A statement cites legal decisions by the GAO in its capacity of overseeing certain laws related to spending decisions. Image: DCStockPhotography/Shutterstock.com
Senior Democrats on the Appropriations Committees of both the House and Senate have raised challenges to Trump administration actions on spending and reorganization of agencies, in the latest conflict over whether the administration is usurping powers reserved to Congress.
A statement cites legal decisions by the GAO in its capacity of overseeing certain laws related to spending decisions. In one, it found that actions under an executive order to cut off funding for the Institute for Museum and Library Sciences, “was not just unlawful, but that this funding could not be frozen even if they had followed the special procedures of the Impoundment Control Act of 1974, because it is legally owed to identifiable recipient,” they wrote.
The other ruling involved frozen funds and cancelled contracts following a presidential memo calling for a review of wind energy projects. “Both of these GAO decisions reiterate the primacy of Congress’s decision-making when it comes to spending issues and makes clear the single-central issue at hand: if the President wishes to change spending laws, then he must come to Congress and ask them to do so – he has no inherent authority to impound funding, and never has,” they said.
Separately, a letter to the Education Department challenges an interagency agreement under which Education agreed to transfer to the Labor Department certain career and technical education programs and adult education programs.
Those programs were created and funded by Congress as part of Education and “Only Congress is responsible for determining whether to dismantle the Department of Education and its programs. We write to remind you that it is not within your authority to move the administration of these programs to any other agency,” they wrote.
“Respectfully, federal agencies are not interchangeable entities that simply hand out money to states and localities . . . Should the Trump Administration have ideas for changing which agency should administer the federal career and technical education program and adult education program, then the administration needs to propose its ideas to Congress for full and fair consideration through the normal legislative process,” they wrote, saying that in the meantime, the programs should stay at Education.
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