1-29-25 - 9am - Pause on the Pause on Federal Funding

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
That senator sounds like he's had one too many boosters.

Speaker 2 (00:03):
My god, by the way, that's our senator, the Michael Bennett,
who the So let's talk about Trump's well, let's see
Drudge has moved it off the headline. Let's see if
he's changed it. Earlier it was all about how everybody's

(00:30):
getting shut down, you know. Trump shuts Medicaid portals, chaos spreads,
judge blocks, all federal workers offered buyouts. It's armageddon. And
over at CNN it's also armageddon.

Speaker 3 (00:48):
Chrisman, thank you for joining us. I want to start
first anecdotally about your district and what you're hearing from
organizations there about the impact that this has had so far.

Speaker 2 (01:00):
Great to be with you.

Speaker 4 (01:00):
You know, I'm right here in my home in Philadelphia.
I represent about half of the city it comprises my
congressional district. It is a largely working class district of
people who go to work every day, and a lot
of them live paycheck to paycheck, paycheck by paycheck. So
when we're talking about all of a sudden head Start

(01:23):
being frozen and head Start facilities not able to access
the portal yesterday were suddenly Medicaid frozen. You know, Medicaid
is what pays for the majority of people who have
an elderly parent or grandparent in nursing homes. So those
are just two of the many, many examples where government

(01:43):
funding interacts with the normal daily lives of many in
my constituents. So I heard outrage yesterday, and by the way,
so did the Trump administration, because by late yesterday they
were backtracking on a number of things they had said
just the night before.

Speaker 3 (02:00):
A federal judge has paused this program at least until Monday.
And I'm wondering if in those intervening days, if you
think that you can either get enough opposition from your
Republican colleagues to kill this proposal, or if you can
get enough clarification from the White House to limit the
impact to some of those organizations you just listed.

Speaker 4 (02:22):
You know, I have to say I was not surprised.
As extraordinary as it is, and contrary to what the
Senator Foon said, this is unprecedented and extraordinary. This is
not what an incoming administration ever.

Speaker 2 (02:35):
Remember, this is unprecedented, according to the congressman from Pennsylvania.

Speaker 4 (02:40):
Does because it is completely contrary to the Constitution and
federal law. But as remarkable as a step as it
may be. I was not surprised because Russ vought the
incoming onb director. He was one of the principal authors
of Trump's Project twenty twenty five, and in that document

(03:01):
he wrote in great.

Speaker 2 (03:02):
Detail that this is what they would be planning to do.

Speaker 4 (03:05):
So I think this is going to be litigated in
the courts. The Supreme Court previously is upheld unanimously the
right of Congress to control the purse. It is pretty
clear in an Article one of the Constitution that Congress
has the power of the purse. So I think we
will ultimately prevail. But until that is finally resolved in

(03:27):
the courts, I think they're going to cause a lot
of disruption and a lot of heartache needlessly among the
American people.

Speaker 2 (03:35):
Who's causing the heartache and the fear, because I would
argue that it is not the president, it's not the freeze,
it's not the pause, it's the cabal, and it's the Democrats,
and of course it's their constituents in this money laundering scheme.
Like there's some I've already feln it away, but I

(03:58):
did so. I did to Michael Brenton Michael Brown mean
this morning, and it's about some immigrant advocacy group here
in Colorado who is just panic stricken. Now, this particular
group provides lawyers to illegal aliens so that they can
have legal representation on their deportation hearings or whatever issue

(04:18):
they might have, like where's where's my freaking iPhone? My
iPhone doesn't work. And my whole point in the minute was,
first of all, you haven't lost your funding. You've already
gotten your funding for this fiscal year, and you've probably
already gotten your funding for this month. I don't know

(04:40):
what your payment schedule is, maybe you get funding every quarter,
whatever it might be, but you've already gotten it. And
if you are afraid about next month, why were you
always or why were you never out seeking private donations
grants from foundations, or grants from other charities, or donations

