White House floats a new funding trick — and GOP lawmakers grimace
Russ Vought's relationship with Republican appropriators was already strained. Then he started talking about pursuing the ultimate end-run around their funding power heading into the fall.
The White House budget director has been persistently touting the virtues of 'pocket rescissions,' a tactic he has floated as a way to codify the spending cuts Elon Musk made while atop his Department of Government Efficiency initiative, and which the federal government's top watchdog says is illegal.
On Capitol Hill, leading GOP appropriators see Vought's comments as another shot against them in an escalating battle with the Trump administration over Congress' 'power of the purse.' And they warn that the budget director's adversarial posture hinders their relationship with the White House as they work to head off a government shutdown in just over three months.
'Pocket rescissions are illegal, in my judgment,' Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine) said in a brief interview this week, 'and contradict the will of Congress and the constitutional authority of Congress to appropriate funds.'
To hear Vought tell it, a 'pocket rescission' is a legitimate tool at the executive branch's disposal. In such a scenario, President Donald Trump would issue a formal request to claw back funding, similar to the $9.4 billion package he sent lawmakers this month to cancel congressionally approved funding for public broadcasting and foreign aid.
But in this case, the memo would land on Capitol Hill less than 45 days before the new fiscal year is set to begin Oct. 1. By withholding the cash for that full timeframe — regardless of action by Congress — the White House would treat the funding as expired when the current fiscal year ends on Sept. 30.
The dizzying ploy is another means toward the same goal Trump has been chasing since Inauguration Day: to spend less money than Congress has explicitly mandated in law. But the Government Accountability Office says the maneuver is unlawful, and the GOP lawmakers in charge of divvying up federal funding are wary that Vought is now talking about it in the open.
'I understand we want to use all the arrows in our quiver, and he wants to use all his,' Rep. David Joyce (R-Ohio), a senior member of the House Appropriations Committee, said of Vought in an interview. 'But every time you pull out an arrow, you have to be ready for the consequences, right?'
Joyce continued: 'It's going to change the course of conversations and how each side works toward coming to resolution going forward.'
Vought declined last week to elaborate on his intentions, when pressed in person on Capitol Hill about his plans to use the ploy in the coming months. His office also did not return a request for comment. However, the budget director laid out a detailed argument for the maneuver on television earlier in the month — then mentioned it again as he left a meeting with Speaker Mike Johnson and then during a later hearing with House appropriators.
'The very Impoundment Control Act itself allows for a procedure called pocket rescissions, later in the year, to be able to bank some of these savings, without the bill actually being passed,' Vought said on CNN. 'It's a provision that has been rarely used. But it is there. And we intend to use all of these tools.'
Rep. Mike Simpson of Idaho, who chairs the appropriations panel that funds the Interior Department and the EPA, recently warned that the gambit is 'a bad idea' that 'undermines Congress' authority,' after saying last month that he thinks 'it's illegal' for a president to withhold funding lawmakers approved.
But many top Republican appropriators — while scoffing at Vought's comments — aren't willing to engage in rhetorical arguments about the bounds of the president's spending power.
'Talking is one thing. We'll see if he actually does it,' Rep. Ken Calvert (R-Calif.), who chairs the appropriations panel that funds the military, said about Vought's comments.
'He's got his ideas,' said Rep. Steve Womack (R-Ark.), chair of the appropriations panel responsible for funding the departments of Transportation and Housing.
'I'd have some concerns about it,' said Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-Ala.), who chairs the appropriations panel that funds the departments of Education, Labor, and Health and Human Services — all targets of Trump's deepest funding cuts.
Tension has been building for months between those Republican appropriators and Vought, who has a history of testing the limits of funding law: When he served in this same role during Trump's first administration, he froze aid to Ukraine in a move that helped set the stage for the president's first impeachment trial.
Republican funding leaders are irked that the White House has yet to deliver a full budget request, which appropriators rely upon to write their dozen funding measures. Vought has already left open the door to withholding the new money if the administration doesn't agree with the spending priorities in the final bills.
They also say the president's budget director and other Cabinet secretaries have withheld essential information about how they are using federal cash as the Trump administration fights off more than 100 legal challenges around the country. The suits are seeking to overturn the White House's freezing of billions of dollars Congress already approved for myriad programs and agencies.
House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole (R-Okla.) issued a rare rebuke of Vought this spring for taking down the public website showing how agencies are expected to disburse federal dollars.
