with a memo from the White House Office of Management and Budget to cease spending on any grant or loan programs if they suspect it might conflict with President Donald Trump’s recent executive orders on DEI, foreign aid, climate spending more.
The memo prompted widespread confusion among advocacy organizations and state officials, some of whom reported error messages when trying to access portals to draw down funds for Medicaid, community health centers and more.
A legal challenge has been filed by nonprofits and health groups who argue the Office of Management and Budget is exceeding its authority.
“There’s no uncertainty in this building,” Leavitt said when asked to clarify about exactly what programs will be impacted.
“Social Security benefits, Medicare benefits, food stamps, welfare benefits, assistance that is going directly to individuals will not be impacted by this pause,” she said.
Leavitt later added, “However, it is the responsibility of this president and this administration to be good stewards of taxpayer dollars. That is something that President Trump campaigned on.”
Leavitt said the freeze was temporary, but did not expand on a specific timeline on when it would end.
When asked if Medicaid was impacted by the pause, Leavitt couldn’t immediately say. She also did not directly respond to a question on the impact on organizations like Meals on Wheels, which provides meals to 2.2 million seniors, or Head Start, a program for preschool education, that receive federal funding.
Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden posted on social media about reports about Medicaid portals being down in states as he criticized the freeze.
Leavitt, after the briefing, wrote on X: “The White House is aware of the Medicaid website portal outage. We have confirmed no payments have been affected — they are still being processed and sent. We expect the portal will be back online shortly.”
An OMB memo obtained by ABC News Senior Political Correspondent Rachel Scott also sought to shed light on the freeze’s implications.
According to the memo, “in addition to Social Security and Medicare, already explicitly excluded in the guidance, mandatory programs like Medicaid and SNAP will continue without pause.”
“Funds for small businesses, farmers, Pell grants, Head Start, rental assistance, and other similar programs will not be paused,” the document read. “If agencies are concerned that these programs may implicate the President’s Executive Orders, they should consult OMB to begin to unwind these objectionable policies without a pause in the payments.”
Still, the pause could have sweeping implication as the federal government funds thousands of programs, including housing subsidies and educational grants.
The Environmental Protection Agency, which gives grants for an array of national, state and tribal programs — including some to assist with air and water quality — said on Tuesday it was temporarily pausing disbursement.
(WASHINGTON) — Lawmakers from both political parties invoked China as a potential winner in international development as the U.S. reviews its foreign assistance programs and non-governmental organizations funded largely by American grants await answers on the fate of funds critical to their missions abroad.
An official for the demining authority in Cambodia on Thursday said he received a notification to “demobilize staff members and operational teams under the support of the U.S.” starting on March 1, calling the loss of the partnership a “critical situation.”
Grantees in Cambodia were ordered to stop work via an email on Jan. 26 from the State Department office which has since 1993 dispersed grants globally to remove landmines and unexploded ordnance.
A State Department spokesperson told ABC News that “each program is undergoing a review with the goal of restructuring assistance to serve U.S. interests,” including the demining grants from the Office of Weapons Removal and Abatement.
In its 2024 annual report, the office said the U.S. was the world’s “top supporter” of weapons destruction projects, including landmine clearance.
‘Clearing unexploded ordnance here for 100 years’
U.S. grants fund 30% of demining work in Cambodia, a vital nationwide effort in the southeast Asian country to remove landmines from its brutal civil war and unexploded bombs dropped by the U.S. in the Vietnam War, said Bill Morse, chairman of Cambodian Self-Help Demining.
“We’ll be clearing unexploded ordnance here for 100 years,” he said to ABC News via video call from Cambodia.
In a statement, Heng Ratana, the director of the Cambodian Mine Action Centre (CMAC), which oversees demining operations in the country, pointed to other countries in Asia — such as China and Japan — and western nations like Germany and Canada who continue to fund the Cambodian authority on demining.
CMAC estimates the country is laden with as many as 4 to 6 million landmines and other unexploded ordnance. Nearly 20,000 people have been killed — and 10,000 more have had amputations because of their injuries — in explosions, according to HALO Trust, a leading NGO.
Non-governmental organizations that work in coordination with CMAC are looking for new funding sources amid uncertainty during the freeze, said Morse, whose NGO has received grants from the State Department since 2009.
“We’ll take money from anyone if they help us clear landmines. I’m not going to be picky about it,” Morse said.
Demining is viewed as a key link between the U.S. and Cambodia, a developing nation that has increasingly relied on China for infrastructure investments and is an ally of Beijing.
Flying the American flag in the field
Demining “is a highly visible demonstration of American support for a country,” Morse said. “We fly the American flag in the field. Our uniforms carry the American flag on it. The helmets that we wear have the American flag on it.”
“Most people in the country, in the countryside, what they know of the United States is what we’re doing in the field … They’ve never seen an ambassador in their life. I may be the only American they ever meet.”