(05:05):
from other charities, or a grant or a contribution from
a foundation. No, because you're totally dependent upon the federal government,
because you're actually part of the Democrat Party. But to
be hyperbolic and talk about oh my gosh, we're gonna
you know, they're gonna lose all their rights, we're gonna

(05:25):
lose all our money, and we're shutting down Medica. Ingram
to know this is all bull crap. The cabal always
eager to pounce on Trump's every move, Well, this is
all this is is their latest outrage. Listen to what
he Listen to what he did. He decided to delay
discretionary spending until the new cabinet members are installed. Now,

(05:50):
think about that for a moment. If you're a member
of the United States Senate and the chief executive of
the executive Branch, I said, you know what, I'm just
going to pause. I'm going to delay discretionary spending until
these cabinet members get approved so they can come in
and get a handle on what's going on. If you're

(06:13):
a senator, rather than going on television and bitching and
moaning about the fact that, oh my god, we're not
going to get the Medica payments, which is simply not true,
how about you just get those cabinet members confirmed. So,
of course they're just screaming foul. They declare that this
is somehow unlawful, that it's an overreach, it's a violation,

(06:35):
like he just said, of the Congress's power of the
purse and of course, it's going to be the end
of the country. It's the end of civilization as we
know it. The problem with them being so hysterical, they're
ignoring the fundamental principles of the Constitution, and they're ignoring
the precedent. Let's get something clear. Trump is not refusing

(06:57):
to spend the money that Congress appropriated. He's merely trying
to ensure that when it is spent, it is spent responsibly. However,
even if he were to refuse to spend certain moneyes,
he's well within his constitutional authority to do that. I

(07:18):
don't care what this congressman says. All we have to
do is look at history. Democrat and Republican presidents alike
have done exactly the same kind of thing. In fact,
not only does Trump have the right to delay discretionary spending,
but I would argue that he has an obligation to
do so if he believes that spending something is reckless, wasteful,

(07:41):
and threatens our interests, the American interests. The Constitution does
not empower Congress to micro manage the executive or they're
spending timelines. All Congress does it authorizes a program which
is different than appropriating let's have our little budget us
and for a minute, Congress has to first create and

(08:04):
authorize a program. So the program is to provide nipples
for baby bottles to certain organizations that meet certain requirements.
That's the program, that's the authorization. But the program can't

(08:24):
provide nipples to baby baby bottles unless and until Congress
appropriates money to fund that program. So then Congress appropriates
money to buy nipples for baby bottles to provide to
certain organizations that meet certain requirements. Then that authorization, the
creation of that program. Omb Officer Management budget gets a notification.

(08:47):
Here's a program that Congress is authorized and by the way,
they've appropriated, you know, a bazillion dollars for it. Now
it's up to the executive branch to administer of the
program and they can exercise their discretion in spending the
appropriations unless Congress very specifically, but you know they don't

(09:12):
do because what do they always do? This gets back
to my big bugget boo back. Congress never does his
job in the first place. So Congress just creates a
program that says, hey, we want certain organizations to get
nipples for baby bottles. Now, where that came up in
my head. I have no idea, but that's the program.
Then they say, for example, this one will probably be

(09:34):
through HHS. Then they say to HHS, by the way,
we created a baby a program for nipples for baby bottles,
and you're going to administer the program. But you get
to write the rules and regulations for how you administer
that program. So they give up their Congressional They don't
give up oversight, but they give up their their limitations

(09:54):
unless they write very specifically into the law all the where, what, when,
and why, how the money's going to be spent or
how the programs is going to be administered. And they
never do that because they're too lazy and they're too stupid. Now,
adding to this absurd outrage over Trump's simple delay in
spending is the fact that we're already out of money.

