Morning Roundup: Trump’s Spending Freeze Already Has Consequences

January 29: Ilan Goldenberg, Jim Acosta, Dr. Cynthia Idriss-Miller, Jennifer Weiss-Wolf and more

Good morning, Contrarian community! Today our heads and headlines are full of the fallout from Trump’s unconstitutional edicts to freeze nearly all federal grants, loans, and other assistance.

Ilan Goldenberg, Special Advisor on the Middle East under Vice President Kamala Harris and author of Dialogue and Dissonance, joins us with an elucidation of just how much can go wrong in a 90-day pause to foreign aid—and what damages are already underway, from an endangered ceasefire to intentionally destroyed HIV/AIDS resources. It’s a must-read: Trump’s Foreign Aid Spending Freeze – a Combination of Chaos and Cruelty

And Jennifer Rubin and Meghan Houser look at the looming crisis of missing grants for healthcare research, in lost science and lost lives: The Human Cost of Frozen Funds

Of course, with the Trump administration one crisis is never enough. This morning we also featured a vital conversation between Jen Rubin and Dr. Cynthia Miller-Idriss about the pardoning of the January 6th rioters and its impact on domestic terrorism and extremism: Jen Rubin and Dr. Cynthia Miller-Idriss (video)

And in happier news, Norm Eisen joined newly-former CNN correspondent Jim Acosta for a Substack Live last night to welcome him to the world of independent media. As Norm said, the water’s fine! Here’s a clip, fearing the fortifying message from Acosta that “There is such a thing as truth”: Live with Jim Acosta and Norm Eisen (video)

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And in case you missed it yesterday evening…

*Jennifer Weiss-Wolf brings us A Citizen’s Guide to Menopause Advocacy in her bracing piece on the multi-generational fight for women’s healthcare: The Fight for Midlife and Menopausal Health is Essential to Reproductive Rights—and Democracy.

*And Jen Rubin spoke with Dr. Rob Davidson about how public health is at severe risk, especially in light of RFK Jr. and his potential confirmation, and what he and his group have done to try to prevent that from happening.

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We’re grateful to The Contrarian’s expert voices for making sense of our tumultuous present and to you, our readers, for lending your own voices to the fight for democracy. Keep sharing your thoughts with us and with one another!