Power of the purse challenged

And so the question, Paul, is, is this legal or not? And we've certainly had some conflicting opinions on that.

Right.

So you have sort of like two main opposing sides here.

And one is the Government Accountability Office.

which argues that a pocket rescission is illegal because Congress has the power of the purse and the president is not allowed to cancel spending that Congress has approved and that a president has signed into law unless it follows the proper procedure.

And so GAO argues that Congress has to act on a presidential rescission request.

The president can't just cancel the funding in a scenario where Congress is not there to act on it, and then the funding is repealed.

So that's the GAO argument.

So the White House argument is that the law does, there's nothing in the wording of the law that prohibits the administration from doing this or that says that the administration needs to send the rescission request more than 45 days before the funding expires.

And the White House also points out that in the past, years ago, GAO had warned Congress to change the wording of the law to remove this loophole.

And Congress has since then made changes in the law, but did not make that specific change.

So the White House says that Congress, by not making the change, has actually endorsed this idea that a pocket rescission is legal.

Yeah, and this 1974 impoundment law, it's called, is kind of vague on that point, right? In fairness to the White House, it doesn't specifically set a date by which the White House must request a rescission.

It does leave open this possibility of requesting it right up to the end of the fiscal year, right? So because of that, they're saying there's nothing in the law that specifically prohibits them from doing this.

And if Congress wants to prohibit that, they need to change the law, right? That's the White House

argument.

Right.

And yet GAO is saying it's clear that – GAO has shifted its position in fairness because initially, as they've acknowledged, initially they had ruled the other way and – In more recent years, they've rethought it.

They've cited recent court cases that forced them to rethink it.

And they have now come out against a rescission.

They've issued an opinion in 2018 that did that during the first Trump administration, saying that clearly only Congress has the authority to make spending decisions and To allow this means that the administration can unilaterally essentially have a line item veto.

And so it's clearly unconstitutional.

So there are these two conflicting views on this thing.

And so the question, Paul, is, is this legal or not? And we've certainly had some conflicting opinions on that.

Right.

So you have sort of like two main opposing sides here.

And one is the Government Accountability Office.

which argues that a pocket rescission is illegal because Congress has the power of the purse and the president is not allowed to cancel spending that Congress has approved and that a president has signed into law unless it follows the proper procedure.

And so GAO argues that Congress has to act on a presidential rescission request.

The president can't just cancel the funding in a scenario where Congress is not there to act on it, and then the funding is repealed.

So that's the GAO argument.

So the White House argument is that the law does, there's nothing in the wording of the law that prohibits the administration from doing this or that says that the administration needs to send the rescission request more than 45 days before the funding expires.

And the White House also points out that in the past, years ago, GAO had warned Congress to change the wording of the law to remove this loophole.

And Congress has since then made changes in the law, but did not make that specific change.

So the White House says that Congress, by not making the change, has actually endorsed this idea that a pocket rescission is legal.

Yeah, and this 1974 impoundment law, it's called, is kind of vague on that point, right? In fairness to the White House, it doesn't specifically set a date by which the White House must request a rescission.

It does leave open this possibility of requesting it right up to the end of the fiscal year, right? So because of that, they're saying there's nothing in the law that specifically prohibits them from doing this.

And if Congress wants to prohibit that, they need to change the law, right? That's the White House

argument.

Right.

And yet GAO is saying it's clear that – GAO has shifted its position in fairness because initially, as they've acknowledged, initially they had ruled the other way and – In more recent years, they've rethought it.

They've cited recent court cases that forced them to rethink it.

And they have now come out against a rescission.

They've issued an opinion in 2018 that did that during the first Trump administration, saying that clearly only Congress has the authority to make spending decisions and To allow this means that the administration can unilaterally essentially have a line item veto.

And so it's clearly unconstitutional.

So there are these two conflicting views on this thing.