About this transcript: This is a full AI-generated transcript of OMB Director Russell Vought Grilled By Lawmakers In House Appropriations Committee from Forbes Breaking News, published July 2, 2026. The transcript contains 20,103 words with timestamps and was generated using Whisper AI.
"days within which to revise and extend their remarks and insert extraneous material into the record i now recognize myself for an opening statement i'd like to welcome back director vote and thank him for being here today the office of management budgemen or omb plays a central role in most of the..."
[0:05] days within which to revise and extend their remarks and insert extraneous material into
[0:10] the record i now recognize myself for an opening statement i'd like to welcome back director vote
[0:16] and thank him for being here today the office of management budgemen or omb plays a central
[0:21] role in most of the decisions made in the executive branch particularly as it relates
[0:24] to the federal budget it's also important to remind our audience again that omb is an office
[0:29] created by congress in 1921 congress passed the budget and accounting act of 1921 which created
[0:35] the bureau budget under the department of treasury later in 1939 in the reorganization act of 1939
[0:43] the bureau was relocated to the newly created executive office of the president and in 1970
[0:49] congress approved the bureau's renaming to the office of management and budget i restate this
[0:54] history because omb plays a unique role both as an office created by congress and one that has been
[0:58] and continues to be responsible for fulfilling the president's policies over the course of the second
[1:04] trump administration omb continues to play a central role in the continued reshaping of the federal
[1:09] government as of june 20th 265 executive orders 59 memoranda and 153 proclamations have been signed
[1:17] by president omb plays a critical role in each one of these decisions however we need to work together
[1:23] to ensure that federal funds are being used as congress intended even if the administration doesn't
[1:28] agree with the intent of certain programs this is why the president's budget remains so important
[1:33] it is a guide to help congress understand agency priorities and how the legislative and executive
[1:38] branch can work together to deploy the resources necessary to execute on those priorities the fiscal
[1:45] year 2027 omb is requesting a 146.1 million dollar a 13.3 increase above its fy enacted 26 uh enacted level
[1:56] i look forward to discussing omb's fy 27 requests with director boat and how we can work together to
[2:02] ensure that agencies have the resources they need to work on priorities for our constituents and the
[2:07] public writ large i now recognize the ranking member for his opening statement thank you very much mr
[2:14] chairman i appreciate your calling this hearing and you referenced how overwhelming is the relationship
[2:26] between the omb and the policies being pursued by the government frankly i think we could have used days of
[2:35] hearings given the extraordinarily broad impact that the omb has had on the operations of government
[2:43] i wish though as well that we had a chance to have this budget hearing before we did the budget
[2:50] mr vote is in essence the administration's chief financial officer and chief operating officer process
[2:56] matters and that bill would have emerged stronger from this subcommittee had we been able to hear from
[3:01] the director and question him on omb's priorities ahead of that marco nevertheless i expect many of us
[3:07] will be asking pointed questions today about the management of federal resources from an expensive war
[3:15] of choice to vanity projects the white house grounds and around dc omb is one of the most powerful
[3:23] and least known offices in our government it is in many ways the nerve center of presidential power
[3:30] under director vote in my opinion it has become a hub for making irrelevant the constitutional limits
[3:37] of the executive branch's power and has become in his own words a soft source of trauma for our
[3:45] nation's dedicated and hard-working civil service i hope today's hearing will be a reminder to director
[3:51] vote that every administration is accountable to congress which is the subject of the constitution's first
[3:59] article and which represents the people it also includes american scientists researchers who rely
[4:06] on federal grants which are now at risk because of director votes plan to impose a political litmus test
[4:13] over a non-partisan peer-reviewed historic process and it includes the millions of americans whose health
[4:21] health lives and likelihoods are adversely impacted by cuts to federal programs and agencies that director
[4:28] vote seeks to impose unilaterally and without congressional approval and in many cases contrary to
[4:35] congressional intent and direction i'm talking about impoundments which are illegal and direct
[4:43] constitutional challenges to congress of the united states and i'm referring also to pocket rescissions
[4:50] mr chairman this oversight hearing may be the most important one held this year in the house
[4:56] it has sadly become rare in this committee to hold hearings with the leaders of the executive
[5:01] branch agencies directly today we have a de facto leader of the unitary executive theory and while
[5:10] the president's focus on being has been on printing money with his face on it and ensuring him and his
[5:16] friends make money through no-bid contracts director vote has been relentlessly focused on enacting his own
[5:24] ideological program president trump said in september 20 or that he had quote nothing to do with project
[5:32] 2025 before us is the architect of that program of which the president disclaimed any knowledge
[5:44] director vote has discernment said he believes america is in a post-constitutional moment i'm not
[5:52] sure what that means not surprising given his apparent disdain for the constitution that he like all public
[5:59] servants have sworn an oath to support and defend director vote i can assure you that our constitution is alive
[6:08] and well and that this committee and congress will hopefully hold you accountable and the government
[6:14] accountable the executive department accountable uh using the oversight tools it places in our hands
[6:22] so we have a lot to cover today and i hope as i said at the beginning that we will have sufficient time
[6:31] to do so because we have differences of opinion serious disagreements unlike justice scalia that said that
[6:41] the executive department uh clearly did not have impoundment theory i think mr director mr chairman is
[6:50] the principal proponent of the opposite conclusion so we could take a lot of time on what the consequences
[6:58] of that philosophy are and the consequences to the american people of the exercise of that philosophy with
[7:09] that i will yield back the balance of my time thank you ranking member hoyer today we welcome the
[7:16] testimony of the honorable russ vote director of the office of management and budget director vote
[7:21] without objection your full written testimony will be entered into the record with that in mind we
[7:25] ask you to summarize your opening statement in five minutes please thank you mr chairman chairman
[7:30] joyce ranking member hoyer members of the subcommittee thank you for having me here today to testify in the
[7:35] president's budget request for fiscal year 2027. i look forward to a productive conversation on how to
[7:41] continue the fiscal progress we've made so far when president trump took office the nation was facing
[7:46] financial catastrophe under the failed leadership of the biden administration in decades of status quo
[7:53] spending strangling our nation those decades produced nothing in the area of fiscal restraint a lot of
[7:59] talk about the program but utter futility about doing anything about it that few fiscal futility ended with
[8:05] the return of president trump in just one year the trump administration and congress have made historic
[8:11] progress on writing our fiscal ship the speed and scope of which have not been seen in washington for
[8:16] many years the president drove enactment of the working families tax cut which is a once in a
[8:21] generation legislation to end fiscal futility invest in critical priorities and cut taxes for working
[8:27] americans this bill bent the cost curve for federal spending achieving nearly two trillion dollars in
[8:33] mandatory savings while securing historic investments in our nation's defense and department of homeland
[8:39] security without corresponding increases in objectionable non-defense spending the president also shepherded
[8:47] legislation through the congress that rescinded nine billion dollars in wasteful and weaponized spending
[8:52] which was the first standalone rescissions package enacted by congress since 1992.
[8:57] we built on the rescissions package in the full year 2026 appropriations bills together which enacted
[9:04] the first real cut to spending in over a decade and rooted out wasteful spending that the administration
[9:09] identified across federal agencies the enacted bills reaffirm administration policy to eliminate
[9:15] ineffective federal agencies that do not serve a useful purpose for example the bills eliminated all
[9:21] programming for usaid as the administration works to fully shut down the agency after decades of
[9:27] mismanagement and abuse the bills also included the complete elimination of the corporation for public
[9:33] broadcasting which funneled billions of taxpayer dollars into biased woke programming at npr and pbs we
[9:40] look forward to working with you to achieve even more progress in the fiscal year 2027 appropriation cycle
[9:46] in addition to working with you on the administration's recent supplemental funding request the 27 budget
[9:52] builds on the president's vision by continuing to strain non-defense spending and reform the federal government
[9:58] the budget proposes a 10 percent cut to non-defense levels within this total the budget maintains
[10:04] investments in border security immigration enforcement deliveries on the president's commitment to
[10:09] support law enforcement and combat violent crime with a 13 increase to the department of justice
[10:15] and honors the nation's sacred obligation to military veterans in addition the 2027 budget eliminates
[10:22] wasteful green new deal projects that are dependent on foreign supply chains returns control of
[10:27] education back to american families and routes waste out fraud and abuse and programs both at home and abroad
[10:34] the budget simultaneously builds upon the historic 1 trillion defense top line from fiscal year 26 by
[10:41] requesting 1.5 trillion for 2027 a 42 percent increase as promised by president trump last year the 27 budget
[10:51] will ensure the united states continues to maintain the world's most powerful and capable military as we grapple
[10:57] with an increasingly dangerous world it is a sizable increase and that i want to explain it is meant for
[11:03] significant paradigm shifting investments for instance the president and his department of war are
[11:08] exhibiting tremendous leadership to build ships planes drones munitions and satellites faster without the
[11:15] backlog status quo for the industrial base to double and triple capabilities and build more facilities
[11:23] not just add shifts it requires multi-year agreements to purchase into the future that cost has to be
[11:29] booked in the first year omb plays a unique role in supporting and implementing the administration's
[11:35] fiscal strategy and has been hard at work crafting the president's budget and accomplishing the largest
[11:40] deregulatory agenda in the nation's history omb's fiscal year 27 funding request for itself is 150 war
[11:49] 154.1 million which is level requested from what we requested last year omb is a personnel intensive agency
[11:59] and i want to note that the 27 requests cannot support additional or even maintain staffing at the 26 levels
[12:06] accordingly omb is not asking for additional ftes in fact we're assuming a lower fte level
[12:12] to be absorbed in the base 25 ftes down to 470 omb based on our request omb is going to have to
[12:21] leverage funding from the working families tax cut to ensure that its staffing levels are necessary
[12:26] and remain the same to perform its critical mission in implementing key administration priorities now that
[12:35] our fiscal ship has finally turned to face in the right direction i look forward to working with you to
[12:39] continue to move forward i'm happy to answer any questions thank you director vote um i'll recognize
[12:49] the ranking member uh of the full committee who has asked if she'd be able to make an opening
[12:57] statement thank you much very very much mr chairman i apologize to you and to the rest of the committee
[13:15] and to our guests this morning there are many many meetings going on uh so i i appreciate your
[13:24] the opportunity to provide an opening statement i want to say a thank you to chairman joyce
[13:28] to ranking member hoyer um and i want to welcome director vote a lot of ground to cover and uh you
[13:37] and i agree on very little but i'm glad that you are here to fulfill your constitutional responsibility
[13:43] to respond to congress's oversight authorities quite honestly even if it's only after all 12 bills
[13:50] have been passed by this committee um in your position as director of the office of management and
[13:56] budget you have asserted unprecedented control over taxpayer funding a power of the purse that
[14:02] belongs to congress under the constant democratic or republican you have withheld funding that congress
[14:09] passed on a bipartisan basis and that presidents of both parties including the current president have
[14:16] signed into law you have shuttered entire federal agencies contributing to the deaths of some of the
[14:22] most vulnerable women and children across the globe in the process and you have done all these things
[14:28] under the guise of shrinking the government yet you have also spent billions and billions of dollars
[14:33] beyond what is legally allowed you have hijacked billions from investments to maintain u.s military
[14:39] superiority in the future and you have taken over 400 million dollars in taxpayer funding from the secret
[14:47] service to pay for the president's ballroom project you are currently withholding 19 billion dollars to
[14:52] shutter an agency congress has not agreed to shutter and as i wrote to you last march you have unlawfully
[14:59] spent over nine billion dollars in taxpayer funding that was never legally appropriated exposing dozens of
