Dem
47
GOP
53
Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) is more than concerned this time. She is actually worried... about her reelection prospects next year. This time it is about Donald Trump's use of recissions. The scenario is like this. After much negotiation, Congress passes a bipartisan appropriations bill. The negotiation is needed because such bills can be filibustered by the Senate Democrats. After it has passed, Trump sends Congress a bill to remove those parts of the bill that include the Democrats' priorities. This is called a recissions bill and can be passed by a bare majority of each chamber. In effect, recissions bills double-cross the Democrats by reneging on the promises the Republicans made to them to get the original bill passed.
But it is even worse than this. OMB Director Russell Vought suggested that Trump submit a recissions bill so close to the end of the fiscal year that Congress doesn't have the 45 days it is supposed to have to vote on it. While Congress is "debating" whether to approve the rescission, the president is not required to spend the money previously appropriated. By doing nothing until the end of the fiscal year, the president can de facto get out from spending money he doesn't want to spend in the final 45 days of a fiscal year. This is known as a "pocket rescission," analogous to a pocket veto. Trump is currently trying to kill nearly $5 billion in foreign aid using a pocket rescission.
So where does Collins come in? She is chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee and signed off on spending the $5 billion in foreign aid. She is very angry that Trump is undermining the work she did in getting the original bill passed and is usurping the power of the purse from Congress. She even said: "Any effort to rescind appropriated funds without congressional approval is a clear violation of the law." So she is accusing Trump of breaking the law. That is stronger than merely being "concerned." She said Congress, not the president, gets to decide how the government's money will be spent.
This trick is going to have ramifications for the ongoing negotiations to prevent the shutdown. If the Democrats believe that the Republicans are negotiating in bad faith, agreeing to things that will later be unilaterally rescinded, why should they negotiate at all? What if they insist on including in the appropriations bill a change to the law governing recissions, making those bills subject to the same rules as the appropriations bills, namely that they are not privileged and can be filibustered? Needless to say, Republicans will never accept that, which could lead to a shutdown. (V)