But the Oklahoma Republican generally avoids any public criticism of the Trump administration and is not sounding off now about Vought's embrace of pocket rescissions. Cole said this month that he would 'look at each individual' request the White House sends to claw back funding, now that the House has passed the $9.4 billion package to nix money for foreign aid and public broadcasting.
That package of funding cuts now sits in the Senate, where some top Republicans are interested in tweaking the plan to protect funding for preventing AIDS around the world and supporting PBS programming in their home states. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) suggested Vought's public comments about using pocket rescissions could be intended to encourage reluctant senators to clear it.
'Maybe that's the way to let members know: Vote for the ones he sends up,' Johnson said, noting that he would be 'totally supportive' of Vought using the tactic this fall.
Another Senate fiscal hawk, Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Chair Rand Paul (R-Ky.), said he believes the law 'does allow for pocket rescissions.'
'I think the president should have more power not to spend money,' Paul told reporters last week. 'So if we have a way to reduce spending, by all means, we should use it.'
No court has ruled on the president's power to cancel funding by sending Congress a request and then running out the clock at the end of the fiscal year. But GAO has twice weighed in.
In 2018, the watchdog found that the law 'does not permit the withholding of funds through their date of expiration.' Vought, though, likes to cite an older GAO conclusion from 1975: It determined that Congress was unable to reject then-President Gerald Ford's requests to claw back funding 'in time to prevent the budget authority from lapsing.'
Katherine Tully-McManus contributed to this report.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
30 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Fox News Poll: Voters distrust Biden administration on president's mental fitness
Voters say they were aware of former President Joe Biden's decline, and believe the administration lacked honesty and transparency about his mental fitness, with many wanting Congress to investigate the matter. A new Fox News survey finds more than half, 52%, think it is important to investigate whether Biden advisors used an autopen without the president's awareness, while 46% say it's time to move on. House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer is pursuing investigations against former Biden administration staff for allegedly covering up Biden's mental decline and using an autopen for executive actions. Views are split on whether advisors should be scrutinized for making key presidential decisions on behalf of Biden (50% investigate vs. 49% move on), while a majority opposes investigating whether Biden advisors covered up his decline (44% investigate vs. 55% move on). Fox News Poll: Voters Think Iran Poses A Real Threat To Us Security, But Split Oj Israel's Strike Among Democrats, one in five supports investigating whether there was a cover-up, while roughly one in four feels that way about using the autopen and making presidential decisions. Read On The Fox News App Overall, 68% of voters believe the previous administration was dishonest about Biden's condition, including 52% of Democrats, 75% of Independents, and 81% of Republicans. Fox News Poll: Economic Pessimism Abates Slightly As Voters Reflect On The Economy Yet, while a majority agree there was a cover-up, they weren't fooled. Nearly 7 in 10 say they were aware of Biden's cognitive condition even before his jaw-droppingly bad debate performance in June 2024. Some 28% say they knew he was in decline as soon as he took office, 21% say a couple of years into his term, and 19% after he started running for re-election. Another 20% knew of Biden's decline after his debate with Donald Trump. Fewer than 1 in 10 say he wasn't in decline (9%). These numbers are consistent with what voters said throughout Biden's term. As early as November 2021, only one year after Biden was elected, Fox News surveys found that a 53% majority thought his age was interfering with his job as president, including more than one-quarter of Democrats. By the 2022 midterms, our Fox News Voter Analysis election survey found 57% of voters felt Biden lacked the mental capability to serve and, by July 2024, that grew to 65%. "Somewhat lost in the kerfuffle about the exact timing of Biden's decline is the fact that most knew he was losing it and had factored this into their vote choice long before the presidential debate," says Daron Shaw, a Republican who conducts the Fox News survey along with Democrat Chris Anderson. "Still, Biden's reputation and legacy are clearly taking a hit as the real history of his administration is revealed." Biden's current personal favorability is underwater by 13 points (43% favorable, 56% unfavorable), compared to -19 points in January. During the early days of his presidency, his ratings were net positive by 10 points (54% favorable, 44% unfavorable, April 2021). Today, 75% of Democrats have a positive view of Biden, down from 95% four years ago. CLICK HERE FOR Crosstabs AND Topline Conducted June 13-16, 2025, under the direction of Beacon Research (D) and Shaw & Company Research (R), this Fox News survey includes interviews with a sample of 1,003 registered voters randomly selected from a national voter file. Respondents spoke with live interviewers on landlines (149) and cellphones (566) or completed the survey online after receiving a text (288). Results based on the full sample have a margin of sampling error of ±3 percentage points. Sampling error for results among subgroups is higher. In addition to sampling error, question wording and order can influence results. Weights are generally applied to age, race, education, and area variables to ensure the demographics are representative of the registered voter population. Sources for developing weight targets include the American Community Survey, Fox News Voter Analysis, and voter file data. Fox News' Victoria Balara contributed to this article source: Fox News Poll: Voters distrust Biden administration on president's mental fitness
New York Post
31 minutes ago
- New York Post
What will it take for Gavin Newsom to focus on his day job?
