Law be damned, Trump asserts unilateral control over executive branch, federal service (3 Viewers)

[superchuck500]

Following the Project 2025 playbook, in the last week, Trump and his newly installed loyalists have moved to (1) dismiss federal officials deemed unreliable to do his bidding (including 17 inspectors general) - many of which have protections from arbitrary dismissal, (2) freeze all science and public health activity until he can wrest full control, (3) freeze all federal assistance and grant activity deemed inconsistent with Trump's agenda, and (4) moved to terminate all federal employee telework and DEI programs.

The problem is much of this is controlled by federal law and not subject to sudden and complete change by the president through executive order. Most notably is the Impoundment Control Act of 1974 that simply codifies what is the constitutional allocation of resources where Congress appropriates money to the executive branch for a specific purpose, the executive branch must carry out that statutory purpose. This is indeed a constitutional crisis and even if Congress abdicates to Trump by acquiescing, the courts must still apply the law - or rule it unconstitutional.

And meanwhile the architect of much of this unlawful action is Russell Vought, Trump’s OMB nominee who the Senate appears ready to confirm.

120. The Impoundment Crisis of 2025

The Trump administration's Monday spending freeze is likely to provoke a crisis over the constitutionality of "impoundment"—one that the justices could well have to resolve *very* soon.

www.stevevladeck.com

 

[Sendai]

Since this is my job...this is complete unadulterated horsesheet. Musk is making sheet up and trying to pull the wool over people's eyes.

All federal payments must have some degree of documentation. I'm very familiar with several different forms of payments that can require anywhere from 2 to dozens of pages of documentation. Every payment must have a minimum of 2 supporting documents, the funding document and some sort of invoice or bill to support the funding document.

There are multiple tracking numbers that are tied to the line of accounting and color of money the funding is tied to. And there are several steps a payment request goes through before the funds are paid out. Every dollar is accounted for.

People can disagree about how the funding is spent, but as a general rule it's all public and accounted for through Congressional appropriations, the President's budget and the financial reporting of the CFO or director for each of the agencies.

The idea that payments aren't categorized or justified is a complete fabrication. Whoever said that is lying through their teeth.

Is your job posting the actual treasury payment? Do you see the category code and explanation recorded on the payment? Is it possible the payment is made without coding and notation connected to the documentation?

 

[FullMonte]

They have been at it for only 17 days (that's being generous), USAID and the CFPB have a combined workforce of over 10K personnel with a combined budget of over $40M. That's how I KNOW!

I'm not sure if it was a typo....but the annual budget for USAID is in the billions. I think for 2024, it was around $2 billion.

 

[FullMonte]

And they have lied about USAID being the source for the funds you are making fun of. That was the State Dept behind those initiatives. You shouldn’t believe anything Musk or Trump says, they lie continuously.

And this brings up something that Lawrence O'donnel asked on his show. If Doge is finding so much corruption and waste in these agencies, why are they making up lies about what they found? Why haven't they come out with some actual corruption and waste?

 

[DJ1BigTymer]

I'm not sure if it was a typo....but the annual budget for USAID is in the billions. I think for 2024, it was around $2 billion.

It was, I got that from Wikipedia since USAID site doesn't exist anymore and they listed the budget at $40B in 2023.

edit: Their OIG page is still available, get it while last!

Office of Inspector General

oig.usaid.gov

 

[FullMonte]

It was, I got that from Wikipedia since USAID site doesn't exist anymore and they listed the budget at $40B in 2023.

I think that was the budget for all "Foreign Operations." USAID had a budget closer to $2 billion in 2023.

Here is the state department's budget, in the Congressional Budget Justification document, on page 95, it begins to cover Foreign Operations.

Technical Difficulties

edit: I have no idea why the link shows up as "Technical Difficulties"

 

[el caliente]

Right and it was put on at a Colombian University in 2022. What's nefarious about that? And why this particular performance and not any of the other performances that are put on through various grants with US origins?

I believe I also mentioned DEI, the musical. Perhaps we can catch that matinee as a group next time we are all in Ireland.

Lol

 

[MT15]

This guy brings up something I completely missed. The IG for USAID was investigating Musk for his actions with StarLink during the Ukraine war. No wonder he zeroed in on the relatively small budget of the USAID on literally Day One. This is such a joke of a situation and the fact that some people are buying this BS just really calls their credibility into question.

 

[el caliente]

Not to mention some of these DEI initiatives were funded during the first Trump administration.

DEI is actually a brilliant thing. With it, corporations can grow through creative thought. Without it, growth is capped. Trump may be a maniac, but at the end of the day he is in it for businesses (after himself of course).

I think we can all agree on that.

 

[el caliente]

And he's literally linked to a page showing that it was in fact entirely transparent and not at all hidden.

And I still don't get what him not knowing how to buy a ticket for it has to do with anything.

@el caliente is the premise that the US government shouldn't fund anything at all that you, as one taxpayer, aren't invited to purchase a ticket to? That seems a bit nuts.

It’s less that I want tickets, and more that the American people didn’t sign up to pay for crap like that (and not just me). The proof is in the outrage (outside of this echo chamber).

 

[MT15]

It’s less that I want tickets, and more that the American people didn’t sign up to pay for crap like that (and not just me). The proof is in the outrage (outside of this echo chamber).

