{"id":4573,"date":"2025-09-29T17:20:29","date_gmt":"2025-09-29T17:20:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thegloss.online\/?p=4573"},"modified":"2025-09-29T17:20:29","modified_gmt":"2025-09-29T17:20:29","slug":"whats-at-stake-in-mayor-wus-fight-with-the-white-house","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thegloss.online\/?p=4573","title":{"rendered":"What&#8217;s at stake in Mayor Wu&#8217;s fight with the White House"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div id=\"\">\n<p class=\"\"><em><strong>Editor&#8217;s Note:<\/strong> This is an excerpt from WBUR&#8217;s politics newsletter, Mass. Politics. If you like what you read and want it in your inbox, sign up here. <\/em><\/p>\n<hr\/>\n<p class=\"\">Mayor Michelle Wu is now officially unopposed in this fall\u2019s election. But beyond November, she faces perhaps an even greater challenge: the wrath of the White House.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Over the last eight months, Boston and Wu have become prime targets of the Trump administration. Federal officials accuse the city of providing safe harbor to violent criminals by refusing to cooperate more on immigration enforcement, and have flooded communities throughout the region with ICE agents.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">As we recently reported, that\u2019s caused local officials to fret over the possibility of troops on Boston streets. Trump recently sent the National Guard to patrol major Democrat-led cities like Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles, and is planning deployments for Memphis and Portland. Boston \u2014 which despite some problem areas boasts historically low crime rates\u00a0\u2014 hasn\u2019t been named publicly among the<a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.npr.org\/2025\/09\/05\/nx-s1-5530051\/trump-national-guard-chicago-baltimore-new-orleans\"> growing list of cities<\/a> that Trump has threatened with deployments. Still, Wu and Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Campbell have indicated they\u2019re bracing for the possibility. (Neither has detailed what those preparations entail.)<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">So far, much of the conflict between the city and federal government has been less visible than troops on the streets. Boston has faced an antisemitism inquiry and a lawsuit over immigration from the Justice Department. Last week, Wu told the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce the city relies annually on some $300 million in federal funding, primarily for education, public safety and housing. And she said an array of those dollars are at risk, including grants awarded under the Biden administration that have been revoked or threatened with cancellation.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indent-medium\">\u201cSome of this, they may have the right to do \u2014 some of this they legally cannot do at the federal level,\u201d Wu told the assembled business leaders. \u201dAnd so, unfortunately, we have also been very busy in court.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Campbell is convening weekly meetings with local officials about funding cuts to municipalities. Wu said the meetings are intended \u201cto make sure we&#8217;re on the same page about which grants are now on the chopping block, or which ones we should or shouldn&#8217;t apply for.\u201d She said that also includes certain types of language to avoid in grant applications.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Wu cited one victory: Through a court decision, Boston was able to retain access to roughly $48 million in funding to address homelessness. On the other hand, the mayor cited grants for neighborhood-level infrastructure projects that appear to be lost, such as <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/mass.streetsblog.org\/2025\/09\/17\/usdot-cancels-20-million-pledge-to-fund-street-and-transit-improvements-in-roxbury\">$20 million for road improvements in Roxbury<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Wu reiterated something she\u2019s said since before Trump took office: Boston won\u2019t back down from being a welcoming city. She says it&#8217;s actually a competitive advantage the city should continue to embrace.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">\u201dUp against federal threats, rising tides and chaotic markets, Boston is and will be the best place to build a business, because we are making Boston the best place for families of every culture and every generation,\u201d Wu said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">While any battle between the federal government and the country\u2019s 25th largest city is hardly a balanced fight, Wu has seen her national profile rise as a critic of the Trump administration. Her emergence as David to Trump\u2019s Goliath doesn\u2019t please everybody \u2014 for example, the handful of labor unions that endorsed her former opponent Josh Kraft for mayor. Asked why they backed the underdog, one union official recently told me Wu was too busy \u201cfighting the guy in Washington,\u201d and not concerned enough with development in the city.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">However, Wu said at the Chamber event that the results of the preliminary earlier this month show that the majority of the city\u2019s residents are backing her up.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Editor&#8217;s Note: This is an excerpt from WBUR&#8217;s politics newsletter, Mass. Politics. If you like what you read and want it in your inbox, sign up here. Mayor Michelle Wu is now officially unopposed in this fall\u2019s election. But beyond November, she faces perhaps an even greater challenge: the wrath of the White House. Over<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4574,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[807,514,805,509,212,808,806],"class_list":{"0":"post-4573","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-whats-in","8":"tag-fight","9":"tag-house","10":"tag-mayor","11":"tag-stake","12":"tag-whats","13":"tag-white","14":"tag-wus"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thegloss.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4573","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thegloss.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thegloss.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegloss.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegloss.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4573"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thegloss.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4573\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegloss.online\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4574"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thegloss.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4573"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegloss.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4573"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegloss.online\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4573"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}