(10:21):
On her last day in office, probably the worst Secretary
of the Treasury in the history of the country, Janet Yelling,
notified Trump that the government would hit the debt limit
ceiling during his first week in office. Now, normally when
you hit the debt ceiling, what's on the news. Oh

(10:41):
my god, the government's out of money and we got
to shut down we can't do anything in What do
they do when they shut down the government? They shut
down the things that will affect you the most. They
shut down the national parks, they shut down the memorials,
They shut down we know, the National Air and Space
Museum where they shut down. You know some federally fund
a bridge somewhere. They shut down things. They're going to

(11:03):
make you pissed off. Well that's what they did here,
except they didn't shut anything down. And I haven't heard
a peep about Janet Yellen notifying Trump that we hit
the debt ceiling last week. Now, she at the same

(11:26):
time instructed the Treasury Department before she left as the
Secretary of Treasury to implement extraordinary measures to keep the
government afloat. So what does that mean extraordinary measures? Well,
they make all sorts of financial maneuvers that are used
to avoid breaching the debt ceiling. What do they do?

(11:48):
Oh see if this sounds familiar. They suspend investments in
government retirement funds like the Civil Service Retirement and Disability Fund,
or they suspend payments into the Postal Service retiree health
benefits funds. And thus I specifically use the word they postponed.
They didn't say we're not going to do it, We're

(12:10):
just not going to make that investment today. They suspend
new investments of the Exchange Stabilization Fund, and they refrain
from reinvesting maturing securities in the Government Securities Investment Fund
of the Federal Employees TSP through a savings plan. So
those measures do not raise the debt ceiling. They just

(12:34):
put off the inevitable. They're stop gaps that by Congress
time to increase or suspend the debt limit. But here's
the reality. Congress is not given Trump additional borrowing authority,
so it has no standing to bitch and moan about
his decision to delay spending. Because if the House and
the Senate want of the money spent immediately, what should

(12:57):
they be doing. They should be acting on the debt,
sealing up posturing for the cameras over things like Bobby
Kennedy today. But it goes beyond that, and this is
the stupidity of the debt ceiling. I'm with Trump on
this one. Get rid of the debt ceiling. It's an
artificial limitation anyway. The US Constitution is explicit. It divides

(13:23):
responsibilities between the well between all branches. But in this
case I'm talking about, it divides responsibilities between the executive
branch Article two and the legislative branch Article one. So
Congress controls the appropriations, meaning that Congress decides whether money
can be spent and for what purpose, but it does

(13:45):
not dictate when or how efficiently those funds are to
be used. Let's go Article two, Section three. Now Article two,
this is the executive branch. Section three says, in fact,
it directs, it orders the president to one take care
that the laws be faithfully executed. So that tells me

(14:09):
that the founders meant that the president, not Congress, had
the power to execute spending in a manner that ensures
that spending is done efficiently, effectively, and with accountability. That
separation of powers prevents Congress from dictating the minutia of
how the executive is going to administer the programs. It's

(14:32):
a clear separation of powers issue. Appropriating funds that's one thing,
but managing funds effectively that's another. And the responsibility is divided.
Congress appropriates, the executive manages. The responsibility of execution belongs
squarely in Article two with the president. But let's go

(14:54):
beyond that, because guess what when they tell when that
congressman tell, he tells you, as they did in that
soundby that this is unprecedented. He's lying because President Trump's
decision to put off spending is not a power graph,
and it's not unprecedented. Presidents had been doing this for decades.

(15:17):
The notion that he's required to blindly follow spending timeline
dictated by Congress is not only constitutionally dubious, but it's
contradicted by history. I myself have refused to spend money
that Congress has appropriated. I had a Congressman from Florida
who wanted money spent at a specific university. I forget

(15:39):
whether it was the University of Florida of Florida State OFFI,
it doesn't make any difference. But spent at a Collie
at a university in Florida on a program that I
thought was stupid. It was it was like, this is
totally with outside our jurisdiction, has nothing to do with us.
This is money that we should not spend. So I
told my chief financial officer, do you not spend that money?

(16:03):
Did I get in trouble? No? Did I get a
call from the congressman when the university who had been
promised the funds didn't get the money. Yeah, I got
a call from the Congressman. I went up to his office.
I said, no, I'm not going to spend the money. Now.
If you want to have a fight over the spending
of the money, take that up with the Office of

(16:24):
Management and Budget, because I had got in the White
House approval not to spend the money. First money never
got spent. The congressman back. Now, so what do we
do with that money? We put it to another purpose.
But I want to give you some specific example, and

(16:45):
let's start with since Bobby Kennedy is talking about HHS,
let's go to the Affordable Care aut aka Obamacare. Next. Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike.