[15:06] your administration colleagues to criminal liability the lack of accountability you have shown to the
[15:11] american people must be addressed but today i want to highlight one recent item that should concern
[15:16] people of every political persuasion in every corner of this country at the end of may
[15:22] OMB released a proposed rule in an attempt to subject all federal funding to a political litmus test
[15:28] the proposal instructs political appointees in the trump administration to deny or terminate virtually any
[15:36] grant at any time for any reason or no reason at all at the beginning middle and end of the federal funding
[15:44] process under your proposed rule a recipient must quote demonstrably advance the president's policy
[15:51] priorities end quote not the country's and not the laws there is no telling on any given day what the
[15:58] president's priorities may be he routinely announces a policy in the morning only to reverse it in the
[16:04] afternoon his habit is to govern by whim and fiat this proposal seeks to establish yourself as the chief
[16:11] interpreter and final arbiter of what does or does not conform to this ill-fated ill-defined standard your
[16:18] proposal would sideline the independent non-partisan experts who ordinarily make grant funding decisions
[16:25] as part of a peer review process based on evidence and science in favor of political tests imposed by
[16:32] you instead of awarding research funding based on the likelihood of success it will be conditioned on
[16:39] political compliance rather than scrutinizing the data applicants will have their social media
[16:45] scrutinized you are creating an environment in which promising cancer treatments will lose grant
[16:51] funding because the university that houses the lab has the word diversity in its mission statement
[16:57] you are inviting the possibility that years of work on a revolutionary alzheimer's drug will be cut
[17:03] short and abandoned because the head researcher spoke at a conference hosted by a group that disagrees with
[17:09] the trump administration on vaccine policy it has canceled culture for cancer research weaponization of
[17:16] bureaucracy the harm this will do if allowed to take effect is unfathomable do not take my word for it
[17:22] experts in psychiatry immunobiology and neuroscience at yale university have expressed profound alarm
[17:30] at the impact this proposal will have i am submitting for the record letters that i received from these doctors
[17:36] and researchers detailing the catastrophic effects of this proposal would lead to may i submit through the
[17:42] documents because i will wrap up uh very quickly lastly i want to touch on the supplemental
[17:52] okay i i i appreciate that but i would like the record to have it um um uh oh there is a lot
[18:00] we're very much eager to hear your answers today director director vote to the questions and if i might
[18:06] um my entire statement be read into the record i apologize for being late it is not for lack of
[18:16] diligence but because of the schedule that we have here so i appreciate it i thank the very chairman
[18:22] for that much appreciated thank you and now we'll start around the questions i will begin the answer will
[18:33] be five minutes or questions if people see fit to have five minutes of monologue so be it but uh at the
[18:40] end of five minutes uh we move on to the next person i recognize myself director vote last week you
[18:46] sent a supplemental request to congress requesting 87.6 billion in additional funding for fiscal year
[18:52] 2026. with respect to this committee 36 million was requested from the office of terrorism and
[18:58] financial intelligence and 600 million was requested for gsa half for elevator related capital projects
[19:04] and half for the district's heating and transmission decoupling program among other things
[19:07] uh my question for the on behalf of the committee is how was this request developed how did omb determine
[19:14] its supplemental priorities vis-a-vis its fy 27 budget request and what changed between may and now that
[19:20] triggered these requests thank you mr chairman and thank you for inviting me to testify um we ran a process
[19:28] with the supplemental to try to assess the defense needs in particular uh that we had with operation epic
[19:35] fury uh we also sent out a request uh for needs not unlike what we would do for anomalies with a cr request
[19:43] to to determine what are the most uh dire needs obviously needs came back with the state department with
[19:49] regard to buildings that may need to be repaired from active activities overseas but also in terms of
[19:55] uh coast guard needs because they are absorbing uh activities where the dow would normally have
[20:01] performed those activities or in the case of gsa kind of a an acute need with uh the elevators uh that
[20:09] uh was was was needed based on kind of kind of a typical inability to get that much money coming from
[20:16] congress so that one might have been come might have put forward in the normal appropriations process or
[20:22] our budget cycle uh but we wanted to use this as an opportunity and again we have not said this is
[20:27] this is um just defense we we wanted to make sure that any needs that we see uh we are bringing to
[20:34] you um as legitimate and it has on b seal of approval and i appreciate in your testimony mr chairman the
[20:40] role that on b provides for this committee in particular so that you know when we send something
[20:45] up we believe it is it's been pressure tested uh accordingly well thank you and i appreciate that but
[20:53] i noticed that uh and we've had hearings on it that there's a tremendous backlog of maintenance in all
[20:57] of facilities uh unfortunately that we all need to get to with that in mind for fiscal year 2027
[21:03] budget request omb is requesting a 13.3 percent or 17.1 million dollar increase this increased
[21:10] funding would support quote unavoidable costs investing in omb's workforce among other priorities
[21:15] would you explain what those unavoidable costs are and why omb needs additional funding only to
[21:19] cut staffing levels and how do you reconcile the statement well we need omb's budget to grow and
[21:25] it's largely been flatlined for a number of years if you look at gao's budget they have about 900
[21:30] million dollars to our 150 million dollars they have 3 000 staff that perform the activities that
[21:38] you all feel is vital we have in the neighborhood of 500 ftes that largely hasn't grown even though the
[21:44] federal government has expanded in size and you know if you just look at some of the portfolios that
[21:50] people have their their astronomical um we have tried to change that uh but we need more ftes to do
[21:56] that ob3 the the one big beautiful bill will help us uh with additional ftes we're going to
[22:03] unfortunately draw down on that to maintain steady state levels and that's my main concern uh mr chairman
[22:09] is that my hope is that the base level will grow accordingly uh this year and into the future but
[22:16] to answer your question specifically we have rent costs because we are uh in the midst of a move and
[22:22] we have to pay rent temporarily in both places max is a computer system that the whole federal government
[22:28] uses and it constantly needs um to be invested in almost as an i.t system uh and then the the security
[22:35] that is uh unfortunately a new phenomena for omb in terms of some of the the security threats that
[22:41] uh i have faced uh we are now building that in uh to uh account for that cost because i certainly do
[22:48] not want it to take away from the already uh uh smaller uh appropriation that omb has historically had
[22:56] as a small agency and i think you'll find this uh committee on a bipartisan basis has been very
[23:02] um cognizant of security issues and tried to make uh all those areas under our jurisdiction whole so they
[23:09] can provide the necessary security for yourself and for the employees and the people who visit this
[23:14] uh 27 budget justification cites several new responsibilities that omb will assume assume
[23:20] through recently issued executive orders this includes eo 14215 titled ensuring accountability for
[23:26] all agencies uh protecting america's bank against fraud waste and abuse and 14275 uh restoring common
[23:35] cents to federal procurement and eo 1432 improving oversight of federal grant making uh i noticed
[23:42] that i'm gonna about run out of time and in order to be fair to everyone i will now notice uh notice my
[23:48] ranking member mr hoyer for his five minutes well i would have been interested in the answer to that
[23:54] question mr director um the hundred million dollars you've got in the in the reconciliation bill the first
[24:07] reconciliation bill what's the status of that hundred million dollars we are attempting to hire ftes in
[24:14] certain key areas one of them to answer the chairman's question would be fraud prevention
[24:18] one of them is to be able to have a lot of oversight of the spending we're asking you with regard to
[24:24] defense that would be one of those portfolios that we feel like we have nowhere near the number of ftes to
[24:28] be able to provide accountability for uh and we are trying to invest in tools that would allow us to
[24:34] use technology to do own own these work better how much of that hundred million dollars has been
[24:40] obligated uh not very few has been obligated well how much i'd have to get back to you but it would
[24:47] be in the millions less than 10. i would think so yeah so that uh you are asking for additional money
[24:59] and you made the point which i think is a ballot point in terms of ability to do the job that we
[25:05] require you to do um but when you make a comparison the gao the gao has oversight over the two million
[25:16] people who work for the federal government uh and uh you have control over almost all of those two
[25:24] million in terms of getting information uh studies reports so that i think it is a is a not a fair
[25:31] analogy to make that gao has more authority and scope than you have available to you but in any event
[25:38] let me go to debt and deficit this administration and my republican colleagues say the debt is a very
[25:45] serious matter you're aware of of course the fact that the first reconciliation bill uh over 10 years
[25:51] has been a judge to cost either between 4.1 trillion dollars or 4.7 trillion dollars uh depending upon
[26:00] whether you use static or dynamic scoring ironically the dynamic scoring that i think do you support
[26:08] dynamic scoring of course yes uh it costs more under dynamic scoring uh by about uh 800 million billion
[26:17] dollars uh who's gonna how are we gonna bring that down what's your plan in light of the fact that we
[26:25] have now just spent and you're asking for a supplement of 60 billion dollars on a cost that was not
[26:31] uh uh incurred except by choice of this administration and so many other costs they're incurring
[26:41] uh how are we going to uh pay those bills uh we reject the the budget baseline uh assessment that
[26:49] you just gave to the one big beautiful bill uh if you use a proper baseline which assumes current law
[26:56] revenue current policy revenue coming into the federal government uh it would have saved 1.5 trillion
[27:02] dollars as you update the the 10-year window so i look at the one big beautiful bill and i look
[27:08] at it and i say this was the end of fiscal futility and i worked in this uh in the house of representatives
[27:13] i spent many years developing budgets for members of congress i know this place well there was many
[27:18] people uh including yourself who cared about the deficit and and levels of debt and many ideas and
[27:24] plans were put forward this is the first time we've actually had success on the mandatory side
[27:31] and success in the discretionary side i think the appropriations process that you all just
[27:36] completed with the exception of the two shutdowns which we can talk about but the appropriations bills
[27:41] that you passed into law and the appropriations bills that i am seeing and and monitoring as they're
[27:46] moving are for the first time taking some of the suggestions from the president's budget request and i
[27:52] commend this committee on that let me stop you not because i want to stop you but because i have 58 seconds
[27:59] left clearly not enough time but i would suggest to you the two largest uh deficits that we've had
[28:07] were in 2020 and 21 fiscal year 21 under the trump administration now we had the pandemic
[28:13] so one has to take it but the next highest is what we're going to experience today 1.9 trillion
[28:20] dollars do you agree that that's the projected deficit for this fiscal year uh cbo and others are making
[28:26] projected deficit we have not included that in our budget resolution we are going to uh wouldn't it
[28:31] be useful for the omv director to know what the projected deficit is going to be in terms of the
[28:36] obligations that the taxpayer of america well the challenge by the way our grandchildren not ourselves
[28:42] we're certainly committed and have to uh eliminating the deficit and to be able to get back on a
[28:49] trajectory towards balance and my last five seconds when do you project that to happen under the
[28:53] the reckon two reconciliation bills that have passed so far well the fact that we've been in
[28:58] reconciliation bills and are using that has has caused us to send up discretionary only budgets
[29:05] because we do not want to confuse the country with regard to proposals that would be proposed but
[29:11] not for a ride on one of these on these reconciliation bills so we have a lot of ideas but we and we
[29:17] certainly want to get a budget to you as soon as we possibly could so our budget does not include those
[29:23] tables but the mid-session review will have those types of numbers in them later this summer
[29:31] thank you ranking member hoyer the chair now recognizes the distinguished uh chair of the
[29:38] homeland security subcommittee mr amity for any questions you may have thank you mr chairman and
[29:44] the only reason i have that title is because you quit the job and headed for greener pastures but
[29:49] that notwithstanding thank you for being here this morning mr director um does omb recognize congress's
[29:57] full oversight authority over funds provided through reconciliation well as in terms of congress
[30:03] absolutely yes okay thank you um can you provide obviously with that introduction we've struggled getting
[30:13] information that has to do with um the previous folks subject matters clear in in terms of homeland
[30:21] um can can can your office provide an accounting in terms of what we bought for airplanes for ice and
