MIAMI — About 36 hours after anyone learned that Donald Trump’s budget office was ordering federal agencies to pause all assistance programs, Republicans in Congress had settled on a message about the controversy: This is all the media’s fault.
“I want to address that ridiculous first media hoax of 2025,” House Majority Whip Tom Emmer said during a House Republican retreat here. “The Office of Management and Budget’s review of certain spending priorities should be seen for what it is: good governance.”
Emmer continued that there had been “a lot of outright lies from members of the media,” and even though the Trump administration, hours later, would rescind the OMB directive — suggesting that the controversy over the memo was not just some media creation — Emmer was certain the debate over the federal aid freeze was manufactured.