Trump administration threatening funds approved by Congress – The Washington Post
Trump budget officials claim sweeping spending power from Congress, records show
Russell Vought, the White House budget director and architect of Project 2025, would have vast authority to approve or block billions in federal spending, the records show.
August 19, 2025 at 5:00 a.m. EDTToday at 5:00 a.m. EDT, 4 min
Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought speaks with reporters outside the White House on June 3. (Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
By Riley Beggin and Jacob Bogage The Trump administration is asserting new power to withhold billions of dollars from low-income housing services, education assistance, medical research grants and other programs approved by Congress, centralizing sweeping authority in the executive branch and potentially inflaming tensions between the two branches.
The new practices revealed Monday — which increase the leverage and power of budget chief Russell Vought — are likely to reignite a clash over the administration’s power to freeze dollars approved by Congress, usurping authority that the legislative branch has under the Constitution. The power struggle dates to President Donald Trump’s first term, when his refusal to release congressionally approved money for Ukraine helped spark a House impeachment, from which he was acquitted in the Senate.
Trump during his second term has been more emboldened to ignore Congress’s approved spending plans, and the two Republican-controlled chambers have largely acquiesced. But the issue has simmered in the courts, which recently determined the White House Office of Management and Budget must make its spending decisions public.
The agency’s newly released documents, made public under the court order, show Trump’s budget office is imposing litmus tests on releasing money — demanding plans from agencies to show they are following guidance Trump has laid out in executive actions, such as avoiding spending on diversity programs. While Trump has authority to issue those directives, experts say they do not, under law, carry the same weight as congressional actions.
The documents show OMB has in some cases blocked the release of funding until agencies provide a White House-approved spending plan and in other cases prevented funds from being spent that conflict with Trump’s executive orders.
The restrictions effectively give Vought, the director of the White House budget office and an architect of the controversial conservative governing plan Project 2025, the power to approve or deny virtually all spending decisions. The records do not provide a full accounting of government funding that has been withheld.
The administration’s spending requirements are coming in the form of footnotes attached to “apportionments,” which are records that provide permission for agencies to spend federal money.
Federal budget offices under previous presidents have generally asked agencies to provide spending plans before doling out money, according to experts. But withholding that money constitutes an impoundment, which is illegal under the 1974 Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act, those experts said.
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