[30:29] border patrol what we bought for airplanes for coast guard um in the first uh in the first in the past
[30:37] 12 months and to the extent that those and also what we spent for detention facilities planned around
[30:47] whatever the plan was around the nation to the extent of identifying how many aircraft in whatever category for
[30:54] those three agencies customs border patrol ice and coast guard how many were purchased how many are
[31:01] still part of the mission and for anything that was that was not part of the mission now how they plan
[31:09] what the plan is for hey it turns out we don't need this 737 this gulf stream 5000 and the detention
[31:17] facilities and here's what our plan is and then the theme is simple how are we protecting taxpayer dollars
[31:23] if we reassess those needs whatever just so we can kind of close the book on those sorts of things is
[31:29] that something your office has the ability to do yes i'm happy to work with you i'll follow up with
[31:34] you after this hearing and try to drill down on what you're not getting from us perfect i appreciate
[31:39] that um last thing is um cissa we had a hearing uh last week uh and uh with with the homeland security
[31:49] secretary this has been through ups and downs from the the end of the biden administration to present
[31:57] the mission i don't think we need to talk about the mission but in last week's hearing after cutting
[32:03] 1100 employees through various uh whatever mechanisms the secretary of homeland security says we need 600
[32:11] folks back can you can you kind of help me with because the administration's budget request was
[32:20] more um lean times if you will and so it's like how are we how are we mixing that up in turn because
[32:29] you know better than anybody you don't just flip a light switch on and you got 600 folks over in cissa
[32:34] now according to the secretary what's the plan for getting cissa fully operational and i understand the
[32:41] political things about elections and the gen easterly years and all that other sort of stuff we're talking
[32:46] about now how do we make sure that we have a robust effective uh cost effective cissa force because
[32:54] i don't think anybody thinks we have it now but if i'm wrong tune me up uh thank you for that question
[33:00] it is does take time to to increase staff that's one of the things we're learning as we try to increase
[33:05] omb staff with the the same money from the one big beautiful bill what i would say is uh i haven't
[33:10] gotten a formal request from the secretary uh as it pertains to cissa ftes um he was not
[33:17] here when we developed this budget so if he feels the need to have uh additional resources we will
[33:25] work that through internally and at the appropriate time come up and brief you i do think that he's in
[33:31] the process still of getting his arms wrapped around the department and this is probably one of those
[33:37] things particularly uh in uh the cyber world has you now have a year and a half of a new administration
[33:45] we saw this agency had major concerns with it in in in our four years outside of government um and with
[33:51] new management i think it's um it's now an agency or could be an agency of that plays a very valuable
[33:58] part for ths's portfolio great i look forward to robust communications and uh thank you for your
[34:05] testimony i yield back mr chairman thank you mr hamaday i would second that that cissa needs all the help we
[34:12] can get as soon as possible and recognize mr pokan for any questions for five minutes that he may have
[34:19] great thank you mr chairman and thank you director vote for being with us i think you know many of us
[34:24] disagree with the first time in 250 years history of the country the unified executive theory so let me
[34:30] drill into one area to ask do you concur that multiple studies have shown that people both adults
[34:36] and children across the globe have died because of cuts to programs like usaid i do i do not concur with
[34:43] the validity of those studies they are based on do you agree that people have died across the globe
[34:48] because of our i believe these studies that people are banting about my question is do you believe people
[34:53] have died because of the cuts to usaid it's simple yes or no i do not believe that the administration
[34:58] don't believe anyone's died let me finish the question no no it's a yes or no it isn't it's really
[35:02] simple do you think people died or not cuts are aimed all right you're not going to answer it i would
[35:06] claim my time i thought you were going to be a little more helpful director vote but that's fine
[35:11] um so this is boston studies lancet studies others have said hundreds of thousands to millions of kids
[35:18] and adults will die because of this uh one of your co-conspirators elon musk recently has been going
[35:23] nuts trying to claim no one's died and he has to name names so let me mention a few people who've died
[35:31] because of these cuts rovina naboy in kenya her little daughter jane uh died of starvation in
[35:38] a refugee camp because we cut back on their food and the food rations she got sick and died ugana
[35:44] balama nigeria usaid funded uh program babies a special nutrition nutrient dense paste uh to avoid
[35:53] malnutrition she had twins six months old the program ended abruptly because of cuts to usaid two weeks
[35:59] later one of the twins died i've got a bunch more are you familiar with any of these stories 13.4
[36:04] million for civic are you familiar with any of these stories there's no number involved in that
[36:09] answer director vote you're citing are you familiar with any of these stories i just gave you two
[36:14] examples are you familiar it's a yes or no don't dance you're not a tap dancer are you familiar with
[36:19] the stories it's really that simple i am familiar with the press that you are citing the reports that
[36:25] you are also referring to are i i take my time back you're clearly not going to answer questions
[36:30] today i thought you came to answer questions you're not so uh will you commit to reach out if i submit
[36:37] some of these names of people who have allegedly died due to cuts will you personally reach out to
[36:43] find out if they have since you're saying no one's died i will personally uh read all correspondence that
[36:48] congress gives me and do everything i can to be responsive to them yeah and could you reach out to
[36:52] them to actually verify whether or not someone's died because of a cut to usaid we're we're monitoring
[36:58] all of these studies to see if there's validity but there is nothing about those studies that has
[37:03] caused us to to think differently about ending so morally climate resilience and i take my time
[37:10] back please morally isn't it wrong to facilitate the death of children isn't it morally wrong to produce
[37:15] that's a question coming back with you look you're not confucius or you know whatever you think
[37:21] you are answering the question with a question i said is it morally wrong to facilitate the killing
[37:26] of children you're you're basing simple question you're basing it on a premise that is okay i'm not
[37:31] going to answer that question take my time back you wrote in a 2021 article in newsweek about christian
[37:35] nationalism that our rights and duties are understood to come from god isaiah 58 7 commands
[37:41] quote share your food with the hungry and provide the poor wanderer with shelter are you saying god was
[37:47] misquoted or wrong i'm sorry what does that have to do with the the question with regard to our
[37:54] it's morally wrong to facilitate the death of children i think we're not doing everyone we're not
[37:59] doing that like i that's why i'm asking you to reach out to folks but what i'm saying is if that
[38:04] is a quote from the bible and i know you are a christian nationalist by by declaration by articles
[38:09] year in a row that you've used that slander for it's not slander you think that's slander you and other
[38:14] christian you think calling someone a christian nationalist is a slander you wrote an article
[38:19] uh is there anything actually wrong with christian nationalism and now you're saying it's a slander
[38:22] that's really odd i don't you use it as a pejorative and it's the second year you've done it would you
[38:26] agree that it is wrong morally ethically or by your own admission biblical standards is it wrong to
[38:35] facilitate the death of children that's not doing that we have adequate foreign aid for this you're not
[38:40] answering the question listen to the question please is it morally ethically or biblically wrong
[38:48] to facilitate the death of children don't take anything else in context is it wrong this administration
[38:54] is not doing that you cannot answer a question i mean i'll i believe he answered the question you just
[38:59] don't like the answer so no he hasn't no mr chairman you can ask your own questions and get your own
[39:03] answers but if he's not going to give an answer and move on everyone else can figure out no i don't have
[39:07] to move on i can ask the question and if this guy is going to one say christian nationalism is an
[39:12] insult you might have some friends to answer it if that one for but to say the sort of stuff and
[39:16] not answer questions directly it is morally ethically and biblically wrong to facilitate the
[39:22] five minutes now recognize the chair recognize mrs henson thank you mr chairman um good morning uh
[39:28] director vote thank you for taking the time to come testify and answer our questions today and
[39:32] um i want to give you just a moment to you were citing some numbers there um uh in your answers
[39:37] to my colleague across the aisle and um i think you were about to refer to some some very wasteful
[39:42] spending that um we have worked to curtail um a huge part of what uh your mission has been at omb would
[39:48] you like to um to give some of those um statistics please so the committee can hear and taxpayers can hear
[39:53] what their money was going to fund overseas that was an incredible waste thank you congressman i think
[39:58] it's important to also differentiate the fact that this administration continues to fund foreign
[40:03] aid just at the department of state so all of the types of things that uh people across the globe
[40:09] are relying on as an aspect of humanitarianism or soft power those are now being funded at state we did
[40:15] have cuts to at usaid to deal with the extent to which the agency was weaponized against quite frankly
[40:21] those countries and our own taxpayers let me just give you an example 24.6 million to build climate
[40:27] resilience in honduras 38.6 million to build low emissions development in west africa 600 000 for
[40:35] listening tours on local development in timor-leste 12 million for telling the usaid story in bosnia
[40:42] herzegovina 13.4 million for civic engagement in zimbabwe i can go on and on that's why we passed
[40:49] the rescissions package last year which included a number of these reductions and it's why our foreign aid
[40:55] is now serving uh with with the the best of intentions the policy objectives of congress and
[41:00] the president united states well thank you for your clarity on that and i think everybody agrees that
[41:04] every dollar spent abroad should be advancing american interests in the right way and i think we can
[41:08] argue that some of those expenditures were not uh doing that so thank you for clarifying that um i want
[41:14] to ask you today about um cdfis because i think when when we look at these specialized lenders that help to
[41:20] to make sure that some folks can access capital we understand they're um absolutely vital and
[41:24] revitalizing and growing our economies especially in states like iowa we have the first time home
[41:29] buyer down payment assistance programs to payday alternative loans the treasury secretary has
[41:34] announced that he of course supports cdfis said that their role in underserved communities is very
[41:39] important and i do agree when used responsibly these funds certainly are a significant opportunity to
[41:45] help build our communities i am very appreciative omb did a portion of fiscal year 25 funds back in april
[41:52] glad to see those also released by treasury this week can you share a little bit more about how omb is
[41:57] working directly with treasury and other agencies to support a more cohesive process to ensure those funds
[42:03] are dispersed in a timely manner as congress intended thank you congressman we put out uh the nofo's this
[42:11] week uh we are implementing uh the spending as you have uh put forward in the appropriations process we
[42:17] have concerns with the program we put forward uh proposals that are similar but different i have
[42:24] concerns from my perch at cfpb uh where i'm in charge of people's ability to repay and they cdfi individuals
[42:32] get an exemption from ability to repay so when you took you look at the kind of market uh and and uh tensions
[42:39] and uh and cracks in the market that could come from that i have concerns and then if you look at some
[42:44] of the cdfis that the biden administration were funding and i'll just give you an example of 4.9
[42:52] million for local initiatives support corporation that publishes blogs condemning the level of whiteness
[42:57] and community development that's the kind of thing that we want to put an end to it's why it's taking us a
[43:02] little while to get the nofo's out and the apportionment done um but i know we understand congress
[43:08] largely supports this program uh we're trying to do our best to make sure it's spent well as best we
[43:13] possibly can and i appreciate that specific example if there are any others like that that you could
[43:18] give our office so that we can go back to the folks who are trying to access programs and say
[43:22] here's what we're actually trying to get rid of so that more of those dollars are available to you
[43:26] that would be helpful looking ahead to fiscal year 26 funding apportionment and we're obviously
[43:31] working through fiscal year 27 right now do you have ideas for the committee or congress to consider to
[43:36] help ensure funds that may have been delayed maybe for reasons like you referenced but other reasons
[43:40] as well are actually getting uh through the agencies with omb moving forward no i mean we got the the
[43:46] it's a two-year chunk so 25 and 26 and their next task is the 26 and 27 amount and we'll get those out
[43:52] expeditiously all right thank you um i yield back mr chairman thank you very much ms henson chair now
[43:58] recognize the gentleman from georgia mr bishop for any questions yeah thank you mr chairman and welcome uh attorney