(17:08):
Guess what day it is? Trump Day? What day?

Speaker 5 (17:16):
Trump Day?

Speaker 2 (17:17):
Trump Day? Hump Trump Hump Trump Day. That's what it is.
Hump tump. That's that's Mellennio's job. Oh, okay, only because
she pays him. Oh, they have an arrangement. They kind
of like you, missus Redbeard, have an arrangement. It's an arrangement, yes,

(17:38):
because she's had me review the agreement, so I know
I know exactly what the arrangement is actually signed off
by a neutral party, and of course it can be
terminated at will at any time, any moment, any moment. Uh,
I have a text message I'll get to in a
minute if I want to finish this first, because the text,

(17:59):
I think you're trying to convince me that it's the
end of the world if your wife's organization doesn't get
her grant. And I'm sorry, but I'm kind of yawning.
So there's historical precedence for doing what Trump's doing, and
I think the best place to start is with Obama

(18:21):
and Obamacare. Remember Obamacare was passed without one single Republican vote.
Only Democrats voted for it because Democrats had the majority,
and of course Obamacare was more important to them than
any sort of you know, immigration reform, which they always
talk about Republicans are blocking, yet when they had the
opportunity to do it, they failed miserably to do it

(18:43):
because this was more important. But how important was it.
Let's go back twelve years twenty thirteen. Obama on his own,
unilatterly without approval from Congress, key provisions of Obamacare. Remember
Obamacare was his baby because he argued that they needed

(19:07):
more time to implement the law effectively. So they lobbied
for got a law passed, and then admitted, hey, we're
not ready for it. We need more time. The delay
affected employer mandates, It delayed reporting requirements, It delayed all
these clear statutory deadlines that the Democrats had written in

(19:32):
the law for their Democrat president to implement. And Congress
erupted him protests like they are today, and Obama told
him pound sand. But the reason is more important than
the fact that he told his colleagues the pound sand,
because he maintained that executive discretion was necessary in order

(19:56):
for them to properly implement the law. So all the
Democrats that are screaming, now, do you remember doing that?
Don't you remember Obamacare? Yeah? Uh, nineteen eighty Ronald Reagan,
of course, he was as bad as Trump. So you know,

(20:17):
maybe this isn't a good example, but Reagan delayed and
withheld foreign aid appropriations when he decided, when he decided
that the recipients, including some really brutal regimes, were not
aligned with our American interests. So the Reagan administration was

(20:38):
deeply involved in vetting where the money went. Because they
wanted to ensure that the money did not end up
both string communist influence, so they withheld the aid. Congress
screamed and hollered. Reagan didn't budge. You want to go
way back. There was a present back I think way

(21:02):
back during the Civil War sometime it was a long
time ago. He was a former general. He had something
to do with D Day, whatever that is. It was
like WW two or something. And then he went on
to run as a Republican. His name was my first
dog was named my first Wiener dog was named this Eisenhower. Eisenhower, Yeah,

(21:23):
remember that guy. He was concerned about inflation, say, there's
nothing new under the sun. And he was also upset
about inefficient spending, so he very deliberately slowed down infrastructure spending.
Despite this congressional appropriation for certain public works projects, he

(21:46):
took a very measured approach. He ensured that the funds
were deployed in a manner that maximized their effectiveness, rather
than simply adhering to whatever timelines Congress had put into legislation. Oh,
that sounds awfully familiar to what Trump's doing. Because Trump's
decision to pause discretionary spending follows in all of these

(22:08):
examples of the tradition of executive prudence. You know, unlike Congress,
where politicians love to just throw money at problems with
little regard to oversight or effectiveness or you know, is
it really going to do what it's supposed to do.
They don't care about that. Trump's actually, and I know
this is a shock to the body politic of this country,

(22:29):
but Trump is actually worried about ensuring that our tax
dollars are not wasted on frivolous or for that matter,
dangerous spending. Consider two egregious examples that were mentioned yesterday
in the press conference. Fifty million dollars for condoms in Gaza.

