The U.S. Capitol in Washington on Nov. 19, 2024. The president can ask Congress to permit either a recision or a deferral of spending. Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times
Posted on 11/23/2024 5:05:51 PM PST by SeekAndFind
President-elect Donald Trump has said he intends to cut government spending by reasserting the presidential power of impoundment, a move certain to spark a court battle and one that could redefine presidential power for decades to come.
Impoundment occurs when the president chooses not to disburse funds authorized by Congress; instead leaving them unspent in the U.S. Treasury.
This power is not mentioned in the Constitution but has been employed by presidents since Thomas Jefferson. Congress enacted limits on the practice 50 years ago.
Now, Trump intends to challenge the Impoundment Control Act of 1974 (ICA), which he believes is unconstitutional.
“I will use the president’s long-recognized Impoundment Power to squeeze the bloated federal bureaucracy for massive savings,” Trump said when announcing his plan in June 2023.
Others say the ICA was needed to prevent the misuse of impoundment to alter congressional spending priorities, not merely eliminate waste.
Expanded use of impoundment power seems certain to be challenged in court.
Resolution is likely to hinge on two constitutional questions that define the balance of power between the executive and legislative branches of the federal government.
Jefferson appears to have been the first to use impoundment.
In 1803 he delayed purchasing gunboats to patrol the Mississippi River because they were no longer needed after the United States acquired the Louisiana Territory from France.
Since then, most presidents appear to have used the practice from time to time, and usually because the spending was no longer in the public interest.
President Ulysses S. Grant used impoundment to prevent federal funds from being used on river or harbor projects that would benefit private parties rather than the public.
President Franklin Roosevelt used it to limit spending on civilian construction projects to concentrate on wartime spending.
President Lyndon Johnson impounded some money to reduce inflation.
President Richard Nixon used the practice more frequently than previous executives, and his use of impoundment represented “a difference in kind, not simply in degree” from his predecessors, according to Joshua Chafetz a professor of law and politics at Georgetown University.
Nixon’s opponents argued that he was assuming the power to do away with certain government programs by simply starving them of funds, which violated the will of Congress.
His team argued that presidents have a duty to consider other factors, including inflation, when deciding if or when to release government funds.
Congress then passed the ICA, which, in addition to reforming the congressional budgeting process, strictly limited the executive’s ability to cut or delay spending the money appropriated by Congress.
Nixon signed the bill into law.
The ICA stipulates that presidents must ask congressional permission to impound funds. The president can ask Congress to permit either a recision or a deferral of spending.
A recision is a spending cut.
When the president asks Congress to cut certain spending, he may defer that spending for up to 45 days while Congress considers the matter.
If Congress does not grant the request, the president must release the funds.
A deferral is a delay in spending certain funds to a later point within the current fiscal year.
If Congress doesn’t respond to the deferral request, the president may defer the spending.
Robert Kravchuk, professor emeritus of public policy at Indiana University told The Epoch Times: “In one case, he'd have to hear positively from Congress not to spend money, and that’s the recision.
“In the second case, he hears nothing, then he could go through with his deferral, but he can’t defer it to the next year or the year after that.”
The U.S. Capitol in Washington on Nov. 19, 2024. The president can ask Congress to permit either a recision or a deferral of spending. Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times
Article II of the U.S. Constitution states that the president must “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.”
Trump has said the ICA violates that clause because it strips the president of discretion in how best to achieve the government’s purposes.
“The [ICA] dramatically limited impoundment, the power of the president to choose not to unnecessarily spend taxpayer dollars, forcing the executive branch to spend every penny of congressionally appropriated funds,” Trump wrote in his statement.
A second argument in favor of impoundment is that congressional appropriations specify a maximum amount that may be spent, not a minimum.
“Congress has the ‘power of the purse,’ so its appropriations necessarily set a ceiling on federal spending for a particular purpose, but it should not set the floor,” Trump said.
That argument was made as early as 1876 when Secretary of War James Cameron wrote that “spending the full amount” of an appropriation “was in no way mandatory.”
Read the rest here...
Congress can only “authorize” spending. It cannot demand that the money be spent.
Bkmk
I can’t be overdrawn! I still have checks left! — Congress
"FBI budget? I told 'em I impounded it!"
Sounds fun.
For example, Trump could hold up the money for those silly LCS things?
That’s a question.
And you can bet that, thanks to Republican knuckleheads not showing up for Senate votes this past week, there WILL be some Schumer judge that will overturn Trump’s impoundments.
hopefully, with the DOGE bit, they could also cull the workload. Since congress defines the roles of these agencies relatively minimally, with the agency itself filling the blanks, it should be easy to do.
E.g. - Congress passes a Department of Housing that must build houses for Americans.
The Department writes a reg that says, each house is to have 6 bedrooms and gold toilets. It hires employees to build the rooms and mine the gold.
Trump comes in and says, no, I’m culling the reg to say the houses have two bedrooms and use porcelain toilets. Bye-Bye 90% of the employees and required budget.
The houses continue to be built and since congress didn’t actually specify the house, the prez has faithfully executed the law.
It didn’t work for Nixon. Good luck with that.
In 1996 Congress passed the “Line Item Veto Act”.
Bill Clinton (!!!) actually used it to rein in some spending. In a subsequent lawsuit the Supreme Court found the law unconstitutional.
We have different times and a different court. Time to test it again.
Stare Decicis?
As long as there's no law requiring that particular vessel, yes it could be scrapped. I doubt congress ever has specified anything beyond saying "give us a navy" as far as actual boats go.
For myself, I don't see much use for VTOL. We already have helicopters and while it may have been a nice exercise in developing technology, as far as I know, they are superfluous.
Well both Chevron and Roe were overturned so that goes only so far.
Come senators, congressmen, please heed the call
Don’t stand in the doorway, don’t block up the hall
For he that gets hurt will be he who has stalled
The battle outside ragin’
Will soon shake your windows and rattle your walls
For the times, they are a-changin’
Thank you, Trump.
MORE! MORE! MORE!
“I will use the president’s long-recognized Impoundment Power to squeeze the bloated federal bureaucracy for massive savings,” Trump said when announcing his plan in June 2023.....
No wonder Congress has been melting down
Trump doesn’t care about the money some would say, I agree. But if you take away the money you away the power...from the bureaucracy.
Think of the benefits, first you slap our pathetic congress across the face, no money to pay worthless fed employees, lower taxes, the list is endless.
What a beautiful thing, cutting the legs off congress and the feds at the same tie.
A critical mass of Americans will finally understand that the Federal Government cannot be fixed at the ballot box.
The constitution also says that one of the primary jobs of the House of Representatives is to pass a budget. It does not say it should have an omnibus bill that just keeps the allotment the same as the year before at a higher percent.
This will be a seminal court ruling - one for the ages
Too many FReepers appear to think the solution is to just elect any republican.
In washington DC, the democrat and republican party are just two cheeks on the same a$$.
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