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PaperclipPerfector  3mo ago (text post)   35727 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 3, 2025

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On the power of the purse and control of the Treasury.

I’ve seen a few articles and videos going around, referencing and linking or exerpting the various left-wing people (mostly women) on “short video” social media filming themselves crying about how they can’t sleep because they’re up all night with the thoughts of how their children are about to starve because Trump is taking their EBT and Social Security away; followed by a debunking of this — complete with links to/excerpts of the press conference addressing this mistaken view, and how these sorts of domestic benefits are unaffected by any funding halts President Trump has ordered so far — and how these people have worked themselves up due to believing scaremongering from voices on the left. But I’ve come to wonder whether this is just about riling up these sort of easily-misled people… or if it’s about laying groundwork for a fight over the Treasury Department.

I’ve repeatedly held (here and elsewhere), whenever someone has talked about “defunding the left,” that it would actually be very hard to do, because for all that the constitution gives Congress “the power of the purse,” in reality all the checks are actually written and issued by the unelected bureaucrats at Treasury, as seen in every “government shutdown.” So what if Congress orders some left-wing institution defunded… and Treasury just keeps writing the checks anyway? I’ve argued that they can, and maybe even will, just defy Congress, because who can stop them?

Well, on the one hand, we’re seeing that permanent bureaucrats are less “unfireable” than I thought. On the other, we have this tweet from Musk on how independent people at the Treasury act:

The @DOGE team discovered, among other things, that payment approval officers at Treasury were instructed always to approve payments, even to known fraudulent or terrorist groups.

They literally never denied a payment in their entire career.

Not even once.

So, again, what if Treasury officers keep issuing checks after being told to stop? Or, in an alternate scenario that brings things back around to my first paragraph, they start engaging in the sort of malicious compliance we’ve already seen elsewhere (like the “No DEI? Guess we have to stop teaching about the Tuskegee Airmen!” bit)? If they talk about how, since they can’t tell who’s been really fired by Trump and who hasn’t, and thus who they should or shouldn’t issue paychecks to, they’re going to err on the side of caution and halt all federal employees’ paychecks (are ICE agents going to be deporting people for free?). Or how if Trump’s talking about abolishing the IRS, that means they need to put an immediate stop to issuing anyone’s income tax refunds. Or how they’re so confused trying to figure out what is and isn’t funded by Trump’s rushed, poorly-written executive orders, they’re just going to halt all Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, EBT, etc. until things get “straightened out.”

Because what are Trump, Musk, and company going to do, fire them all? Because this is where Scott’s “Bureaucracy Isn't Measured In Bureaucrats” really comes into play. The more people at Treasury you fire, the fewer are left to process and issue all the funds that need issued, the more everyone’s paychecks and Social Security and Medicare and EBT and tax refunds get delayed.

So, will the Treasury #Resist? Can they be reined in, or does their control over the cash spigot so many depend upon give them too much power?

I posted this in last week's thread about a nearly identical topic that is prescient here:

In constitutional law, it is very clear--the executive branch does not have the authority to stop payments. A entity like DOGE isn't even a part of the government and does not have a right to view classified material. Regardless, this is considered impoundment. There are 3 reasons for this:

  1. Article I, Section 9, Clause 7: “No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law.” President's do not create law, congress does. Withholding funding is considered "Impoundment" by

  2. The Impoundment Control Act of 1974 which was upheld via judicial review by

  3. The SCOTUS ruling in Train v. City of New York (1975).

So these actions would go against all 3. The Constitution has not been amended, the law has not been repealed and the supreme court has not seen a case to change that precedent, at least not yet.

This is doubly so for Musk, who isn't even an official part of the government. If Trump wants to change this, he can ask congress to pass a law--republicans are a majority in both houses, or they can try to amend the constitution.

But this is unlawful just like the OMB executive order and for the same reasons. Congress has the power of the purse, not the president.

I think you may be wrong in certain areas. First, DOGE is part of government (read the EO). Second, the president can give info to whoever he wants. Third, the President can certainly stop payments where the authorizing legislation is broad and open ended (eg 50m to foster goodwill in LATAM is not a command to spend xx dollars on a specific project in LATAM)

You are wrong on #1 and #2: Congressional action is required in order to create new executive branch offices. Presidents cannot do that through executive order per the constitution Article II, Section 2, Clause 2. DOGE was not created by congress and Musk has not been approved by congress. #3 depends, as most funding is earmarked to what organization it goes to.

Specifics matter. If Trump wants to have a new office in the executive branch, he will have to ask congress to create it for him. If he wants Musk to lead it, he will have to get him confirmed, the latter will never happen.

He won't do either one, so it looks like we are headed toward a constitutional crisis.

You mean offices like US AID? That was created by EO. Department level offices cannot be created by EO.

Also BS on the president being restricted on sharing info. Classification and de classification is a power of the president.

You are wrong on both counts and really need to read up a bit on this. It was created by EO, but established as an "independent establishment outside of the State Department by Section 1413 of the Foreign Affairs Reform and Restructuring Act of 1998, Division G of P.L. 105-277. So again, this action is another example of executive branch overstep. If they want to get rid of it, fine, but to it legally through congress. Which they have a majority in both chambers mind you.

Since September of 2020, there have been rules to prevent security clearances being given to anyone who has been a lobbyist or have a financial conflict of interest. This has not been done. Musk owns companies that compete with other companies who have government contracts, whereas now he will have unfettered access to their employees information (SSN, address, tax info, etc) along with complete information on government contracts with those competitors.

Hey buddy — you might want to check the date on the law you cited and the date USAID was created.

Also, and? Again the president can choose classification. It doesn’t matter that Biden made rules relating to lobbying.

Maybe it is you who needs to read up.

You didn't read the link. Again--congress made it a separate entity from the State Department years after it was established.

Since congress separated it, the president cannot get rid of it. Congress would have to do that.

You seem to not know how our goverment works. That is fine, but this discussion is pointless until you read up. I recommend starting here

You were and contribute to respond to something I didn’t say. I never made a claim about what Trump could do with respect to closing USAID by EO (that whole can of worms is complex and depends on what is meant by close—suffice to say I think Trump could effectively neuter USAID even if he can’t formally close it).

Instead I pointed out you were wrong to say that an EO cannot create a government office specifically pointing to USAID as an example (this was after I pointed out that you were mistaken to believe DOGE was not part of the government). You then retorted with a law 30 years after JFK created USAID.

So you chided me for things I didn’t say and asked me to read closely while literally ignoring what I said. Maybe slow down and don’t assume what other people mean to say and respond to what they actually said. Also have some humility as you’ve been factually wrong a few times and overstate your legal case.

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