Since he seized the White House with the help of Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump has waged a nonstop war on the poor in America. From trying to end coverage to preexisting conditions to trying to gut the food stamp program, Trump has gone far beyond shocking indifference to low-income individuals and families in our society. Now, the courts that have not been packed with Trump's enablers have continued to push back on some of the worst excesses of the Trump Administration. A federal court in Washington, D.C. has struck down work requirements for the Medicaid program that Michigan had previously issued with the complicity of the Administration.

One of Donald Trump's chief policy aims has been to destroy the social safety net that has been the lifeblood of millions in the country for more than a half a century. One of his big initiatives was to change the program rules for Medicaid to allow states to make it more difficult for the poor to remain on the Medicaid rolls. Prompted by Washington, the state had instituted requirements that some recipients either work or attend school for technical or vocational training to remain in the expanded Medicaid program. However, this blanket rule does not take into account the individual circumstances of Medicaid recipients.

Michigan Had Finalized Rules Under its Republican Governor

In 2018, the State House in Michigan changed hands. After two terms of Rick Snider, Michigan voters elected a Democrat as governor. Shortly after she took office, Gretchen Whitmer asked a federal court to rule quickly on the legality of these work requirements in the wake of a lawsuit filed by four Michigan residents. On March 4, a federal judge issued a decision which struck down these requirements. This continues the poor track record of these rules in federal court as all but one state has seen these proposed requirements overturned by the courts or tied up in litigation.

The Medicaid rules could have kicked as many as 100,000 people out of the program. The rules would have applied only to the state's Medicaid expansion program as opposed to the traditional Medicaid program. Nonetheless, the impacts would have been pronounced on the lives of the people who would have been affected by the rules.

The court ruling did not go into great detail as to the reasoning behind the court's decision. However, the effect is still the same, and efforts to apply the rules to Medicaid recipients have now been halted. The defendant in the lawsuit was the Trump Administration since it had approved these rules. It is unclear whether the Administration will file an appeal.

The federal judge in Washington is the same one who struck down work requirements imposed by a number of other states. Ten different states have submitted proposed rules for approval by the federal government. Only Utah actually has these rules in effect. A number of other states have also lost lawsuits challenging the legality of these rules. Other states have put their own versions of work requirements on hold since they are tied up in litigation.

One Victory in the Fight to Save the Poor

This recent ruling gives hope that the judiciary can continue to restrain the worst excesses of the Trump Administration when it comes to its war on the poor. Many of the harshest rules have run into trouble in court. However, Trump and McConnell's unholy partnership to pack the federal judiciary with far-right ideologues will eventually wear down the resistance to the attacks on the social safety net. Partisan judges are increasingly allowing the Administration to target the vulnerable with impunity, and there are many more of them than there were three years ago.

For now, the independent judiciary is proving that there are limits to what the Executive Branch can accomplish administratively to undo social programs that have supported tens of millions of people over the past half century.

The Trump Administration is nowhere near done in its incessant targeting of the poor. Its recent budget request signalled the fact that it still intended to slash funding for health care and food stamps. There will come a time when the judiciary can no longer be counted on to halt these illegal and cruel power grabs at the expense of the poor. In the meantime, the hope is that the worst programs can be stopped until there is a change of power in Washington, which will hopefully come in 2021.