President Donald Trump rightly took the ruling upholding his National Guard deployment to Los Angeles as a 'BIG WIN,' but it can be a winner for Californians, too — if it inspires their governor to focus on the job they elected him to. Gov. Gavin Newsom vows to litigate on, but if necessary the Supreme Court will slap him down, too. What will get him to quit his near-nonstop posturing to set himself up for a 2028 presidential run, and get his nose to the gubernatorial grindstone? It's bad enough that he sided with LA Mayor Karen Bass in obstructing ICE efforts to deport child predators, murderers and other worst-of-the-worst 'asylum seekers' — posturing that all but invited the riots that Trump deployed the Guard to shut down. Worse that this rush to the left came after Newsom's fake to the right with a series of podcasts where he pretended sympathy to centrist criticisms of the far-left agenda. That follows his haplessness during the Los Angeles fires — a disaster Trump credibly tied to Newsom's green obsessions. Other Gavin grotesquerie included rushing to meet the president on Trump's LA visit bare weeks after prepping for all-out legal #resistance to the new prez. California is plagued with soaring homelessness, elevated crime rates and brutally high costs of living: Even its welcome to illegal immigrants hasn't prevented a historic switch from growth to decline. That is: On Newsom's watch, Cali is for the first time ever losing seats in the House of Representatives because so many residents are fleeing to less-toxic jurisdictions. The Golden State is a natural near-paradise, but Newsom & co. are destroying it. That governor is still devoting his time and energy to a years-off national run is damning proof that he doesn't care a whit for the people of California.
New York Post
31 minutes ago
- New York Post
Mayor Eric Adams flip-flops on controversial Medicare push days after legal win
Mayor Eric Adams on Friday said he was abandoning his years-long effort to move retired city workers onto higher-cost healthcare plans — despite scoring a major legal win in the controversial case earlier this week. The mayor, who is running as an independent in the November general election, had been the only major candidate in the race backing Medicare Advantage, a private plan that uses Medicare subsidies rather than the traditional program offered to retired city workers. But Adams flip-flopped on Friday, announcing in a statement that his sudden change of heart stemmed from town halls and public events with retirees who said they were worried about the change. Mayor Eric Adams said he is now flip-flopping his initial stance and will abandon his year-long effort to move retired city workers to higher-cost healthcare plans. Getty Images 'We have informed union leadership that we are pursuing other avenues for improving health care for city workers that will provide even better outcomes, and we look forward to continuing to work with our partners on the best path forward,' he said. The mayor's office did not clarify what other options they were considering at this time. Every morning, the NY POSTcast offers a deep dive into the headlines with the Post's signature mix of politics, business, pop culture, true crime and everything in between. Subscribe here! It came just two days after New York's Court of Appeals on Wednesday ruled in favor of the Adams administration, finding the city could legally shift retirees to Medicare Advantage plans after years of fighting by advocacy groups. Republican mayoral candidate Curtis Sliwa jumped on the mayor's about-face, slamming it as a nakedly political move. 'Now, just days after the Court of Appeals ruled in his favor, and just as his reelection prospects dim, Eric Adams suddenly finds the backbone to stop his assault on our retirees,' Sliwa said in a statement. Republican mayoral candidate Curtis Sliwa criticized Adams for changing his stance on the healthcare proposal. He claimed that Adams would break his promise and go back to supporting the health-care plan if he was re-elected. An Adams campaign representative did not respond to a request for comment. Medicare Advantage was originally introduced in 2021 by then-Mayor Bill de Blasio, who argued that the program would save the city over $600 million a year.
