Impoundment: Unlawful Stealing of Funds Promised to Americans
Impoundment—stealing funds promised to the American people—has always been unlawful. The Trump Administration, including OMB Director Russ Vought, fabricated the existence of an inherent Presidential power to impound, something the Government Accountability Office, the Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel, and the Supreme Court of the United States have all disavowed.
President Trump and Russ Vought have dispatched hordes of unelected and unaccountable political appointees to choke off investments made to the American people. The Trump Administration has blatantly and repeatedly violated the law to steal American taxpayer dollars by depriving communities of the promised investments they deserve. Every instance of Republicans unilaterally stealing investments from American families and businesses directly affects individuals across the nation.
House Appropriations Committee Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-03) released a fact sheet detailing how the Trump Administration under the recently fired and forever-disgraced Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has been dismantling the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and making Americans less safe since day one.
Since the day they took office, President Trump and Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russ Vought have been breaking the law, blocking Congressionally-approved public funding, and depriving American communities of crucial resources that were allocated on a bipartisan basis. A new fact sheet released today by House Appropriations Committee Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-03) lays out some of the most flagrant violations of the law perpetrated by President Trump and Russ Vought.
Today, Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-03), Ranking Member of the House Appropriations Committee, and Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, released updated information detailing at least $410 billion in federal funding that President Trump and Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russ Vought are holding up and denying communities across the country.
Since taking office, President Trump has trampled over our nation's laws and choked off critical investments that families, businesses, and local governments in every zip code in America are counting on.
House Appropriations Committee and Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education Subcommittee Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-03) issued the following statement on Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russ Vought’s unlawful effort to unilaterally cancel appropriated funding.
Today, Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur (OH-09), Ranking Member of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, and Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee and Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, released the following statement in response to the Department of Energy’s announcement of another release of crude oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
A new joint report from the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) Local 2883 and the Public Data Observatory found that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have suffered estimated workforce losses of 30 percent, or more than 3,800 civil servants under the reckless stewardship of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and President Trump.
The Trump administration is breaking the law by attempting to unilaterally eliminate (or “impound”) nearly $1 billion in taxpayer funding that was constitutionally enacted – approved by the House, the Senate, and signed by the President – a new report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) has found. House Appropriations Committee Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-03) issued a statement regarding the ruling:
The Trump administration used funding allocated for Customs and Border Protection (CBP) in Republicans’ “One Big Beautiful Bill” to pay for President Trump’s government funded political ads that started running last week. House Appropriations Committee Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-03) and House Appropriations Homeland Security Subcommittee Ranking Member Henry Cuellar (D-TX-28) released the following statement:
House Appropriations Committee Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-03) issued a statement following reports over the weekend that the White House is drafting a new executive order to exert further political control over who receives research grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH):
Today, Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-03), Ranking Member of the House Appropriations Committee, and Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, released updated information detailing at least $410 billion in federal funding that President Trump and Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russ Vought are holding up and denying communities across the country.
More than 100 tribal representatives and organizations will testify before the House Appropriations Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Subcommittee this week, in one of the largest collective testimonies by Native communities in recent committee history.
For weeks, I have been sounding the alarm on the devastating impacts that the Trump administration’s policies are having on our communities—from our farmers and educators to our scientists and small businesses. I hope the tribal witnesses we’ll hear from will share how this administration is affecting the lives and livelihoods of Indigenous people in their communities — and across the country.
Ranking Member DeLauro regarding the Jan. 13 editorial, “Thumbs ups and thumbs downs on Trump’s picks."
House Appropriations Committee Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro (CT-03) delivered the following remarks during a House Appropriations Committee hearing on automatic continuing resolutions.
House Appropriations Committee Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro (CT-03) delivered the following remarks before the House Rules Committee regarding the House Republican Continuing Resolution released on Friday.
House Appropriations Committee Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro (CT-03) delivered the following remarks on the House Floor during debate on the Fiscal Year 2027 State, Foreign Operations and Related Programs funding bill:
House Appropriations Financial Services and General Government Subcommittee Ranking Member Steny Hoyer (MD-05) delivered the following remarks during a hearing with Supreme Court Justices Elena Kagan and Amy Coney Barrett:
House Appropriations Committee Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro (CT-03) delivered the following remarks during an appropriations subcommittee hearing with Supreme Court Justices Elena Kagan and Amy Coney Barrett:
Today, Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur (OH-09), Ranking Member of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, and Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee and Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, sent a letter to Energy Secretary Chris Wright calling out the dozens of changes being made to operating directives at the Department of Energy (DOE), which is jeopardizing the safety of work being done at DOE labs, plants, and sites, reduces transparency and Federal oversight, and risks wasting taxpayer dollars. DOE made these sweeping changes without meaningful engagement with workers, labor unions, and other stakeholders.
Yesterday, Ranking Member Marcy Kaptur (OH-09) of the Committee on Appropriations’ Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development and Ranking Member Zoe Lofgren (CA-18) of the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology sent a letter to Department of Energy (DOE) Secretary Chris Wright demanding answers regarding a political appointee remaining on paid administrative leave nine months after they were removed from their position. The appointee in question, Ms. Cathy Tripodi, served as the Director of DOE’s Office of Clean Energy Demonstration (OCED). She was removed from her position in October 2025.
House Appropriations Committee Ranking Member Rosa DeLauro (CT-03) together with the other eleven Democratic subcommittee Ranking Members urged the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to withdraw its proposed Regulation for Federal Financial Assistance in a letter submitted as part of the proposed rule’s comment process.
Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur (D-OH-09), Ranking Member of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, and Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee and Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, asked the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to issue a legal decision on whether President Trump’s Department of Energy (DOE) violated key appropriations laws in shifting hundreds of millions of dollars provided for research and development of clean energy sources in the full-year continuing resolution (CR) President Trump signed into law in March and steering those funds to energy sources it favors.
Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-03), Ranking Member of the House Appropriations Committee, and Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Senate Appropriations Committee Vice Chair, sent a letter to Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russ Vought calling out the Trump administration’s unacceptable failure to submit detailed spend plans for each agency to the Appropriations Committees, as the Full-Year Continuing Appropriations Act of 2025 requires by law.