The bill that Trump signed on July 4 is a beast from the pit and will dump extra requirements on state and local governments -- unless they, too, give in, hang their heads and let low-income workers fend completely for themselves. Some will do that; we feature here some who are not. Maryland is making its own moves, other states are also looking for ways to avoid housing market collapse, nutritional and health-care deficits and other human-rights abuses in many locations. The carnage in Texas floods, in which the National Weather Service's huge DOGE staff cuts may have contributed to lack of warning and preparedness, just amounts to the most jarring examples of what the cuts in this bill will do in order to fatten the tax benefits that the rich can send their platoons of lawyers out to reap. We hope this blog post will illustrate both the worst consequences and the most inventive responses of local governments and outraged working people to this devastating Trump assault. It is important now, as noted below, not to be fooled by the GOP timeline that puts off the worst damage until after the 2026 elections. The congressional jellyfish who knuckled under to Trump and voted for this casino-carnival of inequality have got to start paying the price today, and every day. Gear up.
HERE IN MARYLAND
MONEY, POLITICS AND INFLUENCE IN MARYLAND: TWO ROUNDUPS
Lobbyists' Political Donations Skyrocket Before 2026 Election: Lobbyists seeking to influence Maryland officials donated about $2.6 million to the campaigns of those officials since the last statewide election in 2022 — a nearly 75% increase compared to the same period during the previous four-year term, according to an analysis. The spike in donations has helped pad the campaign war chests of Gov. Wes Moore, top leaders in the General Assembly and hundreds of other rank-and-file lawmakers or local officials before another important election next year in 2026. Baltimore Sun.
Maryland's Congress Members Got Free Trips: To Where and Who Paid? Members of Maryland’s congressional delegation or their staffs got thousands of dollars worth of international or domestic travel paid for by nonprofit groups, some of which have strong policy agendas, according to congressional ethics disclosures. The destinations included Bellagio on Italy’s Lake Como; Dublin; Belfast, Northern Ireland; Tel Aviv, Israel; and Orlando, Fla. Baltimore Sun.
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Maryland Aging Slightly Faster Than U.S. Average, New Census Numbers Show Some of the fastest-aging counties are in central Maryland, while rural counties are a mixed bag. Maryland Matters
A Year After Moore's Weed Pardons, Impact Limited: Last June, Gov. Wes Moore (D) issued a blanket pardon to 100,000 people in Maryland, forgiving decades of low-level marijuana possession charges in one of the nation’s most far-reaching acts of clemency. A year after the pardons — which Moore has called record-setting “both in impact and scope” — their practical impact has been limited. WaPo
Maryland Officials Vow To Fight Trump Plans To Relocate FBI To Another Site In D.C. They say Greenbelt, selected after years of competition, is still a better site for the agency than Ronald Reagan Building announced Tuesday. Officials say years-long study and process are junked as Trump, Patel eye empty USAID space in DC. Maryland Matters
Eight Sheriff’s Offices Partner With ICE: In June, another Maryland county joined an Immigration and Customs Enforcement program that would allow local officers to carry out some of the federal agency’s work, bringing the number of participating counties up to eight. Baltimore Sun.
Snap Cuts Could Threaten Sun Bucks Program: Maryland distributed more than $23 million at the end of June to help the families of more than a half-million low-income children afford food this summer while school is out. Maryland Matters.
