There isn't a single day when the president of the United States has not been engaged over a verbal or social media spat with the Democrats. This time it was New York Governor Andrew Cuomo with whom Donald Trump had a war of words on moving to block federal funding to cities such as New York, Portland, Seattle, Washington and other localities the administration deemed were under "anarchist jurisdictions".
During a press conference on late Wednesday, Cuomo told reporters that the president was now "persona non grata" in his home state, and would need an "army" to protect himself if he were to walk down the street in New York City.
"Forget bodyguards, he better have an army if he thinks he's gonna walk down the street in New York. New Yorkers don't want to have anything to do with him," Cuomo said.
"It is more of the same from him. It's political, it is gratuitous. And it's illegal. But it is another attempt to kill New York City," the governor added, according to the New York Post.
This came after Trump earlier on the same day approved a five-page memo, which stated that the White House is intended to begin restricting federal funding from going to certain Democratic-led cities that the administration determines to be "anarchist jurisdictions," aiming to levy an extraordinary attack on political opponents just months ahead of the 2020 election.
The memo also directed the Justice Department within 14 days to come up with a list of localities that qualify as "anarchist jurisdictions" and post that list publicly.
Trump has said that there is a wide-ranging Democratic plot to defund police departments, although most prominent Democrats, including presidential nominee Joe Biden, have adamantly rejected this approach.
However, the president responded on Thursday morning in a tweet, blaming Cuomo for the number of deaths in New York from the novel coronavirus.
"11,000 people alone died in Nursing Homes because of his incompetence!" the president wrote.
In previous circumstances as well, the New York Governor had branded the federal government as "dysfunctional and incompetent" in taking potential actions in handling the COVID-19 crisis in the country.
