Blue states pile on after Trump suffers devastating court loss

U.S. President Donald Trump welcomes Saudi Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohammed bin Salman (not pictured) during an arrival ceremony on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., November (REUTERS)

Another state agency is smelling weakness after President Donald Trump’s humiliating court loss over frozen funds, reports the Gothamist.

Earlier this month, a Manhattan federal judge ruled the Trump administration must release funding for an expensive road infrastructure project connecting New York and New Jersey, after Trump tried to use the funding to pressure the states to put his name on major travel centers.

Now, mere weeks after Judge Jeannette Vargas ordered the Trump administration to “unfreeze” the funding and NY AG Letitia James ordered him to be quick about it, another New York agency is threatening a lawsuit over yet another of Trump’s funding freezes.

This freeze involves a suit to release money for crucial subway construction if Trump doesn’t hand it over by March 6.

“If we don't have the resumption of reimbursements … We're going to have to actually follow our friends in the Gateway program and pursue a solution through the federal court, through the court process,” MTA Chair Janno Lieber said during a Wednesday board meeting.

In August, The Gothamist reports New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority approved a nearly $2 billion contract to complete most of the work for the project. Over the next year, MTA officials plan to issue two more contracts to complete the work, but Trump and his lieutenants are holding up that money for reasons similar to the unconnected project for which Judge Vargas dinged Trump.

Roughly a year into Trump’s second term, U.S. judges are beginning to turn on the president. Trump’s war on illegal searches and seizures of journalists took a blow in court this week after a judge blocked the Justice Department from conducting further action in the "outrageous" seizure of a journalist's phone. That judge also accused the administration of misleading him about the law to get the original warrant.

Another U.S. District judge invoked anti-totalitarian author George Orwell to rebuke the Trump administration’s removal of items recognizing the history of slavery in the United States from a Philadelphia exhibit.

In addition to countless little cuts, judges are delivering to Trump, his own conservative Supreme Court handed him a devastating blow over the illegality of his unilateral tariffs under emergency orders.

These many decisions appear to be emboldening Trump’s perceived enemies into further legal action.

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