So much for the carrot, eh?
With a new vote coming this afternoon on the clean continuing resolution in the Senate, Donald Trump turned up the heat and laid down another red line on the Schumer Shutdown -- almost literally. Today, the White House canceled more than two billion dollars earmarked for infrastructure spending in Chicago. That money would have funded expansion of public transit, including the Windy City's Red Line.
Russ Vought called it a "suspension" as the administration reviewed the city's DEI practices:
The Trump administration has frozen $2.1 billion in federal funds allocated for Chicago in its latest budgetary maneuver targeting Democratic priorities and projects during the continuing government shutdown. ...
The newly frozen $2.1 billion was meant to fund subway projects in Chicago, Russell Vought, director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, said Friday.
That money was “put on hold to ensure funding is not flowing via race-based contracting,” Vought said.
The Los Angeles Times lays out the damage for Governor J.B. Pritzker and Mayor Brandon Johnson:
The pause affects a long-awaited plan to extend the city’s Red Line train. The money was “put on hold to ensure funding is not flowing via race-based contracting,” budget director Russ Vought wrote on social media. ...
Losing the money would be a significant setback for Chicago’s transportation plans. The Red Line extension is slated to add four train stops on the city’s South Side, improving access for disadvantaged communities.
In addition, a broader modernization project for the Red and Purple lines, which Vought said was also being targeted, is intended to upgrade stations and remove a bottleneck where different lines intersect.
This is similar to -- but much smaller than -- another "pause" on funding for two projects in New York City. One would have created a new tunnel under the Hudson to connect commuters between New Jersey and NYC, and the other would have provided resources for a subway line in the city itself. Combined, New York lost $18 billion in federal funding while the Department of Transportation reprioritized its spending during the shutdown.
Clearly, Trump and Vought want to turn up the heat on the next vote for the clean CR. They're also offering the carrot on talks about extending ObamaCare subsidies, but they want to make sure that Democrats understand that Trump and Vought are ready to play hardball too.
However, these opening moves all have one thing in common: they're all targeting grant money. Vought has shut down some agencies in these opening days -- the Bureau of Labor Statistics, notably, which would have otherwise published the September jobs report this morning -- but have not fired/laid off federal employees yet, as both have threatened. Even these grant cancellations are being characterized as "pauses" and "suspensions," suggesting that the money may become available again if Democrats quit obstructing the budget process.
Trump and Vought are escalating slowly. They are saving the big sticks for later. These first moves are just demonstrations, reminders of the power Democrats handed Trump in the Schumer Shutdown, designed to send messages without doing substantial damage. Yet, that is. Both Trump and Vought have talked tough in public but seem concerned with maintaining an off-ramp for Democrats that won't create more headaches down the road.
However, there's a limit to that kind of tactical patience. Democrats used to call Trump TACO before they objected to Mexican cultural references, an acronym for Trump Always Chickens Out. That may be why Democrats thought a shutdown scenario would be safe, but Trump will want to drop the hammer at some point. One has to wonder whether the hammer will drop after today's floor vote on the clean CR. A three-day shutdown is no big deal, but if Democrats want to push it farther, Trump and Vought may decide enough is enough -- and start making permanent, unfixable changes in the federal bureaucracy where it will hurt Democrats most.
This latest "pause" is likely the last shot across the bow. This is Trump and Vought using the Chicago Red Line to lay down a red line of their own. Will Democrats change course? John Thune seems hopeful:
From colleague Tyler Olson. Thune on Dems: At some point they're going to take yes for an answer. We have done everything we can to accommodate the concerns. A lot of these folks are interested in a normal appropriations process, too. So that's what we want to get back to, which…
— Chad Pergram (@ChadPergram) October 3, 2025
Thune will get his answer this afternoon -- and Democrats will get theirs all weekend.
Editor’s Note: The Schumer Shutdown is here. Rather than put the American people first, Chuck Schumer and the radical Democrats forced a government shutdown for healthcare for illegals. They own this.
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