Russell Vought and His Budgeting Cronies Are Using This Sketchy Loophole to Control Government Spending

9 min readOut on the Weekend(Permanent Musical Accompaniment to the Last Post of the Week from the Blog's Favourite Living Canadian.)Senator Ron (Shreds of Freedom) Johnson has been eclipsed on the calendar of Republican senatorial foolishness by the likes of Tommy Tuberville and, most recently, Eric Schmitt. But there's life in the old fella yet. He personally intervened to allow the odious Office of Management and Budget to use a strategy of dubious legality to impound nearly a billion dollars in appropriations that already had been passed by the Congress. Emine Yücel has been bulldogging these shenanigans for Talking Points Memo.A congressional watchdog agency, the Government Accountability Office (GAO), published a post Wednesday morning reaffirming that “pocket rescissions”—a supposed loophole that the Trump White House thinks it can use to seize Congress’ power of the purse—are illegal. “A pocket rescission is illegal as we explained in our most recent decision on pocket rescissions,” GAO wrote in its WatchBlog, referring to a 2018 report the agency put out that states, “amounts proposed for rescission must be made available for prudent obligation before the amounts expire, even where the 45-day period for congressional consideration provided in the ICA approaches or spans the date on which funds would expire.”[OMB head Russell] Vought and his allies believe they have found a loophole in the budgeting process that, they claim, allows them to declare congressionally approved funding rescinded if a rescissions package is sent to Congress close to the end of the fiscal year when funds will expire. Normally, a formal rescissions request starts a 45-day clock in which the executive branch is allowed to withhold the cash in question that it is asking to claw back. But if the request comes in 45 days before the new fiscal year is set to begin on October 1, Vought contends, the White House could withhold the money for that timeframe, regardless of whether Congress takes action on the package, and then claim that the funding is expired when the fiscal year ends.Vought is trying this Mickey Mouse finagling again. Last week, Senate Democrats tried to force a vote on a bill that would block these so-called pocket recissions now and in the future. On Wednesday night, however, Johnson rose up and objected to the bill, effectively killing it.So, around 7 p.m., we got our answer: Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) objected to the bill. He did not directly address the way in which Vought’s maneuvering has run roughshod over one of Congress’ most important duties: dictating federal spending. He shrugged that all government spending should be reduced, and then said the law around impoundments was vague. “It’ll probably have to be all sorted out by the Supreme Court,” he said. That much is right, and the Court has already shown an openness to what Vought is trying to do.This isn't going to improve Chief Justice John Roberts’s standing with his friends in Maine, poor soul.J. Divan Vance is taking quite eagerly to the traditional vice presidential role during national campaigns—namely, to be a colossal dick on the stump while the president floats above it all. Granted, Vance's job is easier than most since the president wallows rather than soars, but Vance is still up to the challenge. From the Florida Phoenix:Speaking during a rally in an airplane hangar at Lakeland Linder International Airport, Vance began the section of his speech targeting [Senate candidate Angie] Nixon by noting the unpopularity of socialism with South Florida Hispanic voters in recent election cycles. He posited how Nixon herself is a self-proclaimed socialist, having joined the Democratic Socialists of America this summer. “When Angie Nixon calls herself a socialist, I think the right response is to say, ‘Then get the hell out of here. You don’t belong in America,'” he said to loud cheers from the hundreds in attendance.To which, Nixon replied:“I don’t wanna COUCH my words here: I know JD Vance, his eyeliner, and Absent Ashley Moody are used to running away from people when things get tough because they care more about themselves and their billionaire buddies than the people they represent. But this is my home. The most ordinary man imaginable came to my home state to tell me to get out of America while he and Absent Ashley enjoyed the comfort of buildings my ancestors helped build. Imagine standing on the shoulders of the people who built this country and then telling their descendants they don’t belong here.“Wanting lower property insurance and healthcare for everyday families isn’t un-American; it’s what working people deserve. They can take their tech-bro cash and their weird, intrusive agenda somewhere else, because I’m not going any damn place.”That's the way you do that thing. It is very important that Vance continues to be the most unpopular politician in America at least until 2029.Weekly WWOZ Pick to Click: "Wake Up Mr. Moon Man" – (James Booker): Yeah, I pretty much still love New Orleans.Weekly Visit to the Pathé Archive: Here, from 1937, are some merry scenes from the elections in the Soviet Union. We see gatherings throughout the huge country and a staggering array of native headgear. We visit with various celebrity candidates including The Scientist Sobolev, the Milkmaid Nartova (and her cow), and The Stakhanovite Turner Fiodorova. Not pictured: the mass arrests by the NKVD and the suppression of the involvement of the Russian Orthodox Church. The New York Times reported: Along with these figures Mr. Denny sends the statement that few people in Moscow expect any real change. Power will remain in the hands of Stalin and his subordinates. Some day there may be real democracy in Soviet Russia, says Mr. Denny, but the trend has been all the other way since the new Constitution was proclaimed a year ago. If this is the feeling in Moscow it is no wonder that everywhere outside of Russia the debut of Soviet democracy should be received with the deepest skepticism. But at the same time people cannot help wondering, as they do in the case of Hitler's and Mussolini's unanimous plebiscites, what is the use of it all. What point is there to a 100 per cent Stalin victory in an election with only one ticket to be voted for?Aspirational for our current moment, I'm thinking.Holy hell, this is not the job for me.In one sweeping operation this spring, more than four tons of Burmese pythons were hauled out of a stretch of South Florida wilderness. For researchers and conservationists, the tally, 8,080 pounds, collected across 177 massive constrictors, sets a new benchmark for removing invasive giants from the Everglades. The work unfolded over just a few months, from November through April, inside a 200-square-mile expanse of Collier County, about 