What Mamdani’s NY Victory Might Portend for Maryland Progressives: Maryland is traditionally a top-down state politically. Until recently, the state’s political landscape has been dominated by senior Democrats. So the pulses of young progressives in Maryland quickened considerably last week when a 33-year-old self-described democratic socialist, Zohran Mamdani, emerged as the unlikely victor in the Democratic primary for mayor of New York City. Opinion from Maryland Matters
Baltimore Sun fires its longtime cartoonist, Kevin “KAL” Kallaugher: After a 31-year career at The Sun, KAL’s pretty sure his progressive views ran afoul of conservative broadcast mogul David Smith, who’s owned the paper for less than two years. Baltimore Brew
And Two Stories Actually Straddling State Lines: MD: After last Chesapeake Bay cleanup plan fell short in Maryland, new proposal aims to be flexible, data-driven | Maryland Matters and VA: Virginia hikes funding for ag conservation projects aimed at Chesapeake Bay cleanup | Virginia Mercury both via Stateline
THE OTHER 49
Call This the Lede Paragraph of the Week: “The ink is not even dry on the far-reaching domestic policy law that President Trump signed on Friday, and already state governments are bracing for impact as Washington shifts much of the burden for health care, food assistance and other programs onto them.” More in the NYT and for example: New Mexico governor suggests special session to address federal fallout from Republican budget bill | Source New Mexico via Stateline
And another thing: President Trump’s omnibus reconciliation bill, signed into law over the weekend, includes a provision to move the Space Shuttle Discovery from the National Air and Space Museum outside of Washington to Space Center Houston. The Smithsonian, which maintains ownership of the shuttle, says transportation and construction of a new facility would cost $300 million. (Dallas Morning News) via Pluribus
Transit Faces a Growing Repair Backlog
The repair backlog for[mostly state- and local-run] transit systems in the U.S. has ballooned to an estimated $140.2 billion. How did we get here? Decades of underinvestment, rising inflation, and aging systems. Without more sustained investment, agencies will struggle to keep aging infrastructure in working order—putting reliability and service at risk for millions of riders. Pew Trust reports
Focus on Energy: Maine Gov. Janet Mills (D) has signed legislation creating a state Department of Energy Resources. The new agency will have authority to conduct competitive procurement for new clean energy projects as Maine seeks to meet its goal of 100% clean electricity by 2040. (Maine Public Radio) via Pluribus
Abortion Access: Judge Backs Voters: Abortion services will resume in Missouri this week following a court order blocking enforcement of almost all of the state’s laws restricting the procedure, the Missouri Independent reports. A circuit court judge issued an order to enforce the abortion rights amendment approved by voters in November, though Republican lawmakers want to ask voters to repeal that measure next year. Stateline Daily
Housing-crisis solutions at many levels: “Seattle astounded housing advocates around the country in February 2025, when roughly two-thirds of voters approved a ballot initiative proposing a new 5% payroll tax on salaries in excess of US$1 million.…despite nationwide, bipartisan skepticism of government and tax increases, Seattle’s voters showed that in light of a severe affordability crisis, a new role for the public sector and a new, dedicated fiscal revenue stream for housing were not only necessary, but possible.” An architect and urban historian rounds up the latest breakthroughs in social housing and how to avoid the two-tiered systems of the past. In The Conversation
States Fight Library Censorship: Rhode Island has joined at least eight other Democratic-led states that have taken steps against library censorship after Democratic Gov. Dan McKee signed the Freedom to Read Act into law. The legislation protects libraries and their patrons from book-banning efforts and affirms the free speech rights of authors, publishers and readers in the state, the Rhode Island Current reports. Stateline Daily
GLOBAL, NATIONAL AND THE FEDS
Soldiers Are Taking a Stand Against Trump’s Abuses: Defying the U.S. military is one of the most intimidating prospects someone can face. Disobedient soldiers can be court-martialed and face prison. Yet if they do carry out unlawful orders, the fact that they were “just following orders” is no defense in a criminal trial. All this puts military personnel in an untenable situation. Nevertheless, soldiers – supported by fellow veterans – are pushing back on illegal deployments against civilian populations. Portside
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And here is Megan E’s update from People’s Action, our national affiliate: What’s Going on in D.C. and What You Can Do About It. Megan is national affairs director at People’s Action.
Hi People's Action,
I hope you and your loved ones are all safe. My heart goes out to everyone who has been impacted by the horrible flooding over the past few days.
The NYTimes has a list of nearly everything in the Big Ugly Budget bill that was signed into law here. While I’m not a fan of Matthew Yglesias, the end of Ezra Klein’s interview with him about the budget bill is worth listening to or reading. At the end, they discuss why the bill didn’t get more attention in the media or in the opposition - as opposed to the ACA repeal fight (which we won) despite polling very poorly. It’s a reminder that we’ll need to continue educating the public about what’s in the bill and what’s to come in the form of Medicaid cuts. And speaking of political-education headwinds, look what we are up against: Tax Cuts Now, Benefit Cuts Later: The Timeline in the Republican Megabill: Republicans deferred some of their most painful spending cuts until after the midterm elections.
