Appeals court allows Trump to continue ending foreign aid grants

Only the legislative branch can sue a presidential administration for making changes to congressionally approved budgets, the federal appeals court in DC ruled after looking at President Donald Trump’s administration ending planned grants for foreign aid.

The decision empowers the Trump administration to refuse to spend budgeted money. And it will make it much harder for outside entities that don’t already have contracts with the federal government to challenge the president’s decisions, even in spite of Congress’ power of the purse.

The decision allows Trump to continue with his wind-down of foreign aid grants.

The US DC Circuit Court of Appeals panel, voting 2-1, interpreted the law around the Impoundment Control Act, which regulates the action of a president to delay or withhold funding that has been already appropriated by Congress in the federal budget.

In the case, grant recipients sued over access to almost $4 billion for global health and more than $6 billion for HIV/AIDS programs that were appropriated by Congress to be disbursed by the State Department and the now-essentially shuttered agency USAID.

Circuit Judge Karen Henderson, in the opinion, wrote that “the record is simply less developed” on how long grantees would survive if they can’t compete for foreign aid grants in the future.

Lauren Bateman of Public Citizen Litigation Group, as the lead attorney for some of the grantees that sued, said on Wednesday her organization would “seek further review from the court.”

“In the meantime, countless people will suffer disease, starvation, and death from the Administration’s unconscionable decision to withhold life-saving aid from the world’s most vulnerable people,” Bateman said.

The decision, however, doesn’t wholesale end legal challenges around USAID. Some of the ongoing legal challenges over USAID grants regard the fulfillment of contracts rather than budget allocations in the future. The court noted that the federal government has paid “substantially all of the amounts owed on existing contracts for work” earlier this year.

The court found on Wednesday that only the Comptroller General, which is part of the legislative branch of government in the Government Accountability Office, has the ability to sue the executive over alleged impoundment.

“Here, the (Impoundment Control Act) created a complex scheme of notification of the Congress, congressional action on a proposed rescission or deferral and suit by a specified legislative branch official if the executive branch violates its statutory expenditure obligations,” Henderson, a Reagan appointee, wrote in the opinion. “It does not make sense that the Congress would craft a complex scheme of interbranch dialogue but sub silentio also provide a backdoor for citizen suits at any time and without notice to the Congress of the alleged violation.”

Judge Greg Katsas, a Trump appointee also sided with Henderson.

Judge Florence Pan, a Biden appointee, wrote in a dissent that the court’s decision degrades that ability of the balance of powers to be “security against tyranny.”

“It is our responsibility to check the President when he violates the law and exceeds his constitutional authority. We fail to do that here,” Pan wrote.

The majority, Pan added, “depart from the norms of impartial appellate review” to “announce a new and sweeping rule in the President’s favor.”

Steve Vladeck, CNN Supreme Court analyst and a Georgetown law professor, criticized the powerful appellate court’s reasoning on Wednesday as “nonsensical,” because the court cut out the ability of parties to bring constitutional challenges to the president on budget changes.

“It’s difficult to imagine that the full D.C. Circuit won’t want to rehear this ruling,” Vladeck said. “If it stands, Congress is only going to sue when it’s adverse to the president. The real problem is the court is taking a textbook violation of the Constitution and minimizing it.”