You are so completely clueless it’s embarrassing. Or rather you should be embarrassed, but I imagine you are congratulating yourself on being the smartest one in here.

Clueless

 

[el caliente]

Source?

No it's not. There's nothing that really compares to this that I'm aware of.

Dave, did we not talk about the Truman Committee from the 1940s, and National Partnership for Reinventing Government created in the 1990s? These entities were created under executive orders by Democrats in order to cut waste, find efficiencies, and make Americans feel better about their hard earned dollars being sent to Washington. Those were great at the time, and DOGE appears to be following their lead.

Even the GAO is aware of billions in fraud taking place every year, so an extra set of eyes, coming from the corporate world, can only help.

 

[UncleTrvlingJim]

It’s less that I want tickets, and more that the American people didn’t sign up to pay for crap like that (and not just me). The proof is in the outrage (outside of this echo chamber).

But the American people did sign up for that. They elected the Congressmen and President who funded and set priorities and a process to follow, all of which were done. Each President is allowed to set priorities within the allocated budget which was done last administration and would be available for this administration to do as well.

The idea that we should be upset about funding cultural events in a foreign country as a form of diplomacy but not be upset when say the president spends $10 million to attend the Super Bowl, is silly. I didn't approve the President spending that money, therefore it's fraud, right?

 

[UncleTrvlingJim]

Dave, did we not talk about the Truman Committee from the 1940s, and National Partnership for Reinventing Government created in the 1990s? These entities were created under executive orders by Democrats in order to cut waste, find efficiencies, and make Americans feel better about their hard earned dollars being sent to Washington. Those were great at the time, and DOGE appears to be following their lead.

Even the GAO is aware of billions in fraud taking place every year, so an extra set of eyes, coming from the corporate world, can only help.

Not if they keep lying about the numbers and where they are coming from. Both the Colombian opera and the Irish music event were not from USAID. At all. Full stop. To say otherwise is an outright lie.

They also lied about the amounts.

At this point, shouldn't you be more critical of what they are telling you? Practice some of that skepticism you're proud of?

 

[UncleTrvlingJim]

Let's put this way. I think @Sendai, @TampaJoe, @el caliente - would all agree that the President has a fair amount discretion on how he is to execute the laws that Congress sets right?

The last President was Joe Biden, right? Joe Biden had a value of diversity, equity and inclusion, as well as transgender rights as part of his administration correct? So, the programs listed were well within Biden's priorities, correct? And all grants had gone through a review process and documented. Therefore, what did USAID do wrong (well not only USAID, b/c some of the listed expenses were from other departments)?

 

[el caliente]

See here's the thing - you use the present tense of "so that everything is done above board" but they've already been working for a couple of weeks and nobody is really sure if any of it is above board. In fact, there's quite a bit of reason to think it's very specifically not being done above board.

For starters, what authority does "DOGE" have? The only official document stating was DOGE is and can do is the executive order that basically renames the US Digital Service (an Obama-era 'task force' to modernize federal IT systems) and gives it the task of commencing "a Software Modernization Initiative to improve the quality and efficiency of government-wide software, network infrastructure, and information technology (IT) systems."

That's literally the only thing DOGE is formally authorized to do. Yet DOGE has been closing offices, shutting down systems and parts of systems - including the things those systems do, removing websites, data sets, etc., and placing thousands of federal employees on administrative leave.

How can DOGE be "above board" when it's already quite clear that they are operating well beyond the DOGE authority - but so what authority are they operating on? Some have said it's OMB's authority but DOGE isn't an OMB office and it's similarly legally suspect to claim OMB has such broad authority without any additional authorizing instruments (such as an executive order or a statute). While others have said that Trump has the power and he's simply giving it to DOGE to "advance his agenda" but it's that damn easy, what was the point of the DOGE executive order about software modernization?

The answer is it's not that damn easy . . . and while we agree that DOGE should definitely be above the board, it's highly suspect at this point and they're doing very little to demonstrate it.

Time will certainly tell how this turns out, but when I think back to when Elon purchased Twitter, and everyone said that he was going to kill it…well it’s still alive and its competitors still haven’t overtaken the app yet. All that to say, I’m willing to see how this goes because I don’t think this ends as poorly as the fear mongers would have you believe.

Personally I can’t stand either Musk or Trump, and I hope that they eat each other alive.

 

[el caliente]

Read that again.

There is nothing that states that categorization or identification was not being done, they are trying to give you the impression (successfully, I might add) that Treasury is just writing checks without any guidance or regulations governing those payments.

This whole thing is just stupid! The biggest complaint we hear about government is the bureaucracy and red-tape that comes along with getting shirt done. Now here comes DOGE to add even more red tape in an effort to justify their existence.

It seems that by adding red tape it will make less deserving checks less likely to be cut. That’s great IMO.

 

[UncleTrvlingJim]

Time will certainly tell how this turns out, but when I think back to when Elon purchased Twitter, and everyone said that he was going to kill it…well it’s still alive and its competitors still haven’t overtake the app yet.

Twitter is worth less than 20% of the price Elon bought it for now. I'm not sure I want the same thing to happen to America.

 

[DJ1BigTymer]

It seems that by adding red tape it will make less deserving checks less likely to be cut. That’s great IMO.

Here's an opportunity to learn what actual US Treasury audits look like:

https://oig.treasury.gov/reports/audit-and-evaluation