90 miles west of Miami.Four tons of pythons? The snakes, many of which were simply released into the wild by owners who moved or simply got bored feeding them mice, have proven to be a blight on the Florida ecosystem. They eat the native fauna and they breed 70 at a time, which latter turns out to be how the conservationists made their whopping haul.They used radio telemetry, attaching tiny transmitters to 40 male “scout snakes” released back into the wild, to trace their movements during the crucial mating months. The goal was precise: follow the males to the largest, most fertile female pythons. This tactic worked. Researchers concentrated their efforts on pregnant females, which can each harbor around 70 eggs. With these females averaging 95 pounds each and the season’s largest coming in at 153 pounds and an astounding 17 feet long, every capture carried a disproportionate impact on future python generations. Beyond the physical removal of snakes, the team’s laser focusn pregnant females had a multiplying effect. By their estimates, they extracted the potential for roughly 4,100 python hatchlings from the tangled Everglades. In terms of conservation, removing these unhatched eggs has immediate and long-term ripples.And four tons of python is a drop in the old bucket.The current population is staggering. By most estimates, between 100,000 and 300,000 Burmese pythons now prowl southern Florida’s wildlands, forming a shadow over the region’s native species. Scientists describe the pressure as immense; the pythons have firmly secured their place at the top of the food chain. Evidence of their impact can be found inside the snakes themselves. Around a quarter of the female pythons collected in this latest push carried the remains of white-tailed deer, the same deer Florida panthers depend upon. The ripple effects, still being studied, reverberate throughout the Everglades ecosystem.Give humans a chance and they will fck up a free lunch. Don't own pythons and, if you do, keep them in your house. There are enough snakes in Florida, especially if you count the legislature.Discovery Corner: Hey, look what we found. From Popular Mechanics:In the newly uncovered mausoleum at the Utzh An walled complex, which dates back to the 15th century, the team not only uncovered human remains, but also grave goods that may have once belonged to the civilization’s most elite, including gold, copper, jewelry, beads, colorful textiles, and metal weapons.Archaeologists had found elite burials at Chan Chan before, but looters always got there first, particularly after the Inca conquest of the city. The newly discovered burial chamber remained unmolested, however, allowing experts to really mine the site, especially the four-foot-wide and 16-foot-tall central chamber reached by descending an eight-foot long staircase. Archaeologists discovered a total of 38 sets of human remains buried across the funerary area, split nearly evenly between one of two rooms on either side of the central tomb and the larger platform. The main tomb contained just one individual, and its skull was stained a deep blood red.The Red Skull! Hail, Hydra!Hey, BBC. Is it a good day for dinosaur news. It's always a good day for dinosaur news!An exquisitely preserved fossil found in western Liaoning, China, has just been described as a brand-new species of microraptorine dinosaur. The tiny dinosaur, named Norellraptor barsboldi, looks like a bird, but with four wings and a long, feathered tail, it’s clear it belongs to an entirely different group of trailblazing dinosaurs—one that had taken a unique approach to flight. Known for possessing four wings instead of the standard two seen in avialan dinosaurs (i.e. those that evolved into birds), microraptorines have become the poster children for doing things differently, proving that different groups of dinosaurs took to the skies in different ways. The discovery of Norellraptor barsboldi, named in honour of the American paleontologist Mark Allen Norell and Mongolian palaeontologist Rinchen Barsbold, who both sadly passed away in 2025, has added another new species to a diverse group that may contain more than a dozen genera.Microraptorines are predominantly known from China, where they’re found in rocks dating to the Early Cretaceous (125-113 million years ago).It took me a while to get used to the idea of feathered dinos. Somehow, they seemed less fearsome than, say, the T-Rex. But I realized looking at Great Blue Herons fishing in the Charles that their dino ancestors were clear. The long legs and the swoop of their necks were obvious dino legacies. Now we have feathered dinos with four wings! They truly lived then to make us happy now.I'll be back on Tuesday for whatever fresh hell awaits. Be well and play nice, ya bastids. Stay above the snake-line and wear the damn masks, and take the damn shots, especially the boosters and any New One. In your spare time, spare a thought forall the victims of our current epidemics, including the killer countertops, and for the victims of the horrific glacial collapse and flood in Nepal, and for Rep. Max Miller's wife and child, and for the Iranian people, and the Lebanese people and all the other people downrange in our newest war, and all the people in ICE detention,and the victims of ICE violence, and the Epstein victims, and Eric Swalwell's victims, and the victims of the storms in Hawaii, and the victims of the Canadian wildfires, and also the ones in Spain, and the victims of the floods in Missouri, and the victims of the heat domes, and those affected around the world by wildfires, and the victims of the Venezuelan earthguake, and for the victims of the earthquake in Japan, and the victims and their families in the Tumbler Ridge school shooting in Canada, and for the shooting victims in Austin, and for the families of the victims of the mosque shooting in San Diego, and in Michigan, and in Virginia, and in Louisiana, and for the victims and their families of the shootings in Wilmington, Delaware and Kansas City, and for the families and victims of the mass shooting in Midland, Texas, and for the brilliant journalists of the Washington Post, and for the citizens of the occupied city of Minneapolis and South Burlington, Vermont, and the people in the flooded areas of southern Africa, and in the flooded areas in Ireland, and in the flooded areas of Brazil, and the flooded areas of Nepal, and for the storm-clobbered, flooded areas of the upper Midwest, including my alma mater, and in Georgia, and for the people affected by the tornados in Mississippi, and for people suffering from the hantavirus outbreak on the Hondius, the outbreaks of measles, the Hegseth Flu down in Texas, the explosive diarrhea bug, and the Legionnaire's disease outbreak in Harlem, and the victims of the heat wave in Europe, and for our LGBTQ+ citizens, who deserve so much more from this country than they're getting.