(22:56):
I found it hard to believe, but bureaucrats was poised
to spend or to send fifty million dollars to gazes
to buy condoms. By my calculations, that gets you more
than two billion condoms. Now I have bought a condom
in a while, so I don't know, but it seems

(23:16):
to me that at the going rate, that's a little
over two billion condoms. It was under the guise of
this is this is where stuff gets buried, and you
have to really dig into it under the guise of
public health assistance. But if HAMAS is going to control
the territory, and you've got their history, they're well documented

(23:38):
history of misappropriating aid, you might want to ask yourself,
is that truly a priority for American taxpayers, because we
know that, for example, even the food that we send
for a humanitarian purpose gets stolen and then sold in
the black market to the very people it's supposed to
be given to freely. So fifty oh, I know, fifty

(23:59):
million dollars, that's that's what two seconds of federal spending.
But you say fifty million here, fifty million there. Pretty
soon you've saved a billion dollars and now you're on
the way to save us some real money. Do you
know that Biden I didn't know this, that Biden had
allocated eighty I'm sorry eighty I wish it was eighty

(24:21):
eight hundred million dollars for a new embassy in Syria,
despite the fact that that country's government is effectively controlled
by al Qaeda. Seems to me that we have an
embassy in a country starts within a Albania, Alabama, Africa, Oh,

(24:44):
Afghanistan that we just abandoned I'm not quite sure how
the billion dollars or so that we spent on a
embassy in Iraq. I'm not sure how that facility is doing.
Remember the old Green Zone. I'm not sure how that's doing.
But we abandon Afghanistan and let another mortal enemy of

(25:08):
the United States, the Taliban, take over. And by the way,
they're they're supporting and housing al Qaeda, and we just
left everything there for them. Well, Biden wanted to spend
eight hundred million dollars. Wait a minute, it was eight billion,
eight hundred million dollars in equipment that we left in Afghanistan.
You see, I kind of forget the numbers. They are
also big, but we left that amount of money and equipment,

(25:33):
But nobody ever talks about the embassy. We just left
the embassy there. So now you're going to spend eight
hundred million dollars to build an embassy in Syria. It's
controlled by al Qaeda affiliates. If you think, somehow, somehow
they think that building an expensive diplomatic complex in the
war torn region controlled by terras is is it is okay.

(25:55):
I think Trump looks at that and says, I don't
think that's a good use of our money. So I'm
going to hold on that and I'm not going to
allow that money to be spent. And Congress is going
to bitch and moan about it. I would I had

(26:15):
to dig deep to find that story. The condom story
is pretty easy because that's all over the that's all
over the news. The eight hundred million dollars for the
embassy in Syria. Funny that nobody in Congress is bitching
and moaning about that. So this is not an abuse
of power. It's simply an executive decision authorized under the

(26:37):
US Constitution to delay discretionary spending, which is his constitutional prerogative,
and it's a safeguard against government waste. Everybody keeps telling
us they want to cut out government waste. Well, the
way you do that is you have to first identify
the waste. And the way to do that is to
stop everything. Wait a minute, that the dam is just
like a sieve, there's just money flowing through. Let's just

(27:00):
up and all, and then let's start going through and
finding out where the waste is and let's plug those holes.
The Appropriation Clause of the Constitution gives Congress the authority
the power to allocate funds, but it does not mandate
an immediate or rigid timeline for spending those funds. And
even if it did, well set aside the constitution. The

(27:22):
constitution does not do that. But if in statute, if
the executi, if the legislative branch wanted to give a timeline, okay,
But under the separation of powers, as Obama has done,
we've seen, Oh, we're not going to hear to those
deadlines or those timelines because we want to make sure.

