Reflections on the tensions between the Executive and Congressional Budget Processes
As one Congressional Research report notes, “Conflicting budget priorities of the President and Congress accentuate the institutional tensions between the executive and legislative branches inherent in the federal budget process.”
In a 400-500 word reflection, please address the following questions.
1) Briefly describe those institutional tensions. What does the President want out of the budget process? How about the Congress? Structurally, where are their goals aligned and where is conflict inevitable?
2) Define “impoundment” in the context of the Federal budget process, and how it is related to the tensions you outlined in your answer to question 1. And how is this obscure budgetary concept linked to the first impeachment trial of President Trump?
Reading:
1.1967 Presidential Commission on Budget Concepts, Chapter 2
2.CRS Report: Introduction to the Federal Budget Process
3.CRS Report: The Congressional Appropriation Process: An Introduction
4.CRS Report: Item Veto and Expanded Impoundment Proposals: History and Current Status
5. New York Times, “GAO Report Says Trump Administration Broke Law in Witholding Ukraine Aid
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/16/us/politics/gao…
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