[44:06] vote um as you may or may not know i have a great deal of interest in agriculture uh it's the number
[44:15] one industry in georgia and of course it contributes mightily to the united states economy uh but as
[44:22] reported at the time operating under several executive orders uh the department of government efficiency
[44:30] was active in attempting to cease many of the government operations and activities uh and to
[44:36] separate many of the federal employees uh us uh employees left usda through the the forward
[44:43] resin deferred resignation program i think uh the office of expected general reported that aphis
[44:52] lost 25 percent of its workforce and the ag research service lost about 23 percent of its workforce
[44:58] between january of 25 and june of 25 uh how many of these staff worked on the new world
[45:06] screwworm surveillance research and other such activities that were intended to prevent the
[45:12] parasite from re-entering the united states uh if you just take a note of that uh also
[45:21] following the deferred resignation program in 2025 uh aphis advertised 73 open positions and tell me how many
[45:31] of those open positions were for the new world screwworm surveillance monitoring research preparedness
[45:37] then after the uh administration dismantled uh usaid uh usad administered projects that funded the animal
[45:48] disease monitoring projects including those that sought to monitor the new world screwworm in central america
[45:57] in the fy26 budget aphis requested additional funds to prevent the spread of new world screwworm
[46:06] uh did the fy26 budget request include the funding for the screwworm monitoring and surveillance that was
[46:14] previously funded in usaid and i'd like to ask if whether or not omb has used its authorities to assist
[46:22] the international coordination efforts to prevent the spread of new warm uh new world screwworm in north
[46:29] america there's a food and agriculture organization of the united nations which announced
[46:35] uh on june 19th uh a coordinated research project do you intend to allow the united states uh to
[46:43] participate and engage with that uh how have the policy uh the new world screwworm is drastically impacting
[46:52] uh adversely impacting our farmers our cattle producers and the price of uh of food and uh i'd like to know
[47:02] whether or not uh whether or not uh the big beautiful bill all of the cuts uh that were done with doge uh
[47:10] and the proposals that we are now uh faced with uh what is that doing for the american people thank
[47:19] you congressman we couldn't agree more in terms of it being a highest priority uh to deal uh with the
[47:26] screwworm uh to take steps we've if you even if you were to monitor the things that i'm working on at
[47:32] least daily one of those is that uh making sure we have the resources to combat it and making sure
[47:38] we were doing it early in the administration um i can follow up with regards to fte levels at apis i
[47:43] don't know if those off the top of my head but we don't believe that this is issue that is under
[47:48] resource we believe that usda has everything it needs to both create a long-term capability here
[47:54] and also find as many shots on goal to be able to deal with this in real time for farmers the bottom line
[47:59] is as a result of the loss of the ars people that were working on the screw worm issue uh working
[48:07] to make sure that they didn't come north from mexico and central america immediately after these uh
[48:16] resignations of the loss of all of the expertise uh we saw this creep and this ink drastic increase in
[48:23] the school room coming into the united states and our farmers are really really concerned about that now
[48:31] we agree that there is a an issue that the federal government needs to respond to and we believe
[48:35] that we are doing so robustly with a properly resourced effort led by secretary rollins but you
[48:42] did take a state step backwards when you curtailed that in the beginning of the administration i wouldn't
[48:48] agree with that i'm happy to respond to that with questions for the record and and follow up with
[48:53] regard to ftes uh people retire we have to fill those uh those those jobs uh and many of the people
[49:00] that uh we were taking steps to reduce uh there was a a backlog of of individuals that weren't necessarily
[49:09] on board with the administration and performing the policy agenda of this administration i'm specifically
[49:14] talking about school room mr bishop unfortunately we'll have to move on sir chair now recognizes the ranking
[49:22] member or vice uh chair of this committee uh mr lolota from new york thank you chairman thank you for
[49:28] your leadership uh mr roll thank you for being here today sir uh the 2024 election was a choice election
[49:33] that was particularly significant to our nation's trajectory for a long time many folks felt like
[49:39] they were being taken for granted spoken to during campaign season and forgotten the rest of the year
[49:44] they felt betrayed by the people and parties who had long claimed to stand with them only to watch those
[49:50] same voices turned their backs when it came to fight for jobs wages and working conditions they
[49:55] were welders and carpenters they were plumbers linemen electricians and masons they were the men and
[50:00] women who lace up their boots early in the morning pack a lunch go to work and put in a full day and
[50:06] they're the backbone of this country in my opinion they're the reason our economy functions and they're
[50:10] the reason that our infrastructure stands tall and to put it simply the 2024 election was a mandate from
[50:15] the american people to show up and fight for the american worker and american jobs in general director
[50:21] would you agree with that yes sir and as you know many of these american workers are part of the
[50:25] federal workforce and some of these federal workers are members of the association of federal government
[50:31] employees afge whose leadership helped this administration more importantly the country and
[50:36] the democrats multiple shutdowns the longest shutdowns in u.s history i know that i was thankful
[50:42] director that afge weighed in to oppose the democrat-led shutdown director what was the afg's
[50:49] leadership was the afg's leadership helpful to ending the shutdown yes it was thank you you had a
[50:54] few conversations with the leadership how those conversations go i did not have conversations with
[50:58] the union leadership but i know members of our team did and we appreciated their support in that yeah
[51:04] switching gears slightly director are you familiar with the gao's june 17th report on the federal
[51:10] workforce reductions no i have not seen it um it talks about a six percent uh cut to the federal
[51:18] civilian workforce uh you're familiar with that director yes i'm aware of the steps that we've
[51:23] taken to reduce the workforce and no reasonable person should counter your assertion that our debt
[51:29] and deficit situation needs to be addressed i hope that reasonable minds on both sides of the aisle
[51:34] can sometime come to an agreement on that but i want to talk about specifically uh staffing levels
[51:39] and the gao has now reported that staffing at 22 major agencies measured by employees and pay status
[51:46] declined by more than 11 percent between december 2024 and january of 2026. i recognize those are
[51:53] different measures and time frames but gao's own data shows reductions on a substantially larger scale
[52:00] than the six percent contemplated in the budget so my question director is did omb anticipate workforce
[52:06] reductions of this scale across major agencies uh congressman i have to take a look at that study
[52:11] i have and i will do so after this hearing and i'm happy to follow up uh we we responded to the level
[52:17] of 50 ftes that the agencies sent us of where they were and where they thought that they would be
[52:23] heading into the new fiscal year and so that's how we built the budget let me ask you about one
[52:28] particular example the world's traits in our health program are you familiar with that yes
[52:33] established in 2011 to provide health care to individuals with 9-11 related illnesses from
[52:38] fell from 93 employees to 84 employees despite having an authorization of 120 employees
[52:46] at the same time of that massive reduction that was well short of that 120 number there were delays
[52:51] reported in claims of processing treatment authorizations and enrollment appeals for a program
[52:56] serving 9-11 first responders and survivors what should have omb's early warning
[53:02] indications have been that those staffing levels were dropping to dangerously low levels that would
[53:07] impede their ability to delivering on this important mission well if we had known about
[53:11] it we would make sure that they have every adequate resource that they need to perform that
[53:16] that that function and i will take it back and we will see where we are on that
[53:21] omb does not have this uh all-encompassing view of what is happening across the entire federal
[53:26] government we are a nerve center i would i would agree with that uh but we do not have the ability
[53:31] to know uh everything that is happening in the agencies and that's one of the reasons i work so
[53:36] hard uh to stay in contact with members of congress so that i can learn from what you all are seeing
[53:41] what the agencies are seeing um and we can we can move to space where we need to i i guess i would say
[53:47] this speed is important the debt and deficit situation are dire we do need to act what i would assert
[53:52] director is that when moving fast and you need to move fast in a lot of these issues when moving
[53:57] fast that you anticipate some of the issues that will be caused by moving fast and i'll say one
[54:02] thing with the 25 seconds i have remaining there is right now being contemplating moving the uh army
[54:08] corps of engineers new york district office to new jersey it's the new york district office it services
[54:15] areas of both new york and new jersey but it should remain in new york and i hope that we don't fall into
[54:20] the same issue of just in the name of saving money which we should save money to vastly impede the
[54:25] mission in this case of the army corps's new york office i'll take it back congressman thanks i yield
[54:33] right on it's five minutes as you told me sir yeah the chair now recognizes the lady from washington
[54:40] mrs gusenkamp perez thank you mr chair and thank you director vote for being here today um i want to dig a
[54:46] little bit deeper into the proposed ruled overhaul grants procedure have you or anyone else at omb directed
[54:52] agencies to follow the not yet finalized regulation prior to be it being finalized to be a rulemaking
[54:59] no this stems from an executive order that the president signed last year the president's
[55:04] executive order had directed his agency officials to begin to have supervision at the policy official
[55:11] level this regulation is catching up with that executive order to make sure it's actually reflected
[55:17] in that in in the actual mechanics of grant making um have you or anyone else at omb directed agencies to
[55:24] um uh i saw an updated notice from the national science foundation from last week that included
[55:29] guidance to align with the proposed revision into cfr 200 have you suggested that agencies begin
[55:36] implementing this guidance before um the rule was finalized we are certainly working with agencies
[55:43] agencies like i just said are looking at the executive order and trying to align with the executive order
[55:49] that said we are out for comment on our proposed rule we are probably uh record numbers of comments
[55:56] have come in we're going to assess each one of those comments and make any changes that we need to
[56:00] is the omb building an ai tool to flag grants that are misaligned with the administration's agenda
[56:06] we are definitely working on uh technology including ai to be able to have a wider angle lens about what
[56:13] is going on uh with the federal government but uh it's not it would be something that agencies would
[56:18] use in conjunction with us and it's certainly not to to take the place of agency officials who would
[56:23] be making this this determination have you awarded a contract uh for the development or the operations
[56:29] of such a system i don't think we have no um why do you think that an ai system which is itself
[56:35] neither accountable to congress nor necessarily audible um is an appropriate mechanism for making policy
[56:41] well the congressman from from maryland told me to read every gao report of which i would like to
[56:47] have the time to be able to read for that i would like to have a tool that collates and assesses
[56:53] everything in every gao report in a way that i can actually make decisions based that would just be
[56:57] one example similarly there's a lot of information out there on usa spend spending that i would like to
[57:04] have the benefit for examiners to know who are already stretched thin with regard to their portfolio
[57:09] that would be an example um how would you how would a future omb director be able to ensure that such
[57:14] a system works for their priorities too or congress for that matter every administration would would
[57:21] align their policy objectives which would be different from administration to administration
[57:26] to ensure that the grant making uh and how the agencies are spending taxpayer dollars are aligned
[57:32] with the president's agenda as he got elected on behalf of the entirety of the american people what
[57:38] happens when a grant is flagged as being inconsistent with administration priorities no grant has been
[57:44] flagged as inconsistent based on the tools that you've articulated but we are trying to make sure
[57:49] that we're not funding some of this nonsense that i've articulated and we work with agencies to do that
[57:55] that's policy official to policy official uh and we we work collaboratively with our agency partners
[58:03] what about grants that have been explicitly funded by congress is it your understanding that omb or an
[58:07] agency could cancel such grants unilaterally not with regard to earmarks uh we we sometimes you
[58:14] have an earmark to a specific person or a specific organization and that would probably be at the top of
[58:19] the list that is that is uh that needs to be funded but that is not uh something that uh is impacted by
[58:27] these these grant uh making um do you anticipate that states cities or congress has any recourse in
