A federal judge blocked Donald Trump’s plan to freeze hundreds of billions of dollars in payments to federal programmes just minutes before it was set to take effect on Tuesday, capping a day of US political chaos less than two weeks into the new president’s term in office.
Loren AliKhan, a judge in the Washington, DC district court, temporarily halted part of the Trump White House’s order to pause federal financial assistance, according to US media reports, and ordered the funding to continue until a hearing on February 3.
The judge’s decision came after hours of confusion, recrimination and panic around the country as recipients of federal loans and grants — including medical programmes for the poor and elderly — grappled with the scale of the president’s sweeping order to halt the assistance.