The White House announced the cuts through what's called a "pocket rescission," a rarely used and legally murky maneuver, according to the Los Angeles Times. Officials rolled it out just five days before the fiscal year ended, leaving Congress almost no window to review or fight the cancellations before they took effect.
The timing looks deliberate. Republican Sen. Susan Collins and Democrats say the administration used the short runway to sidestep the normal process Congress uses to check a president's spending power, the Times reports. Rescissions typically require lawmakers to sign off. A "pocket rescission" instead runs out the clock, letting the executive branch withhold money Congress already voted to spend.
For the people who rely on these programs, the fight is not abstract. Refugee services, support for unaccompanied minors, housing aid and minority-business programs all took hits, and the agencies running them now have less money than lawmakers intended them to have.
The bigger fight is over who actually controls federal spending, the president or Congress. Nearly $1 billion vanished from the budget in the time it takes most people to plan a long weekend.