[58:32] cases where omb decided that a grant was inconsistent with your priorities and do you believe the proposal
[58:37] provides due process well yeah i do i do you you keep referring to this as as omb making these
[58:42] determinations again this is agency officials that would be making these determinations based on the
[58:48] instructions given to them in the executive order um congress appropriated 100 million from hr 1 to omb
[58:54] last year um have you spent any of that 100 million on moving career omb personnel to the cfpb building at
[59:00] 1700 g street and do you plan to we have not spent any money from the 100 million for the move how many cf how many
[59:07] omb staff currently have their salaries paid out of funding originally appropriated for usa id or cfpb
[59:13] none can can you provide a fund an overview of the funding streams used to pay omb staff salaries
[59:20] since the beginning of the administration it's all of omb salaries have been paid for by uh the omb
[59:28] appropriation the only qualification i would have to say is that there are people like me who are doing
[59:34] work for cfpb of which i'm not getting a paycheck my general counsel is another one who is mark payletta
[59:40] who is the deputy director at cfpb not getting a paycheck at cfpb and so if the question is um what
[59:47] are uh the relationship between omb and cfpb we're not changing funding back and forth with regard to ftes
[59:55] thank you thank you very much the chair now recognizes the chair of the uh transportation
[1:00:03] housing and urban development subcommittee of this appropriations committee mr womack for his five
[1:00:08] minutes thank you mr chairman and uh former chairman of this subcommittee as well uh director vote thank
[1:00:13] you again for being here and thank you for your service uh as you know as was just indicated i chair
[1:00:19] the subcommittee on transportation and housing and urban development so i want to go back to the sup for
[1:00:23] just a minute uh because you referenced that earlier in response to another question
[1:00:28] and uh your words you said those items were pressure tested correct yes congressman what does pressure
[1:00:36] tested mean well a lot of times agencies have ideas for what they would like to spend on and
[1:00:44] you look at them and they uh don't have the level of rigor and analysis that's you would expect of us
[1:00:51] when we request uh funds from congress that that would be would it include a sense of urgency yes
[1:00:57] that it's a supplemental request yes wasn't covered previously but this is an emerging issue for example
[1:01:03] a lot of that money most of that money two-thirds of that money was pentagon spending in response to
[1:01:09] epic fury uh replenishing some of these accounts so that is a sense of urgency is it not yes okay so
[1:01:15] uh there are two not to be terribly parochial uh with t-hud but there were two items in that supplemental
[1:01:22] that affect my subcommittee and i want to ask you about both of them um one is one of them was the
[1:01:27] department's brand new air traffic control bean acts initiative which by the way i strongly support the
[1:01:34] president's goal of updating our air traffic control system and i commend secretary duffy and
[1:01:40] administrator bedford for the progress that they've made but in this supplemental request uh in somewhat
[1:01:48] contradiction of what we did in the one big beautiful bill um you we you would provide the faa
[1:01:55] administrator with complete and total discretion to reallocate how that 12 and a half billion dollars
[1:02:01] is spent provided for the bean acts initiative now i appreciate the benefits that additional funding
[1:02:07] could provide but i'd like to know how uh i'd like for you to tell me how the um bean acts initiative
[1:02:15] this ability for the administrator and the secretary to control all that 12 and a half billion dollars
[1:02:19] outside the scope of these these appropriators is um you know how how that would benefit the bean
[1:02:27] acts initiative can you help me with that yeah you bet there are two tensions within uh the air traffic
[1:02:33] control modernization number one is we are going to have to come back to you for additional funds beyond
[1:02:37] what was in one big beautiful bill we understood that there was a little bit of skepticism with our
[1:02:43] ability to spend the money that you gave us with one big beautiful bill and secretary duffy is going
[1:02:49] at breakneck speed to be able to allocate those and get those on contract but it was the intent of congress
[1:02:54] to put those in in buckets uh within the various jurisdictions of the faa and we're here to ask
[1:03:01] for this we're not saying that we have the ability to just transfer the funds we're saying
[1:03:05] uh with with regard to one particular interface we don't have the money that right now that secretary
[1:03:11] duffy can get going on it and we want the ability to do that and have a little more flexibility to do
[1:03:18] that before we come ask for funds so we don't want to be in a situation where uh we're coming up and
[1:03:25] asking for uh additional billions of dollars and you're like i haven't spent you haven't spent the money
[1:03:29] that we gave you we haven't spent it we are spending it but we haven't spent it in the one key area of
[1:03:33] which you have not given us resources okay yeah the other one was penn station billion dollars
[1:03:41] sense of urgency well we define urgency congressman with regard to the fact that we
[1:03:47] our scarcest resource is time and so this administration wants to take on some of these big
[1:03:53] infrastructure initiatives this would be one of them obviously we're working on a highway bill with
[1:03:57] congress right now uh but if you know i'm sure you've been there if you've seen kind of penn station
[1:04:03] compared to like the moynihan building the moynihan building is just incredible we want penn station to
[1:04:09] be on that on that level of modernization and we don't have a lot of time to do it so we to the
[1:04:15] extent that we have a resource need we want to be up here in front of you my last question is uh
[1:04:21] regarding uh project labor agreements i applaud the trump administration's efforts to cut spending where
[1:04:27] appropriate and we have a responsibility to ensure taxpayer dollars are stewarded in such a way that they go
[1:04:33] further for the american people however in my opinion plas diminish competition and increase the cost of
[1:04:40] federally funded construction projects in a memo last june you clarified that the trump administration
[1:04:46] supports the use of plas when those agreements are practical and cost effective so in the we're
[1:04:53] probably going to have to take this for record but i'll go ahead and finish the question and then give
[1:04:57] you an opportunity to respond to the committee in in writing on this question and that is what specific
[1:05:06] analysis or economic calculations are used in the evaluation of these plas that found their genesis
[1:05:14] back during the biden administration and with that mr chairman i'll yield back my time thank you sir
[1:05:21] and the chair now recognizes mr ivy for five minutes of questions thank you mr chairman um hr1 i call it the big
[1:05:31] ugly bill uh was signed about a year ago and 150 billion of the mandatory it contained about 150
[1:05:38] billion in mandatory defense spending correct yes okay um my understanding is that you still haven't
[1:05:46] spent or a hundred billion of that still has not been spent is that correct we are aggressively getting
[1:05:52] the money out the door uh this year uh and working with dow on that but we have not spent all of the
[1:05:58] money with regard to one big beautiful bill okay but it's a hundred billion that hasn't that's a
[1:06:03] yes that it hasn't been spent yet i wouldn't want to say i can respond specifically what the level is
[1:06:08] but suffice it to say we're working to get all of the money out the door in the fiscal year that we
[1:06:13] are in we're talking about uh needs that are we're okay we're not accounted for in that bill fair enough
[1:06:18] and then the and the president's budget request in april um for defense spending that was
[1:06:25] 1.1 trillion is that it was 1.5 trillion dollars for defense 1.1 allocated to the appropriations
[1:06:34] process and 350 billion dollars for reconciliation and 250 billion uh more for dispend defense spending
[1:06:43] and had been there last year is that correct we would have gone from 1 trillion to 1.5 trillion dollars
[1:06:49] all right 42 percent increase and then the 67.1 uh supplemental now i think someone asked you
[1:06:56] earlier about that um and we got a letter from you that contained that had uh i think about four pages
[1:07:05] a spreadsheet that sort of laid out what the purpose of the request was um and this is from a letter
[1:07:11] that you sent us on june 24th you recall that uh i happy to take a look at it i sent a lot of letters
[1:07:18] well yeah this is the one you sent um and this one contained the the explanation i guess for the 67.1
[1:07:27] billion i'd note that it's one long sentence and what some of the explanations here are 1.2 billion for
[1:07:34] administration priorities um which doesn't give a lot of detail and when you were testifying earlier
[1:07:40] you said that you got information about these types of requests from other from your departments
[1:07:45] are you have you provided details that support this amount of funds to the congress um in support of
[1:07:53] this request uh yes and we will provide as much information as this committee uh requires to to
[1:08:01] work with you on that matter i know dow will be a partner in that uh in answering any questions that
[1:08:06] you have with regard to the need what are the administration priorities i think that's a 1.2 billion
[1:08:12] dollar piece of the request i'd have to look at what you're referring to but the main thrust of this
[1:08:16] is to pay for operation epic fury needs and to also begin to to to buy down some of the requests for
[1:08:24] that that we've asked you at the end of fiscal year 26 and to start 27 for instance munitions i mentioned in
[1:08:30] in my in my in uh my testimony we want to be able to have multi-year procurements that allow us to pay
[1:08:38] here and now for munitions is a separate category facility to be put in the spreadsheet that you
[1:08:44] provide as munitions with a separate category i'm just trying to make sure i understand what that is
[1:08:49] because it's it's a significant amount of money i think you would again i'm happy to look at anything
[1:08:53] we also want to be very well we definitely would like that when in an open setting i'm like what we
[1:08:58] we'd also like to know in advance of you know when these things come up for votes as to what the money
[1:09:03] specifically would go to we're going to make sure you have everything you need before any vote i mean we've
[1:09:08] already marked up what 12 bills not on a supplemental you're referring to the supplemental appropriations
[1:09:15] well i think overall the process would work better with respect to us making appropriations
[1:09:20] determinations if we had these these estimates and this information in advance of the markups
[1:09:25] but i i appreciate where you are and i understood it better the first year because you were just
[1:09:30] coming in but but for year two i think it's it's it's problematic for us and it's not just with
[1:09:35] respect to omb is from the departments across the board but um but let me just ask you this
[1:09:41] because i'm running out of time last week at the one of the appropriations markups there was a
[1:09:48] discussion i know you're using the phrase department of war uh instead of department of defense
[1:09:53] um but we were said we were told that the cbo said it's going to cost 125 million to change the name
[1:09:59] from department of defense to department of war do you you agree with that estimate we haven't done our own
[1:10:04] estimate at omb on on the cost but it's uh something that i think makes common sense it's it's what the
[1:10:10] department was called for most of our nation's history i'm focused on the amount the national
[1:10:15] defense that's moving through the nomenclature concerns me less from an appropriations committee
[1:10:21] standpoint than the fact that we're going to spend 125 million dollars or so you're not challenging the
[1:10:27] number but um i said we haven't looked i haven't i know but that's a lot of money and we spent a lot
[1:10:34] of time hearing that a lot of the needs that we'd like to fund we didn't have the money to fund so
[1:10:40] with that i yield back the chair recognizes mr cloud uh thank you chairman you know what was uh
[1:10:48] much to do in this committee asking the question whether it's morally uh right or not to facilitate the
[1:10:57] death of children i find this rich coming from uh people who supported administration that forced
[1:11:03] taxpayers to fund for the largest human trafficking operation in human history still today we we are
[1:11:11] at a loss to where two to three hundred thousand of the kids who came across our border are as we're
[1:11:16] trying to find them i visited the facilities where over half the women who come across have been sexually
[1:11:21] assaulted on the journey of being from south texas visited the ranches and seen the rape trees
[1:11:28] where cartels had uh done horrific things to women and celebrated it um and and for one i'm thankful
[1:11:38] to see that we have an administration who's putting dollars back to where they should be
[1:11:42] um it was also pointed out usaid uh had we cut fundings to that and and in the way that washington dc
[1:11:54] measures success by how much dollars we send out as opposed to whether they're accomplishing what
[1:11:58] they're supposed to accomplish um it's been said in all these studies as you mentioned based on false
[1:12:04] science whether or not uh people are being killed because of that the latest data coming out is
[1:12:10] actually showing that remarkably mortality rates in south africa are going down following this uh and
[1:12:17] and a lot of these stories are do you suppose that sometimes it's possible that we actually save my
[1:12:23] money by spending less money or save lives by spending less money i do and i would also say
[1:12:29] that this administration the state department is working with these countries to have these
[1:12:34] agreements that ensure that the money is being really well spent and goes to better care directly
[1:12:41] to people in need and not necessarily through ngos that don't share uh uh something other than a
[1:12:48] divisive worldview now a lot of times what we've seen uh and certainly this was true the last