(27:43):
Even Obama wanted to make sure. Hey, even Obama's willing
to admit, hey, we're not quite ready to spend the
money yet. Ask yourself, though, why would Congress be so
adamant with Obama about getting obama Care money out the
door when even their own president, of their own party
says they're not ready to spend it. Oh, maybe because

(28:05):
they wanted to make sure they paid off their friends
that we're going to get that money. So there's something
called the take Care Clause, Article two, where the president
has the duty to ensure that the money appropriated by
Congress is used efficiently in the best interests of the

(28:26):
American people. You've got Reagan, You've got Obama, you got
Eisenhower and now you got Trump. Congress, I'll to stop grandstanding,
shut up and do your job. Good morning, Michael and Dragon.
Here's something to send your OCD off the cliff.

Speaker 5 (28:42):
Back in December, Aurora and Denver had made comments that
they were going to crack down on expired.

Speaker 2 (28:50):
Temporary and annual tags.

Speaker 5 (28:52):
Next time you're out riding around, see how many expired
tags you see and how long they've been expired.

Speaker 2 (28:59):
It's mine blowing squirrel. I refuse to chase it. But
Aurora in Denver are also the ones that are Aurora
in particular is also the one that told us that
because of state law, they will not assist ICE or
CBP in their deportation or repatriation of illegal aliens. Yeah,

(29:24):
so there you go, no guts, no glory. Back to
Bobby Kennedy Jr. So he's still testifying and they're calling
for transparency. Well, do you not think that this administration
has already been a bazillion times greater transparent than the

(29:47):
Biden administration. For example, Kennedy says, my approach to.

Speaker 1 (29:55):
Administration AGHS will be radical transparency. If of this committee
or other members of Congress want information, the doors are open.
I've spent many years litigating against an IH and it's
sub agencies. I mean it's HHS and it's sub agencies,
and I h C C FDA on issues, trying to

(30:17):
get information that we the taxpayers, paid for and oftentimes
getting back reactive copies after a year or two years
of litigation. That should not be the case. And if
Congress asks me for information, you will get it immediately.

Speaker 2 (30:33):
If he can do that and that alone, that'll be
a major accomplishment. Uh, let's go back to because I
think we met. Even though it was fun to listen
to Michael Bennett the the he actually asked a question
that Kennedy gave a great answer to but kind of

(30:55):
got glossed over.

Speaker 5 (30:56):
Children in my old school district and school districts all
this country. It would be better off not getting vaccinated
than getting vaccinated, unlike his own children who were vaccinated,
Unlike the people he invited to his house in Los
Angeles for their party who were vaccinated, For everybody else,
it's about pedaling. These have truths, and he says it

(31:18):
with such conviction that you want to believe him. And
mister Kennedy, I just have some there are many, many
things in the record, but I hope that you could
answer these questions yes or no. I've tried to ask
these a manner that's faithful to what you actually said,
because I didn't want to have a debate about whether
you actually said them. So I'm asking you yes or no,

(31:40):
mister Kennedy.

Speaker 6 (31:42):
Did you say that COVID nineteen was a genetically engineered
bio weapon the targets black and white people but spared Ashkenazi,
Jews and Chinese people.

Speaker 2 (31:53):
Now that's an outrageous statement. I mean a lot of
things outrageous about sars kov too, and called vaccination the
jab the shot, but that it was had a racial impact.
Listen to the answer.

Speaker 1 (32:10):
I didn't say it was deliberately targeted. I just I
just quoted and an i AGE funded, an ani AGE.

Speaker 2 (32:20):
Published study.

Speaker 6 (32:21):
Did you say that it targets black and white people
but spared I.

Speaker 1 (32:25):
Quoted I study, or I quoted an AGE study that.

Speaker 2 (32:29):
Show takes race. I have to move on. I have
to move on. I have to move on because I
can't have you saying that you just quoted ANIH studied
uh a H funded study. I can't have you saying that,
so I got to move on. And then.

Speaker 1 (32:49):
Trends for its poor in this country and yeah.

Speaker 2 (32:53):
We'll save that one for tomorrow. Just too good here,
all of it.