The President wants to take over the appropriations power. Which he is forbidden by law to do. Google "impound act."
If Musk is able to exercise de facto line-item vetoes over what the Congress has appropriated - which again, is illegal, according to a law upheld by the Supreme Court 9-0 - then it is another assault on the Constitution.
Not that any MAGA morons give two shits about the constitution.
The Treasury Dept writes the checks. They have no choice in the matter. That has been upheld 9-0, as I said. Presidents cannot order appropriated money to be halted.
I get the point that the Treasury is obligated to write the checks that Congress mandates. What I don't personally know enough about is where the specifics are laid out on the individual checks. What does the bill mandate, at a detailed level (recipient/amount)?
They know that they can't directly "halt" these payments. But a bright, blaring light needs to be shined on these spend items. Everyone needs to see that media outlets are being funded, billions being wasted on roads that are never finished, gender ideology training in other countries, and vague projects that don't serve our country's interests in any clear way.
I'm hoping that this is the plan. The funds will be issued, but force Congress's hand on taking a public position on these ridiculous wasteful items.
If it had done this all in anything resembling a rational manner, it could have cut lots of crap out of the budget.
But it came with a hammer - and an ideology. This is not about saving money - it's about getting rid of things they don't like. And dismantling anything that could possibly get in Trump's way.
I'll be proven right when the next round of massive tax cuts for rich people are announced. The cuts will be used to justify it.
Further, the Democrat party is using sympathetic judges to try to block the removal of illegal alien criminals from our country as well. Disgusting. No wonder the slogan "MAGA" offends them so much.