[1:12:53] administration not uniquely to the last administration but dollars would go out the
[1:12:57] door we'd have really no idea what they were going to we're finding out as we've been looking into this
[1:13:02] and some of the technology tools that that you have brought to the table and and others uh working
[1:13:07] with the administration like a lot of these billions of dollars been going to bad actors working
[1:13:12] against us uh our our purposes our agendas uh even foreign entities foreign states that uh i know in
[1:13:20] the last what few weeks of the administration 80 billion dollars went out the door i think 40 billion
[1:13:25] in loans in just two days which was like 10 times more than or more than 10 years worth of uh that
[1:13:32] had gone out previous um you are working on a proposed rule that would place a lot more safeguards
[1:13:39] on the taxpayer's dollar going out the door some of which i appreciate some of it seems so simple
[1:13:44] to business owners that talk about like let's not send dollars to dead people um you know uh and other
[1:13:50] things could you speak to some of the safeguards that you're well definitely one of the most uh uh press
[1:13:56] worthy of the reforms that we've had we've had that has uh gotten the attention of of uh the other side
[1:14:04] is the extent to which we have cancellation uh provisions in these grants and people say oh are you
[1:14:09] going to just kind of uh you know do that in a heartbeat no we're not going to do that but if we
[1:14:15] find that nih is giving money to the wuhan institute from tony fauci and naya to the wuhan institute and
[1:14:23] we need to cancel that grant in the middle of a pandemic that it contributed to with its gain of
[1:14:29] function research we need to have the ability to turn the grant off that is that is probably the best
[1:14:34] example of why we need to include these types of provisions is because when we find something that's
[1:14:40] problematic uh that our our our our policy officials would not have caught we need to be able to turn
[1:14:46] it off and it is not something that will be anti-science in any way it will be still on the basis of peer
[1:14:52] review science and work that is done on a comprehensive and well thought out basis by our agencies now there's
[1:14:58] been a move to kind of tout uh the career bureaucrat working in our administration no doubt there are
[1:15:06] some who are here doing their best to do the lord's work and serve the people well but at the same time
[1:15:13] there's this messaging idea and it was actually stated here in this committee like uh that you
[1:15:19] know maybe we should follow their agenda as opposed to the president's agenda uh the constitution is very
[1:15:25] clear that all executive authorities invested in the president and that they should be doing the
[1:15:30] president's will so i applaud your efforts uh to ensure that the administration is being tied one
[1:15:34] thing i did want to touch on i think we're going to run out of time but there's about uh i think 14
[1:15:39] billion dollars that we passed in ob3 that was supposed to go to states who helped fund border
[1:15:44] security uh if we can get an update on where that's at uh you know we thought by now that might
[1:15:49] have gone out the the door we put both nofo's out recently uh had very good conversations with many of
[1:15:55] your uh delegation mates and as well as your governor those nofo's are out um and we will be
[1:16:02] looking forward to assessing the requests that come in from texas and others thank you thank you mr
[1:16:07] cloud and uh the chair would now recognize and i would have normally recognized her immediately after
[1:16:13] mr hoyer but at her own request she has been a team player wanted to go to the back of the line
[1:16:20] uh the distinguished lady from connecticut our ranking member mr lord thank you so much mr chairman
[1:16:27] director i mentioned the proposed rule to overhaul grant making in my opening which seeks to virtually
[1:16:33] uh subject virtually all federal funding to the whims of the president's policy priorities
[1:16:39] substitutes the current standard of evidence and science in favor of political tests based on ideology
[1:16:45] uh i've talked to a number of groups um and many of the groups have asked for and i think they may
[1:16:51] have requested more time uh to be able to read it's a 412 page document uh um and so that they can
[1:16:58] participate in the public comment period can you commit to granting a 45-day extension of the comment period
[1:17:04] no but i will say this uh the number of comments that is that are coming in that we have to respond to
[1:17:11] is going to take us some time the number the answer is no um i think one of the striking aspects of the
[1:17:16] proposal um uh is attempts to put the omb director at the center of all decision making here not true
[1:17:24] and why are you a better judge of an nih clinical trial than a panel of medical doctors and researchers
[1:17:31] how will you ensure the grants will be based on merit and individuals and communities served by the
[1:17:37] federal grants will receive the highest level of service possible um i i don't is there a listing
[1:17:46] um if you could get to us um the agency's priorities the president's priorities what is the set of criteria
[1:17:56] you are using to judge these grants what precludes you from changing the criteria in the middle of a grant
[1:18:03] period because i as i understand it um you you you can um not only can political appointees take control
[1:18:11] of grant awards um active grants can be terminated at any time for any reason um uh and i went through
[1:18:20] some of them uh these efforts but you can cancel it at any moment is there a set of criteria that we
[1:18:27] could have that demonstrates to us why these uh these uh grants are being canceled congress you're
[1:18:36] you're misconstruing the proposal to seem to make it seem as if it is omb centric omb will not be making
[1:18:42] these determinations uh we don't have a formal review in reviewing every nofo uh that is not something
[1:18:49] that uh we intend to take on these are the policy officials at the agency of which the president has
[1:18:56] put these let me just reclaim claim my time but the fact of the matter is is understand it and this
[1:19:02] is uh the probably the most consequential change in the rule senior political appointees rather than
[1:19:09] career scientists and program officers would now be required to conduct a quote pre-issuance review of
[1:19:16] every discretionary grant before it is awarded these appointees are explicitly forbidden from deferring to
[1:19:24] peer reviewers are routinely ratifying their recommendations this is in the 412 page document and maybe
[1:19:32] you think that people weren't going to read it uh so and then there is no longer peer review peer review
[1:19:39] is no longer binding um a political appointee can simply override the scientific community's judgment with
[1:19:47] finding uh with no finding of cause that is what is a part of this of this rule which is it dismantles
[1:19:58] what we established after world war ii for the national institutes of health for the ns uh for the
[1:20:05] national science foundation uh for department of energy for nasa it really reverses how we have awarded
[1:20:13] grants in the future are you shaking your head no but that in fact which is uh which is uh which is but
[1:20:20] the fact of what you are trying to do with a political lens and someone's politically political ideology
[1:20:27] i have one more question for you have you released all appropriately um appropriated funding to each uh
[1:20:34] intended agency um uh through the apportionment process uh we were working through the apportionment process
[1:20:41] uh expeditiously uh we well i can't say we've done every single one of them but if you have one that
[1:20:47] you're particularly interested no but i'm just saying it is your responsibility to get the money out
[1:20:51] of the door in a timely fashion and if you can't do this we need to take a look because congress
[1:20:56] provides this would be a full year a full year apportionment how much funding has been available
[1:21:02] they need right how much funding has been made available uh how much funding have you made unavailable
[1:21:07] to agencies as of today if you can't answer that now i would like an answer to that happy to but
[1:21:12] again there's no concerted effort not to apportion funding for the agency it's not going out in a
[1:21:16] timely way i can just go through because we're trying to assess what it's being spent right no i i get
[1:21:21] it will you commit to us here today that you will carry out our spending laws as congress intended
[1:21:29] through appropriations and reconciliations as they were enacted or not obviously we will
[1:21:37] take and make sure that we're spending money where you intend us to spend money at the same time i'm
[1:21:43] not no that is where no the answer to that then is no i'm not going to you you are not going to spend
[1:21:50] the money that congress in a bipartisan way and acts yes you did i yield my time back thank you mr
[1:22:00] chair uh director vote thanks for being with us this afternoon thanks for your service i know that
[1:22:06] uh you're in a very precarious situation uh administering all the money that is appropriated by
[1:22:15] congress i can only imagine complications uh i take it uh somewhat personal and offensive that you were
[1:22:25] treated so disrespectfully earlier in our conversation uh regarding usaid i think that we all can agree
[1:22:34] that every loss of an innocent life is a tragedy uh and the the reason i take this so personal is i serve
[1:22:43] as vice chair of the nsrp appropriations subcommittee and i know how hard that uh mario desbelart and myself
[1:22:52] and the rest of the team has worked to help ensure the efficient spending of our taxpayers dollars but
[1:23:01] i think it's misleading to suggest that a u.s policy change can be judged by isolated claims while
[1:23:10] ignoring the millions of lives that american taxpayers have saved through decades of humanitarian aid
[1:23:17] the goal is to ensure that aid is effective accountable and reaches those that really need it
[1:23:24] and i'd like to give you just a few seconds if there's anything you'd like to add to that
[1:23:29] conversation when you were so rudely cut off no thank you currently i would just say affirm the
[1:23:34] administration's uh agreement with what you've just said um we have requested foreign aid at the
[1:23:40] state department uh the president cares greatly about continuing to fund areas where we can be
[1:23:46] effective um and to to make sure it's done on an efficient basis and to actually make sure we get
[1:23:52] to real care for real individuals thank thank you for that i'd like to shift gears just a little bit
[1:23:59] to western north carolina you know we were hit by hurricane helene on september 27 2024 and we've had
[1:24:07] somewhat of a mixed bag of uh dollars coming out of the federal government to western north carolina
[1:24:16] uh they seem to have really picked up the momentum has picked up and many of the uh projects uh for
[1:24:24] us to rebuild have been funded at a far quicker rate in the last few months uh can you give me any
[1:24:32] perspective on is something different are you doing something different is mark wayne mullen doing
[1:24:37] something different have we just gotten better what's what's taking place there and what lessons
[1:24:41] have you and uh congress learned to deal with the next natural disaster thank you congressman and
[1:24:49] i'll it's a team effort but i i will say that i as you know we've worked personally to drill down very
[1:24:55] very deep in in several layers of bureaucracy to make sure money is going out the door uh you were an
[1:25:01] incredible advocate for your district in that way um and we're doing that across the board in some part
[1:25:06] that's that's kind of what you know dealing with bureaucracy is i think the secretary is doing a great job
[1:25:11] uh we in general needed to get the the dhs funding out the door much more regularly brick uh the
[1:25:18] program would be an example of one uh in my last last hearing in which um i i talked with uh congressman
[1:25:26] about uh we want to get that money out the door and i think the current team is doing that thank you
[1:25:31] and i'd like for this committee to know that uh director vote uh appeared before another committee
[1:25:38] that i was attending uh several weeks ago and when i mentioned the problems that we were having uh
[1:25:45] director vote invited me to his office that very afternoon and as a result we saw millions of dollars
[1:25:52] coming into western north carolina so i i thank you for that my last question is this according to my
[1:25:59] research the federal government now has about 292 000 less employees than it did when president trump took
[1:26:10] office and most of us conservatives are really happy with that our goal in coming to washington dc was
[1:26:17] to see less government can you speak is that an accident is it something very intentional and uh where
[1:26:27] where's the the the the floor there how how much more do you think that we might be able to save if we
[1:26:34] really sharpen our pencil well i would leave that to the agency officials that are seeing their programs
[1:26:41] and their ftes we've got some great feedback from your colleague uh that are assessing where they need
[1:26:46] to go deeper and where they need to go higher and and that is a balance that uh they each one of them
[1:26:52] are going to be kind of their expert on it for him for my part omb i'm trying to increase uh to a higher
[1:26:59] level based on the fact that when you ask us for dereg deregulatory initiatives we need more in
[1:27:04] people to be able to do that we need more people to be able to drill down into bureaucracy and get
[1:27:09] the money flowing as intended by congress so uh i think it'll be agency by agency and i wouldn't want
[1:27:16] to give kind of a broad view of that other than to say that the the agency officials are constantly
[1:27:20] thinking through what their adequate fte level should be i'll summarize by saying thank you for the
[1:27:26] reduction and thank you for your service mr chair all your luck very kind thank you uh realizing that
[1:27:34] you know that was so much fun the first round here uh there are some questions here that like
[1:27:39] i asked you a question and i'd like to hear your answer for the record uh we're gonna go three minutes
[1:27:45] does that work for folks if you have questions that were unanswered okay
[1:27:49] all right um and while i appreciate you uh my wife just texted me that our daughter is
