I became a federal employee in 1985, skirting a government-wide hiring freeze by vaunt of being a Presidential Management Intern (PMI), a program intended to recruit the “best and the brightest” into public service. My boss, a branch chief at the U.S. Office of Management and Budget, was relieved to be able to exploit the loophole created by my two-year internship to fill a vacant position examining the Medicare budget.
Not too long after my arrival at the New Executive Office Building, the senior managers in my branch gathered the team together. Most of us were in our 20s, graduates from the University of Michigan, University of Chicago, Harvard or Princeton. They wanted to talk about the Impoundment Control Act of 1974, which asserted Congressional power over Presidential withholding of approved budget outlays. OMB has (limited) authority to block quarterly releases of Congressionally sanctioned funds, which it used as a kind of whip to get departments and agencies to bend to its wishes. In the case of Medicare, “recessions” and “deferrals” largely revolved around properly policing spending on hospital and physician services.
Impounding funds was okay, we were told, as long as there was a solid rationale – a poorly performing program; signs of corruption – and a clear schedule as to when and how monies would ultimately be released. Holding Congressionally approved budgets forever, or for purely political reasons, wasn’t allowed.
Within his first month in office President Trump had eliminated the PMI program, and circumvented or perverted OMB’s institutional integrity related to impoundments, among other profound disruptions.
Those distressed about the Administration’s actions are grappling with a host of unpleasant emotions. Former or present federal employees, or those engaged in federally-funded programs, are shell-shocked – and in some cases financially devastated – by the wiping out of their past or present legacies. The U.S. Agency for International Development no longer exists in a recognizable form. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Energy Department have taken sharp policy turns towards the fossil fuel and chemical industries. The Department of Education is being dismantled. It’s as if the children you raised to be respectful, compassionate, and socially responsible suddenly started dealing fentanyl, or selling automatic weapons to school kids.
Others are feeling stripped of agency. Community advocates, Democrats, civil, environmental, and immigrant activists who have intermittently enjoyed decades of political successes are firmly no longer in the room where it happens. They aren’t even in the building. The notion that well-meaning, persistent, individuals with a righteous idea can positively change the world has been deeply disturbed. It’s an emotion that Trump supporters have likely felt for decades, until now. A bottomless sense of powerlessness, in which the only hope is a winning lottery ticket or heavenly intervention.
Although those opposed to the Trump agenda have little room to maneuver, this is a temporary condition. Advocates have enlisted courts to block or alter illegal executive orders, admittedly with mixed results. Congressional elections are a year and a half away. Trump’s stutter-step ascension to a second term itself demonstrates that a dedicated set of clever individuals can reshape politics.
And yes, the Trumpists are clever. The similarities between Elon Musk and Austin Power’s Dr. Evil are uncanny.
Perhaps most disturbingly, we’re in a period of profound historical change. The “arc of justice” that ushered in programs to right past wrongs principally visited on non-European-American populations; an international order that relied on a multinational web of cooperation to address public health, environmental, and security challenges; the rule of law and institutional integrity, among other compacts, have been shattered. Not all the disruptions are unalterably bad; elements of U.S. international aid need to be reformed; diversity and inclusion initiatives merit finetuning; the federal budget deficit is insanely high. But the Trump Administration’s sledgehammer demolition of the houses that Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt, Johnson, Nixon, and even Reagan built marks an epic change in who and what America is and will be.
The combination of elements – particularly the seeming elimination of political agency in a period of historical change – is intensely disorienting. It’s reminiscent of what prior generations experienced; a stream of events – the Great Depression, World War II – over which ordinary people had absolutely no control. Perhaps worse, no outside dictator can be blamed. We created the situation we now live in. In response, one can sink into despair or swim with the current, looking for a place to safely get out of the water.
Ultimately, the resistance will need to build new boats to withstand volatile weather and navigate different Tradewinds. After all, while Trump fiddles with tariffs and diddles with Russia, actual problems – climate change, microplastics, income inequality – are only getting worse. Our most existential fear – that Trump is intentionally crashing the economy to usher in a second coming, in which the gender genie is stuffed back into the bottle and might makes right – will only come true if we let it.