The note that shocked the White House

President Donald Trump intended that his flooding of executive orders should shock and honor his opponents. But Monday night, a memo from the Office of Management and budget instead of Trump shocked the White House.

The memo, with its call for a “temporary break” to all federal state fellow and loans, vulnerable panic and confusion within the federal government and among the millions of individuals and institutions that rely on federal funds. But it was released without undergoing the usual approval processes in the White House.

The memo was produced by the budget office alone, which was not properly unsubscribed from the White House, according to a senior official in the White House and another person who is familiar with the note. The team led by Trump’s Deputy Head of Politics, Stephen Miller, had requested to see the memo before it went out, but Omb never sent it over, these people said.

As a result, the White House was caught by the guard when the memo triggered the kind of chaos that Trump’s team had hoped would be a western of his first period. Within 48 hours, OMB was forced to resign.

After the memo was originally released, employees of the White House were facing a communication problem, if not also a policy – prepared press secretary in the White House Karoline Leavitt to deal with questions about financing freezing at her initial briefing yesterday.

As expected, pepper journalists with questions about which federal programs could be affected by the freezer. “I have now been asked and answered this question four times,” said a slightly annoyed Leavitt. “For individuals at home who receive direct assistance from the federal government: You will not be affected by this federal freezer.”

In response to the confusion sent omb A clarification memo Yesterday insisted that the break “did not use across the table” and was intended to influence programs from the Biden administration that were not synchronized with Trump’s daily executive orders, such as Dei initiatives and “The Green New Deal”-as Republicans use as a catching event for climate programs.

But if the OMB memo was not properly monitored, it should not have come as a complete surprise. A slip tire labeled “Office of Management and Budget”, which outlines priorities and goals in line with Trump’s agenda – marked “Confidential”, carrying seals in the president’s executive office and dated January 2025 – has circulated on Capitol Hill. The presentation, which focused on what it calls “legislative incorrect adjustment”, presents columns with problems paired with actions intended to tackle them.

E.g. Combating Signing Control of 1974 is listed as a problem because it undermines the president’s ability “to ensure fiscal responsibility.” The proposed action is to restore the “Deputing Authority” by challenging the constitutionality of the law in court. Both Trump and Russell Vought, his nominees to lead the budget office, have claimed that the Law on the Water Gate era-what generally prevents the executive branch from spending less than what Congress has awarded various programs and purposes-is constitutional.

Another problem according to the presentation is that “existing legal interpretations protect anchored bureaucratic practice.” To resolve it, it requires the appointment of “a bold General General of OMB with a mandate to challenge outdated legal precedent that protects the status quo.”

A OMB spokesman, Rachel Cauley, told me that despite outlined in detail, many steps that Trump actually took in the office was not the work of Trump’s incoming team. “Trump officials have never seen this document before, and it’s pretty clear that it was generated before Trump was in office,” Cauley wrote to me in a text message.

But regardless of its origin, the glide -cover seems to have been strangely prophetic. The source, who was familiar with the OMB memo, who touched so much controversy this week said it had been prepared by Mark Paoletta, who was appointed by Trump as the agency’s general adviser. Omb refused to comment on this claim.

Even after OMB lifted his Monday Memo, confusion ruled. This afternoon Leavitt tried to clarify things with a post on x“This is not a termination of federal financing freezing,” she wrote. “It’s simply a cancellation of the OMB memo.”

Her post did a little to solve the lingering questions about federal means, but made it clear how the White House now feels about the note.