[1:28:06] her water broken and she's getting ready to leave for the hospital on her first grandchild so three
[1:28:12] minutes works for me sir because i'm going to be out of here this afternoon um i would re-ask the
[1:28:18] question but you're right man i just want to know how will centralizing all those functions from the
[1:28:23] executive orders translate into efficiencies across federal government and how will taxpayers benefit
[1:28:28] from the consolidation of all that power through the executive orders that we talked about before
[1:28:33] what i would say is every time you see an executive order there's a responsibility there for office of
[1:28:38] management budget to be able to perform government-wide function and the level of things that we've been
[1:28:43] asked to do has therefore increased and so we are trying to use each one of those as an opportunity to
[1:28:50] get better at what we do and the work before us is certainly immense but we're excited to do it
[1:28:58] omb received 100 million dollars from the working families tax cut act also known as the big beautiful
[1:29:06] bill the purpose of finding budget and accounting efficiencies in executive branch would you walk us
[1:29:11] through that out money was spent what efficiencies you've identified and how that what committee
[1:29:15] how the committee can expand expect to be informed of those results uh it is uh almost entirely
[1:29:22] based on additional ftes we want to take uh own own b fte level up to around 675 in terms of our
[1:29:30] footprint uh up from where we are uh right now and around 500 employees um we believe we need those
[1:29:38] employees um my hope is that we can work as a uh to give you enough information so that over time this
[1:29:46] subcommittee can fund omb so that there is not a gap we have to use that money within a three-year period
[1:29:53] we haven't spent that money yet because we're not going to obligate or portion to the need until we
[1:29:59] are ready to actually hire people and i will tell you it is not quick to be able to hire the ftes but
[1:30:06] it is one of my highest priorities to be able to scale to that and and that what you are getting with that
[1:30:12] is the omb and the career staff these are career staff largely that will be able to provide uh the
[1:30:20] important civil servant work that they that you've come to know and appreciate from omb and so that's
[1:30:25] what we're trying to do with that number i appreciate that and i have 50 some seconds left here
[1:30:32] i noticed in for the recent uh budget that doge was pretty much eliminated is there something that
[1:30:39] you're going to present or is there somewhere we can find what exactly doge accomplished as far as
[1:30:45] reductions in uh dollar spent uh people at agencies or whatever is there's going to be
[1:30:52] some documentation of what took place i mean we have no plans to do kind of a closing doge report
[1:30:58] we're always happy to uh give you our assessment of of of that work i think it made some really
[1:31:04] important strides uh you all passed many of the reductions that that doge found just through the
[1:31:10] normal appropriations process when you ended the year uh so much lower than the year before uh we
[1:31:16] did some of that in the rescissions package and so many of their uh the fruits of their of their labor
[1:31:21] are sprinkled all across uh the government but i'm always happy to work with you on what you feel
[1:31:25] like you need very kind uh now recognize the ranking member mr hoyer for his three minutes thank
[1:31:33] you very much mr chairman uh are you aware of the fact that the labor healthy doge did 21 000 in
[1:31:40] reduction through the number of three or four options that were available and they're now in
[1:31:45] the process of hiring 12 000 back i don't know what you're referring to specifically but i'm happy
[1:31:50] to look into it well that was the testimony of secretary kennedy uh so the chainsaw apparently went a little
[1:31:58] too deep uh what uh analysis was done prior to uh doge's activity to identify uh the objectives
[1:32:10] of their cutting uh you'd have to ask doge in many of the those won't come up
[1:32:15] here apparently well all i will say is that everything that we have put forward at omb which
[1:32:20] incorporated many of the suggestions which i kind of view doge as a consultant to the agency officials
[1:32:26] we have backed that up with all of the analysis and you know doge also represented a new administration
[1:32:31] coming on and making great aggressive strides to lower the footprint the chairman's eliminating just
[1:32:38] three minutes so we can't do much substance here uh are you aware of the fact that irs has been
[1:32:46] enforcement has been cut some uh by your proposal uh 28 and by the congress's uh action in the house
[1:32:56] by 19 percent in enforcement and that we've gone from nine percent looking for fraud in irs filed
[1:33:05] uh returns of people over a million dollars which are the more complex returns uh to six tenths of a
[1:33:14] percent do you think that's a very efficient way to assure a people do not cheat and b that we collect
[1:33:21] the some 700 billion dollars that almost every irs commissioner republican and democrat have determined
[1:33:29] are doing owen but not paid one of our objections to the body administration was their scaling of the
[1:33:35] irs with almost a viewpoint that they would leave no audit left behind and i don't think that's the
[1:33:40] american that people would say six tenths of a percent it was at nine percent that is leaving 91
[1:33:47] of the returns over a million dollars not audited that's a big hype incentive for people not to worry
[1:33:54] about doing it correctly we have invested in the irs we're trying to make sure that the experience
[1:33:59] that irs in terms of the taxpayer services is is something that would be historically better
[1:34:07] and we're making great strides at that i know that secretary besant is very active in that
[1:34:12] secretary besant uh hasn't testified to this committee this year so i'm not sure what he's
[1:34:19] about well we're trying to invite him up now that the budget's done um you are saying you need more
[1:34:29] people every irs commissioner i've talked to over the last 45 years has said they need more people
[1:34:38] in enforcement neither party in my opinion we put a 80 billion or give or take in the ira
[1:34:46] to try to both from a technology standpoint and from an enforcement standpoint make sure people are
[1:34:52] paying that which is required by law to be paid no new taxes required by a law present law let me say
[1:35:01] something because the time is very brief the largest increase in the debt in my service in the congress
[1:35:10] was under ronald reagan as a percentage the debt was 985 billion dollars when i came to congress
[1:35:19] total national debt every director who has told me we're going to get rid of fraud waste and abuse
[1:35:27] the debt has gone up republicans and democrats uh mitch daniels said the same thing you have said today
[1:35:37] when he was after the bush tax cut the debt has gone up are you saying you believe that the debt
[1:35:45] is going to be reduced as a percentage of our gdp here's what the result of your big bad bill or
[1:35:52] other fiscal legislation or expenditures like fixing pools uh tearing down the east winning of the white
[1:36:00] house here's where i'll say congressman we're the only administration since 1997 to have any
[1:36:05] tangible victory and to put the an end to fiscal futility that has reigned for two decades that was
[1:36:10] the client budget uh balance we recognize public in congress thank you thank you mr chairman um we
[1:36:17] have talked a lot about fraud a very important uh topic of conversation um not to be overlooked though
[1:36:22] i think is the blatant disregard by some bureaucrats for improper payments um i know president trump shares
[1:36:29] this goal myself members of congress have recognized wasting of taxpayer dollars needs to
[1:36:34] stop and we're expressing a need for some systems in place to make sure that those hard-earned dollars
[1:36:38] are not being misused um the president's executive order obviously 14 249 to protect america's bank
[1:36:43] account and then i introduced hr 2597 the protecting american taxpayers from wasteful spending act
[1:36:50] which would codify said executive order can you update us on the implementation of that executive order
[1:36:56] and what is happening to protect america's bank account against waste fraud and abuse thank you
[1:37:00] congresswoman in the spirit of uh congressman edwards uh question we are doing a lot of work behind the
[1:37:06] scenes bureaucracy to bureaucracy agency to agency to get those agencies to use the do not pay system
[1:37:13] and to kind of cut through paperwork that takes forever just get them in to be able to use the system
[1:37:21] and get that cultural uh muscle memory working and if uh we don't think we need uh uh new authorities
[1:37:29] to do though but we always welcome them where you feel like you can expedite things for us okay
[1:37:34] congress obviously continuing to support the reining of reining in of those improper payments and
[1:37:38] encouraging the administration to do so we had house resolution 1335 which would really lay out some
[1:37:45] meaningful policy uh reforms to improve fiscal responsibility including program eligibility and
[1:37:51] spending activities that should actually be verified before those payments go out uh can you share with
[1:37:56] us some of the additional practices that you've implemented short of obviously the interagency workings
[1:38:00] that you're referencing there but um to ensure that the efficiency and accuracy in dispersing that
[1:38:04] funding is responsible and transparent well we've we've stood up an entire task force at the leadership of
[1:38:10] vice president vance uh that is building on a number of the doge efforts like defend the spend at hhs
[1:38:16] to assess do we even know what we're spending on and to make sure on the back end and on the front end
[1:38:23] we're eliminating improper payments um we're going very hard um from a enforcement's perspective with
[1:38:30] regard to fraud it's something the president talks about constantly uh in in in setting a vision for
[1:38:37] uh his fiscal team as the types of things that he wants us to focus on and uh we'd love to continue
[1:38:42] to work with you on it what percentage of the expenditures do you think going out improper
[1:38:47] payments are actually fraudulent you know i wouldn't want to say what a percentage i don't i don't want
[1:38:52] to make a guess on that but i think they're substantial and i think the extent to which we don't focus on them
[1:38:57] and we think it's a small problem uh is is why we never actually make progress in this area and so i'm
[1:39:04] very grateful that uh we are focusing on it and there is such an active interest here in congress
[1:39:09] on it thank you i yield back mr chairman thank you uh mr pokan would be next thank you mr chairman
[1:39:23] so how much does doge cost us what do we spend on staffing of doge i don't think doge cost us much
[1:39:28] at all in terms of the what did it cost us not that that's not an answer so if i say what's your
[1:39:33] favorite color and you tell me 13 000 that's an answer and it's not i disagree with the answer it's a
[1:39:37] non-answer so do you know how much doge cost us i don't believe doge cost us anything they saved us
[1:39:44] do you know how much we spent on staffing of doge uh off the top of my head no i do not know what we
[1:39:50] spent on the the very few doge staffers that there were many of these people were volunteering gotcha
[1:39:58] when the staffing question we were told by secretary kennedy that there had 21 000 people were fired
[1:40:03] they had to bring back 12 000 which seems like a complete mess do you know how many people overall
[1:40:09] were let go uh under in the last year and a half and how many had to be brought back no not off the
[1:40:15] top of my head okay if you could get us that information i'd appreciate it um do you know how
[1:40:19] much we spent on the war in iran so far uh we've spent about 30 billion dollars 30 billion dollars so
[1:40:27] i'm going to hold you to that because people are saying it's more like a hundred billion dollars
[1:40:31] well i'm just telling you what i've heard from the department of war and the analysis that
[1:40:35] they've given us okay i'm just going to remember today june 30th 2026 you're saying as of today 30
[1:40:42] billion dollars is what we spent that's the number that i have no appreciate that um prep far there
[1:40:49] still has not been about 700 million dollars released and we're down to a few months before
[1:40:55] end of september will that money be released by the department we will spend all the pepfar that we
[1:40:59] uh that has been appropriated uh sometimes there are different fiscal years that you might be referring to
[1:41:06] and these pepfar spent over many many years right i think there's 700 million left doesn't that sound
[1:41:11] right at where at usaid state state we will make sure the pepfar spending uh goes out the door thank
[1:41:18] you appreciate that finally i think there's 3.2 billion dollars that came from funds earmarked by
[1:41:23] congress for global health and development programs that was signed uh that there is an unobligated it's not
[1:41:30] obligated by september that money will expire can no longer be spent is that going to be spent that
[1:41:35] money it's not going to be done as a pocket rescission i'm not going to take any tool off
[1:41:38] the table but we have no plans to do a rescission at this point and we will make sure uh that we are
[1:41:43] getting the money out the door expeditiously okay but do you predict that money will be spent before
[1:41:48] the end of september i don't want to make any predictions other than to say that our current
[1:41:52] plans to get the money out the door uh yeah just so you know when we approve funds in a bipartisan way we
[1:41:57] expect that the money gets out and i understand you've had delays and you want more staffing but you've only
[1:42:01] spent about 10 percent of the additional money you got the big beautiful bill we need to make sure
[1:42:06] that when congress approves funds in a bipartisan way it gets expended we agree with the need to get
[1:42:12] money out the door consistent with our review of whether it's being well spent and not taking any
[1:42:17] tools that we may use of the president's fiscal management tools off the table thank you okay we
[1:42:22] now recognize mr bishop for his three minutes thank you very much uh mr vault um it's apparent to the members
[1:42:32] of the committee as well as to the general public that uh you as budget director and president trump
