7 hours ago
12
ARTICLE AD BOX
Russell Vought, head of the White House Office of Management and Budget, said another request to claw back approved federal spending is likely to be sent to Congress.
The White House on Thursday was expecting a major win with Congress giving final approval to President Trump’s first request for $9 billion in clawbacks, known as a rescission package.
“We are willing to send up additional rescissions … and we’ll be working on that to try to get that across the finish line,” Mr. Vought told reporters at a breakfast interview hosted by the Christian Science Monitor.
Mr. Vought cautioned that “we’re not there yet” and said he didn’t want to “get ahead of the package itself.”
The first rescissions package was requested by Mr. Trump in June. Congress has until a Friday deadline to get the measure to his desk.
The House has scheduled the final vote on it for Thursday night.
Mr. Vought said he’s not focused on making the appropriations process bipartisan. He said it needs to be less bipartisan.
“There is no voter in the country that went to the polls and said, ’I’m voting for a bipartisan appropriations process,’” he said. “That may be the view of something that appropriators want to maintain.”
With Republicans holding full control of the government, now’s the time to rein in the debt and spending, he said.
“I actually think that, over time, if we have a more partisan appropriations process for a time, it will lead to more bipartisanship,” Mr. Vought said.
He said he’s looking to “change the paradigm” of the appropriations process in Washington, noting the repeated use of continuing resolutions or stopgap measures to fund the government.
He expects “good results” will come from the process being partisan.
Mr. Vought added that Congress’ “power of the purse” is not limitless.
“It is one of the most constitutional foundational principles, but … it’s a ceiling. It is not a floor,” he said. “It is not the notion that you have to spend every last dollar of that.”
English (US) ·