The White House said Friday that it planned to cut $810 million in bipartisan, congressionally approved funding, spurring criticism from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.
The executive branch would effectively send the funds back to Congress using so-called pocket rescissions, a rare budgetary tactic that the Trump administration has used before to negate congressionally allocated spending. The rejected funding affects several programs and agencies serving immigrants, minority groups and Department of Health and Human Services research programs.
The administration has argued that while the law gives Congress a 45-day period to accept or reject a White House decision to withhold funds, there is no way to follow that protocol if the action occurs less than 45 days before the end of the fiscal year. That argument has been challenged in court and criticized by lawyers and both Republican and Democratic lawmakers.
The fiscal year ends Sept. 30, only a few days away, and the House is not scheduled to return until after the midterm elections in November.
The White House alerted Congress of its plans to reject the funds on Friday, according to a letter signed by the president that was obtained by NBC News. The letter details that the proposed rescissions will “affect programs of the Departments of Commerce, Education, Health and Human Services, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, and Justice, as well as for International Assistance Programs.”
The White House announced the move in a statement Friday, describing the rejected funding as “the most harmful government spending.”
“President Trump is committed to utilizing all possible tools to cut wasteful and harmful government spending that does not benefit American citizens,” the statement said.
Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Susan Collins, R-Maine, called the administration’s move “unlawful” Friday and said, “I will work with my colleagues to address these illegal actions.”
“This move shows that [the Office of Management and Budget] intentionally withheld these funds for months to execute this unlawful cancellation of appropriations that were approved on a bipartisan basis and signed into law,” Collins wrote in a statement. “Not only is the delay itself an impoundment that was not reported to Congress, but also it is a usurpation of Congress’s appropriations powers.”
She wrote that as OMB is part of the executive branch, “it does not get to decide which programs are worth funding.”
Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., who serves as vice chair of the Appropriations Committee, called the move a “theft from the American people” and took aim at OMB Director Russ Vought.
“Russ Vought’s message to Congress is that your votes don’t count, and your laws are optional,” Murray said in a statement. “It is now time for my Republican colleagues who said they would never let this happen to stand up and join us to stop this, and remind this administration this is not how this works.”
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., also disparaged the tactic, writing in a statement: “With this rescissions package, the Trump administration is illegally stripping nearly $1 billion in critical funding that supports kids, K-12 students, small businesses, and health and clean air research.”
Schumer added that Senate Democrats will “challenge Trump’s illegal cuts.”
The White House listed the programs that it rejected funding for, writing in its statement Friday that tax dollars were being “wasted.” The largest cut proposes that it not spend $547 million approved to assist Refugee and Entrant Assistance through HHS funding, writing in its letter to Congress that the program is “overfunded due to the Administration’s successful border policies.”
“These programs, operated by pro-illegal immigration non-profits, provide service to refugees, asylums, and other eligible non-citizens, and put unaccompanied alien children in harm’s way,” the letter said.
The administration also said it rejected funding for Community Relations Services, a subagency of the Justice Department that was established as part of the Civil Rights Act and nicknamed “America’s Peacemaker.” The White House also listed funds for a program that grants debt relief to countries that implement climate change policies.
Additionally, the administration wrote that it plans to give back $56 million in “Housing Counseling Assistance,” arguing that is providing money to grantees “with divisive and DEI-centric agendas that peddle discrimination based on race.”
It also returns over $69 million in funding for International Education and Foreign Language, Domestic Programs, which “provide grants and fellowships to support institutions in bringing foreign students and faculty to the United States to study or teach language, conduct research, and provide professional and curriculum development.”
There were also funds rejected for what the White House deemed “overfunded and unaligned” HHS research programs. It also returned funds for the department’s Office of Minority Health.
Trump used the same tactic to announce $4.9 billion in cuts last year, including $3.2 billion in cuts to USAID, $322 million in cuts for the USAID’s State Democracy fund and hundreds of millions of dollars from funding meant to support worldwide peacekeeping activities.
The $4.9 billion in foreign aid cuts were challenged in court last year, but the Supreme Court ultimately ruled in favor of the administration in September 2025.
Congress approved a rescissions package in July 2025 that nixed $9 billion for foreign aid and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which funds NPR and PBS.
Last year, lawyers for the Government Accountability Office, a nonpartisan federal agency, wrote a post on WatchBlog that stated pocket rescissions are illegal.
“A pocket rescission could allow a president to avoid spending the money regardless of whether Congress approves the rescission request,” the post said. “This would cede Congress’s power of the purse by allowing a president to, in effect, change the law by shortening the period of availability for fixed-period funds.”
In its arguments, the Trump administration has cited the Impoundment Control Act, which Congress passed in 1974 with the aim of regulating the president’s control over the budget. It came after President Richard Nixon had sought to withhold spending on programs that he did not support.
The administration argues that it can withhold money through pocket rescissions, which had not been used in nearly 50 years until Trump revived them last year.
Despite the controversy around the tactic, the White House again touted the president’s use of it Friday.
“Last year, President Trump took the historic step of utilizing long-neglected Presidential authorities provided to him under the Impoundment Control Act to deploy the first ‘pocket rescission’ in 50 years,” the statement said, adding: “This year, he is continuing his commitment.”