[1:42:40] feel that you have the authority to pause and sometimes outright disregard appropriations that
[1:42:47] are directed by congress and of course as we all know the constitution explicitly states that congress alone
[1:42:56] sets the terms for appropriating funds but if for example we give you the minute of the doubt that
[1:43:05] you're somehow under the impression that the omb's actions over the last 18 months to withhold funds
[1:43:11] across a broad spectrum of programs is legal uh can you let us know what kind of language we need to use
[1:43:20] in our appropriations bills that you and omb would consider to be unambiguous enough uh in directing the
[1:43:29] executive branch to disperse appropriating funds without delay without additional restrictions that
[1:43:35] undermine the intent of congress and without political considerations or like retaliation
[1:43:42] or do you believe it's possible for us to put language in the appropriations bills that are
[1:43:47] uh uh direct enough that uh would uh prohibit you from impounding and impeding the intention of
[1:43:56] congress and our appropriations i'm not going to engage in a hypothetical but it's an interesting
[1:44:00] question congressman in the sense that many of the things you say are the questions that we get in
[1:44:06] terms of whether we're getting money out the door quickly is in fact us reviewing to see whether it's
[1:44:11] done efficiently or not and to ensure that agencies aren't aren't aren't doing deficiencies that there's
[1:44:17] a spend plan in place which was literally why we were set up in the first place and so uh i would
[1:44:23] just i'll just offer that as one of the reasons as you're you're you're responding to what you think
[1:44:29] is data that we're not spending fast enough it is also it's often because we're trying to
[1:44:33] but when you put a pause when you put a pause and uh uh not spend it at all um when we clearly and
[1:44:43] it's clearly uh intended by congress for it to be spent uh what kind of language do we need to put
[1:44:50] well i think we have a we have what would you respond to well we would have a difference of opinion
[1:44:55] with regard to the president's ability uh to pursue executive tools to limit spending we've i've been up
[1:45:03] here before to talk about it uh we used many of those tools last year i don't think this is about
[1:45:08] writing the bills differently but i will say this congressman we're working with the committee to
[1:45:15] to pass these appropriations bills i think we had one of the most successful appropriations bills
[1:45:19] in uh seasons and process in history last year subject to you believe that there are three equal
[1:45:25] branches of government that of course of course absolutely but the unitary um executive theory is not
[1:45:33] doesn't take precedence over the other two branches i take it we believe there are three
[1:45:39] equal branches and we are always looking back to how the founders intended our constitutional
[1:45:44] structure to operate and function thank you mr bishop chair now recognizes mrs glusenkamp perez
[1:45:50] for three minutes thank you mr chair and thank you again um one of the concerns that i've heard and
[1:45:57] specific about the changes to grant making rules um is the prohibition on funds for conferences
[1:46:04] there's a there are excellent conferences in skilled trades competitions that is inherently a
[1:46:10] conference um people still glow with pride that they were successful in winning their state skills
[1:46:14] usa champion in auto tech or roofing or whatever it is and so um how do you view this proposed rules
[1:46:21] impact on the ability to host and hold skills competition and how to find the best balance and the
[1:46:26] brightest trades people and really bolster our skilled trades well i would just say with regard to some of the
[1:46:32] excess uh activities that numbers of individuals who are benefiting from grants there's one thing
[1:46:38] that's not in this it's because you all barred us from doing it there's nothing regarding indirect cost
[1:46:43] rates in this regulation but indirect cost rates indirect costs are the kind of things that we're trying to
[1:46:48] restrict as much as we possibly can i think it's analogous to your question bill gates only pays 10 percent for
[1:46:54] indirect cost we pay up to 50 to 60 percent for indirect costs for things like parking buildings and
[1:47:00] administrative costs and while there may be examples where you know something might be useful and
[1:47:07] important we think the trend in that direction is not something that we want the grant programs to be
[1:47:12] funding we want them to be funding actual research and investment um and and that is a durable investment
[1:47:19] our investment in these kids who have correct pride in their skills and competition and so i just ask for
[1:47:24] consideration of this as you're moving through evaluating grants um another concern i've heard from cte teachers
[1:47:29] and students about the proposed elimination of fixed amount awards and subawards um and the impact on
[1:47:35] increasing the administrative cost and burden i know so many great programs who are like we are not
[1:47:39] touching federal grants because we cannot handle the administrative burden meanwhile the people who are
[1:47:44] have grant writers and have slick handouts like they they they can do that they can overcome that
[1:47:49] administrative burden and so i'm asking how you're thinking about balancing the scale of administrative
[1:47:53] burden on rural and smaller organizations um and how to effectively tailor um rather than eliminate but
[1:48:01] tailor um their ability to participate in in these federal tax um programs um because they really can
[1:48:08] provide as much or a greater uh you know dollar uh cost effectiveness i would say that we want the we
[1:48:16] don't want there to be a great administrative burden and that's what the comment phase is for and if comments
[1:48:22] come in that we can learn more about how this would be implemented we're going to definitely take a look
[1:48:26] at those it's just really hard for my smaller organizations to be like oh i'm going to go through
[1:48:30] this portal and make this comment and all this time and so asking for you to consider how to bring in
[1:48:34] people who have been a part of this um from a smaller organization from rural communities um i will make
[1:48:40] this offer if you want me to meet with someone from your district that's a small organization i will happy
[1:48:45] thank you very much appreciate that i'll yield back thank you very much uh chair now recognizes mr ivy for three
[1:48:52] minutes of questions thank you and congratulations mr chair um i wanted to follow up on the doge comment
[1:49:01] that you made i've got a report here from the senate permanent subcommittee on investigations
[1:49:07] um that's entitled the 21.7 billion dollar blunder analyzing the waste generated by doge are you
[1:49:15] familiar with this report no i haven't okay um it breaks it down by category and it runs through
[1:49:21] the cost for example uh and i think there was a stretch where people got paid not to come to work
[1:49:28] and i remember there was a scenario where uh probationary employees were laid off i think that
[1:49:33] would went to the courts i think omb made the decision to lay off the probationary employees
[1:49:39] court said you can't do that it has to go through the departments and then it went back to you but in any
[1:49:44] event the the probationary piece waste generated by involuntary administrative leave and severance pay programs
[1:49:52] they calculated 6.06 billion are you familiar with those i haven't read the report i'm happy to
[1:49:58] read the report in general many of the times that these kind of artificial uh moment in time
[1:50:04] cost estimates with regard to the federal workforce are not uh accounting for the long-term savings
[1:50:11] of what uh a lower footprint for those agencies would look like for instance riffs riffs have
[1:50:16] upfront costs uh this is widely known uh but they lead to uh long-term savings and a a smaller footprint
[1:50:26] and so agreed but my guess is what's going on in that report and you take a look and you can you can
[1:50:31] follow back up with us but you'd also agree that there have been scenarios where departments have laid
[1:50:35] off i'm looking at 110 000 people and brought back 60 000 or you know we've had other scenarios where
[1:50:42] departments laid off a certain number then quickly bring a number back um that's that would be part
[1:50:49] of the long-term calculation you're talking about as well right i would describe it as a dynamic fluid
[1:50:53] process so you have agency heads uh that are trying to assess that they have what they need for the core
[1:51:00] functions that they do it's a dynamic waste of money though if you lay off people and then bring
[1:51:05] them back especially in the short term the the nuclear regulatory commission laid off the staff
[1:51:11] i think was on a friday realized that you know you just can't grab somebody off the street to run
[1:51:15] that and they brought them all back on monday those are not that's not just dynamic that's a mistake
[1:51:22] and that's funding that people that the taxpayers wasted on an effort that was rushed through i think
[1:51:28] part of the concern with respect to doge and um i think most of my colleagues would agree cuttings
[1:51:34] you know employees that that aren't needed is fine but it's clear that what doge did was
[1:51:41] they advocated cutting a lot of people a lot of federal government employees who were doing great
[1:51:46] work they didn't know what they were talking about when they advocated for those cuts then they
[1:51:51] quickly realized that they had to bring people back and that really devastated the individuals lives
[1:51:56] who were caught up in that scenario i my time's expired i yield back and like the wedding feast
[1:52:02] at canaan will now save the best for last and recognize the ranking member of the full committee
[1:52:07] mr laurel wrap this up thank you very much mr chairman i i think you've made clear director
[1:52:13] that um that you are not going to really carry out um the uh spending laws as congress intended
[1:52:21] um and uh that really is very very troubling um look we've already seen omb uh uh implementing
[1:52:29] political review of grants it's led to massive delays at nsf the nih uh nih has had about a 34
[1:52:36] decrease in new awards in 2026 compared to what they've done um in in the past and we understand that
[1:52:44] the decreases due to new layers of political review at the nih at hhs omb as well as the office of
[1:52:51] extramural research directives limiting the number of funding opportunities that are allowed
[1:52:56] um uh that there have been cases where uh people are still awaiting approval and political appointees
[1:53:05] have really denied uh the the uh the award going forward the same problem is occurring across the
[1:53:12] government interior homeland what is a government-wide problem uh what can you do to address it where is
[1:53:20] the hold up um and quite frankly how would requiring a political appointee to approve every single grant
[1:53:26] improve government efficiency one of the things i heard constantly when we were considering the
[1:53:32] rescissions package last year of which you all opposed but one of the things i heard was why
[1:53:38] wouldn't you just uh eliminate just the small things that you have concerns with and not actually take
[1:53:45] the number down lower and the way that we do that the way that we provide good oversight of federal
[1:53:51] dollars is to be able to assess and review how the agencies intend to spend the money and that takes
[1:53:59] time you don't do that in the middle of a 30-day period after you pass the appropriation with all
[1:54:03] due respect mr director my heavens we haven't seen spend plans that has been one of the biggest one of the
[1:54:09] big problems this committee hasn't even seen spend plans uh that we're supposed to uh you know get
[1:54:16] uh and so uh that that there's a point is and and this rule that is really in the process of comment which
[1:54:23] you won't extend the timing on uh uh has is really specific about who is going to review the the the uh
[1:54:34] grants not on merit uh but they're going to go through a political lens um and there's all kinds of
[1:54:42] restrictions on these grant awards that is reverting a process as i said earlier that has been
[1:54:48] established after the second world war uh and as i give you analogy an analogy is that when i do the
[1:54:57] budget for the president do you think i don't rely on the career staff do you think i'm well look
[1:55:03] it has a with all due respect i got five seconds left five seconds left it is about political appointees
[1:55:11] making the decision not people based who would oh the evidence and not based on particularly in health
[1:55:17] and science not based on the science of of of of the award that's happened everywhere i can quote you
[1:55:26] i i can talk to you and talk offline about the what's been denied at yale university that has to do
[1:55:33] with hiv suppression tourettes etc don't tell me that these are they do not meet
[1:55:40] the government's priorities or the president's priorities it's not to deal with tourette syndrome
[1:55:46] to deal with ocd is not about somebody wasting money this is science it's reviewed as it has been
[1:55:55] over 75 years when these awards have been made and you are all in the business of reversing that and
[1:56:01] putting all of these grants through a political lens and someone's political ideology it's wrong and
[1:56:07] we're not going to let it happen i yield back would you care to answer i would just say that there was
[1:56:14] an election the president was put in charge of the executive branch the constitution over the
[1:56:19] constitution says that the appropriations process has is the power of the purse you are ignoring that
[1:56:28] you flout the constitution every single day and you have been doing it for the last year and a half
[1:56:34] and we again not going to continue to allow that to happen no president has the right to just
[1:56:42] violate the united states constitution and no member of this committee does that but the
[1:56:47] administration is doing it regularly with that our time is concluded i'd like to thank director
[1:56:52] vote for being here today there may be some members who'd like to submit more questions for the
[1:56:56] record please submit any questions for the record to the subcommittee staff within seven days
[1:57:01] the subcommittee staff within seven days this subcommittee stands adjourned