China, which has been a partner on demining efforts in Cambodia, dispersed $4.4 million to the demining authority last week, CMAC announced.
Democrats and Republicans on the House Foreign Affairs Committee sparred over U.S. foreign assistance in a Thursday hearing focused on USAID programs, which Chairman Brian Mast, R-Fla., said are “indefensible” and “literally betray America.”
“Your money would’ve been better off if it had simply been thrown into a fireplace,” Mast said to open the hearing.
Yet members from both parties pointed to the rising influence of China, alarmed that China could open a spigot of cash for international aid in areas where U.S. programs cease. “It counters China,” former Republican Rep. Ted Yoho testified, describing development work. “If we’re not there, China will be there.”
Strategic competition with China
The top Republican and Democrat on the panel’s East Asia subcommittee framed the assistance issue in terms of strategic competition with China.
“I worry about what’s happening in the Pacific Islands … we’re ceding our influence there,” said Rep. Ami Bera, D-Calif. “We’re already seeing China step in and take things over.”
Rep. Young Kim, R-Calif., like Bera invoked demining work, citing “reports of CCP officials signaling their willingness to replace USAID in Nepal and demining activities in Cambodia.”
“Even critics of USAID acknowledge the critical soft power value of targeted and efficient programming,” she said.
A House Democratic staffer told ABC News that recipient countries, including allies, of U.S. assistance will be left with little choice but to turn to China.
The U.S. has engaged in Ghana “in part” to limit China’s gains, the staffer said, calling it “a really good U.S. partner” that now has a $156 million gap for which to compensate.
“They don’t want to work with China more. But when you have a country that has such a liquidity crisis — they have a new president, and now they have this huge funding gap — what do you expect them to do?” the staffer asked.
All three expert witnesses at Thursday’s committee hearing agreed that China represents a counterweight to the U.S. in international development.
“The U.S. has owned the space,” the Democratic staffer said, noting Russia’s recent work on mpox and ebola in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, low-visibility assistance that could become more apparent if the U.S. pulls back permanently.
Yoho said good programs run by USAID and the State Department should be “back online as soon as possible” and “mission-driven” projects should be prioritized.
In a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio last week, 17 former ambassadors to Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos called for Rubio “to end the 90 day stop work order for U.S. foreign assistance programming that suspends U.S.-funded mine clearance programs” via “a waiver or quick and affirmative review.”
The diplomats said in their letter that U.S.-funded demining work advances national security by ensuring bad actors do not weaponize explosive materials and by fostering important connections in defense and economics.
“As former Ambassadors, we can attest that these programs helped us advance US interests by generating goodwill and providing access to senior government officials,” they wrote.
In its statement to ABC News, the State Department said it was standing up a coordination team to ensure the review of foreign assistance was “accountable” and “transparen[t].”
“Programs that serve our nation’s interests will continue,” the spokesperson said. “However, programs that aren’t aligned with our national interest will not.”
The stakes are life-and-death, Morse said.
“What’s going to happen is, [there’s a] very good chance people are going to die. Next month, they’re going to walk into an area that should have been cleared this month.”
“They’re going to step on a landmine, blow their leg off and bleed out,” he said.
About 81% of cleared land is used for farming, 15% for schools and hospitals and housing, and 4% for energy infrastructure, according to Morse, creating a key second-order effect of development.
“Clearing landmines doesn’t simply save lives,” he said.
(WASHINGTON) — Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will not attend President-elect Donald Trump‘s inauguration, according to her spokesperson.
Pelosi notably attended Trump’s inauguration in 2017, when she was the House Democratic leader.
A spokesman did not disclose a reason why the California Democrat is skipping the high-profile event.
While she broke her hip on an international trip to Luxembourg late last year, Pelosi returned to the Capitol for both the first day of the new Congress as well as the count of the electoral votes on Jan. 6.
Attending 11 inaugurations so far, Pelosi has rubbed elbows with presidents at their inauguration dating back to her high school days when John F. Kennedy was sworn into office in 1961.
Pelosi has mostly maintained cordial relationships with Republican presidents, particularly George W. Bush despite their differences over the Iraq War and Afghanistan.
But the friction and public battles with Trump, including shouting matches in the Oval Office — have created headlines — such as when she pointed a finger at him in a White House photo opportunity or when she stood over his shoulder and ripped up a copy of his State of the Union remarks in 2020.
Pelosi’s criticism only amplified after the 2020 election and the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol. Pelosi also grew enraged when Trump mocked the violent hammer attack against her husband, Paul Pelosi.
In turn, Trump labeled Pelosi at his 2024 campaign rallies as “an enemy from within.”
“She’s a crooked person. She’s a bad person, evil. She’s an evil, sick, crazy,” Trump said before appearing to mouth the word “b*tch” “Oh no. It starts with a B– but I won’t say it. I want to say it. I want to say it,” Trump said about Pelosi at his final campaign rally in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
ABC News’ John Parkinson and Lalee Ibssa contributed to this report.
