Fox & Friends typically presents a notable pro-Trump point of view, so while their commentary and criticism on the confusion surrounding the Trump administration’s sudden freeze of federal funding was light, it was still notable.
On Monday, President Donald Trump ordered the immediate freezing of trillions of dollars in federal grants and loans throughout the federal government to increase efficiency and limit wasteful spending. But the freeze also led to “confusion and outrage,” as the New York Times described it on Tuesday — as it appeared to interrupt the Medicaid system that provides health care to millions of low-income Americans and other programs that depend on the flow of federal money.
Each Fox & Friends host took turns lauding the spirit of the budget-cutting agenda, but each host tactfully noted that this particular moment may not have gone precisely to plan.
“What they have to do is do things like this, communicate ahead of time,” Brian Kilmeade advised. “Give it ’til September as opposed to yesterday, when we get the story out that all federal funding is frozen except for Social Security and Medicare. And then they expanded and said anybody was getting regular payments. That’s not you. We’re looking at programs but that it took till 2:00 in the afternoon to do to flush it out.”
“I think, yeah, communication is going to be the key,” Kilmeade added. “And they always say the first two months of the administration and the last two months are the most difficult. And this is an example of it yesterday.”
The show then ran a clip from Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt’s first Press Briefing on Tuesday, which featured her absurdly claiming “50 million taxpayer dollars that went out the door to fund condoms in Gaza,” calling it “a preposterous waste of taxpayer money.” What’s preposterous is that anyone would believe that $50 million was earmarked for condoms, a false claim that has been checked and proven wrong.
Coming out of the clip Ainsley Earhardt lauded how “generous” the Trump administration is for offering buyouts to any federal workers and also “saying you can keep your job until September.”
Steve Doocy summed the segment up by noting, “After this announcement happened, there was chaos and great confusion because a lot of states were trying to, they had issues accessing the funds for Medicaid, Head Start programs, could not get funding and stuff like that. And so then they had to come out with a second email, I think it was from the Office of Management and Budget, essentially trying to clarify it, simply saying that what they were trying to do was bring federal spending into line with the President’s executive orders regarding DEI and things like that.”
Watch above via Fox & Friends.
