US Senate confirms Trump’s budget director pick Russell Vought amid controversy

Vought, who antecedently led the Office of Management and Budget during Trump’s archetypal term, sparked concerns from some parties by questioning a 1974 instrumentality that stops presidents from unilaterally blocking funds approved by Congress. This practice, known arsenic “impoundment,” is seen arsenic a cardinal cheque connected statesmanlike power.

During his confirmation hearings, Vought repeatedly claimed the 1974 instrumentality was unconstitutional. Even immoderate Republican senators were uneasy with his stance. “I don’t afloat enactment that position,” admitted a Republican committee chairman, arsenic reported by Reuters.

Recently, the White House Budget Office, nether Vought’s influence, issued a memo freezing hundreds of billions of dollars successful national grants and loans. The Trump medication claimed this frost was indispensable to align spending with the president’s priorities, specified arsenic ending diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives.

However, aft backlash, the White House withdrew the memo, and a national justice temporarily blocked the freeze. This determination raised fears astir the stableness of indispensable government-funded services and concerns implicit Trump’s imaginable to restrict different areas of national funding.

Democrats besides linked Vought to the far-right Project 2025 argumentation initiative, criticising his relation successful arguable Trump-era actions, including attempts to dismantle the US Agency for International.

(with inputs from Reuters)

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