Please join us on Wed, July 23rd at 7pm ET/6pm CT/5pm MT/4pm PT for a Debrief & Next Moves: Big Ugly Bill by registering here: https://ppls.ac/budgetnextmoves.
The Senate is in session and working to pass annual appropriations bills. They also have a statutory deadline of July 18th to pass the White House’s $9.4 billion rescission package which claws back money that Congress allocated to NPR, PBS and foreign aid, from peacekeeping efforts to refugee assistance and climate projects. The House passed the bill a few weeks ago but is stalled in the Senate due to some opposition. It only needs 50 votes in the Senate and there is an effort to force a vote on it next week. However, changes to the bill are expected and it would need to go back to the House. If Congress doesn’t act by July 18th, the agencies will spend the money.
Congress is working on the annual appropriations process (government funding), which has a deadline of September 30th. The White House requested that Congress cut $160 billion in domestic spending - - that’s roughly 22.5% of annual domestic discretionary spending (which excludes Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security spending). If this happens, it will hit low-income people particularly hard and on top of the Medicaid cuts passed in the budget reconciliation. The White House requested to boost the Pentagon and border security by $325 billion -- roughly double the cuts -- so I guess they aren’t really concerned about the budget deficit. The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is already illegally withholding a lot of money from agencies in defiance of Congress and the Constitution.
The House Appropriations Committee has begun hearings and scheduled mark-ups of the different bills. People’s Action Institute is bringing organizers and leaders who work on housing to DC for the subcommittee mark-up of the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development appropriations bill next Monday. The White House is proposing a staggering 45% cut to housing funds, which we’re fighting back against. We won’t get the bill text to see what House Republicans are proposing until the end of the week. The Senate has not scheduled its markup of the housing bill yet but it plans to do so in July. We’re also working to oppose the elimination of the Low-income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP), which helps low-income households pay their energy bills when they can’t afford to. If you’re working on defending against other government funding cuts, please let me know!
Wednesday, July 9th was Trump’s deadline for trade deals before higher tariffs kick in globally but it sounds like the White House is moving that deadline to August 1st. Trump has only made progress on two bilateral trade deals.
From Punchbowl News: “A majority of Americans say they’re not aware of the Trump family’s crypto investments, according to a poll commissioned by a dark money group with ties to the digital asset industry. Roughly 57% of respondents said they had not “seen, read, or heard anything recently” about President Donald Trump’s meme coin, for instance. Trump’s net worth has swelled by roughly $620 million in crypto wealth since returning to office, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Those funds are tied to a growing number of investments in crypto ventures.”
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson said over the weekend that he wants to pass two more reconciliation bills, one in the fall and one in the spring. He said nothing about what will be in them. That’ll be quite the challenge for him. The House is on recess until July 14th.
Netanyahu is visiting with Trump again; cloudy talks on cease-fire in the Gaza atrocity. We’ll see.
ACTIONS TO TAKE: ASKS: What You Can Do This Week
ISSUE UPDATE: CLIMATE
From the Guardian: “The ongoing challenges of forecasting extreme weather during the era of the climate crisis have been brought to the fore again amid catastrophic flash flooding in the “hill country” region of Texas.”
From Politico: “For America, this is now one of the deadliest floods of the past century, per the NYT. This is also now one of the deadliest single events for U.S. children we have ever seen, per NYT national reporter Mike Baker.
For Trump, the questions about the impact of his administration’s cuts to the National Weather Service, and indeed to disaster response agency FEMA, are not going away. Earlier today, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer published a letter to the Commerce Department’s acting IG Roderick Anderson, demanding an urgent investigation into whether Trump administration cuts to local National Weather Service stations contributed to the loss of life. Read it here”
ISSUE UPDATE: HEALTHCARE
‘Tears My Heart to Pieces’: North Carolina Braces for Medicaid Cuts President Trump’s domestic policy law jeopardizes plans to reopen one rural county’s hospital — and health coverage for hundreds of thousands of state residents.
In solidarity,
Megan