Amodei, Rep

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The director of the Office of Management and Budget is infuriating Republican lawmakers by "going rogue" on what appropriations were approved by the House and Senate.

MS NOW's Hayes Brown wrote on Monday that Director Russell Vought has made a unilateral decision to control whether funds are actually sent out for projects that Congress approved.

The constitutional core is Article I’s Appropriations Clause: “No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law.” So, the president can't legally spend Treasury money unless Congress has authorized it through law. Appropriations are technically laws approved by Congress. The president's Article II powers mandate that he “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.”

But the executive branch is refusing to disburse the funds approved by law. In fact, Brown explained that "Vought has used every lever he can reach to stanch the flow of federal dollars."

A series of reports last week cited a group of what they're calling "zombie programs" across the U.S. government. Those are programs like the CDC's Alzheimer’s disease program or programs around epilepsy and sickle cell disease data collection operations. There's even a rape prevention unit. All of them have been approved and fully funded by Congress. When Elon Musk went through his DOGE cuts, the people who worked on the programs were let go.

Vought has encouraged the president to impound money that Congress has allocated, even if it's against the law. In fact, Brown cited "a law specifically forbidding the practice."

After the huge DOGS cuts, "OMB sent a list of rescissions," saying that it would "undo" Musk's moves to kill programs that Congress funded.

"Congressional Republicans signed off on a package cutting $8 billion in foreign aid funding and roughly $1 billion from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. But that wasn’t enough for Vought, who last fall enacted a 'pocket rescission' to cut another $4.9 billion in foreign aid," Brown explained. "By only informing Congress of the hold less than 45 days before the end of the fiscal year, OMB argued, the money would be cut automatically."

Then Vought deployed the “apportionment” process, stating that federal spending must align with Trump's budget proposals. It's the way that Trump's government has been able to take tax dollars from blue states while refusing to allocate appropriated funds.

"Even more troubling, a new federal rule currently in the works would give his office unprecedented control over issuing federal grants. If enacted, the rule would effectively serve as a roundabout veto over spending that fails to 'demonstrably advance the president’s policy priorities,' even those that meet the specific guidelines Congress has put in place," the Brown wrote.

The tactics are angering lawmakers, including Republicans.

"Congress has appropriated money, and you don’t have the authority to impound it,” Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said in a Senate Budget Committee hearing with Vought.

Rep. Mark Amodei (R-Nev.), who is also a senior Republican on appropriations, told Politico, “Pocket rescissions would be a very interesting way to curry favor with the legislative branch — especially the one part of the legislative branch which has delivered on all of the administration’s s——."

A short-term budget bill was passed by the Senate before they left for the August recess, and its language temporarily halts Vought's takeover of federal grants. The House still must pass the bill, but the odds look good, as no one wants a government shutdown weeks before the election.

Brown pointed out that it's one of the far too few occasions on which the legislature has asserted its authority in many years. In the past two years specifically, Congress has ceded its power over trade and war to the president. He said it's nice to see lawmakers finally draw a line.

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On Thursday, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives passed legislation that, if signed into law, would strip federal funding from NPR and PBS. One of the four Republicans who voted against it is now speaking out.

Most of the $9.4 billion rescissions package (legislation in which Congress claws back money that was previously appropriated) is targeting foreign aid through the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the African Development Foundation, with approximately $8 billion being cut from those agencies. However, the remainder of the money was allocated toward the two public broadcasting agencies that are partially funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB).

In a post to his website, Rep. Mark Amodei (R-Nev.) slammed the cuts to NPR and PBS, saying that his constituents depended on their local public broadcasting affiliates to get basic information. And he called on his colleagues to not rush to strip funding from the CPB before having a larger conversation about what the impact of those cuts would be.

"If we do not have time to think about it, we sure as hell have time to talk about it before October 1st when the impacts of these rescinded funds would start to be felt,” Amodei said, referring to the start of Fiscal Year 2026. "This is forward funding. So, before we trigger major consequences for our local public broadcasting stations throughout the West and other rural areas, we need more discussion—rather than railroading folks over the East Coast’s editorials and indiscretions."

IFrame Content

"I agree we must make meaningful cuts to shrink our federal deficit; however, I would be doing a disservice to the thousands of rural constituents in my district if I did not fight to keep their access to the rest of the world and news on the air," he continued.

"Having the ability to discuss real impacts, beyond just the global perspective, is a healthy and necessary step," he added. "I’m sure we will be voting on this again before the cake is fully baked, so I look forward to working with my colleagues to improve and protect this infrastructure our rural communities rely on."

The rescissions package is Congress' first attempt to codify some of the cuts made by Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) earlier this year. In addition to Rep. Amodei, Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.), Nicole Malliotakis (R-N.Y.) and Michael Turner (R-Ohio) also voted no.

Click here to read Amodei's full statement.

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AN 4 25

The one Nevadan who is in the best position to help stop Donald Trump from sabotaging the global economy and shattering the financial stability of Nevada households is Nevada’s only Republican in the Republican-controlled Congress, Rep. Mark Amodei.

Politico reported Friday that Amodei’s fellow House Republican, Don Bacon of Nebraska, plans to introduce a House version of a bipartisan-backed Senate bill empowering Congress to cancel tariffs ordered by a president.

The Senate version of the bill was announced Thursday by Iowa Republican Chuck Grassley and Washington Democrat Maria Cantwell, and four more Senate *Republicans* have signed on as co-sponsors so far.

Congress reining in Trump on tariffs (and, for a change, protecting and preserving the legislative branch’s role in the U.S. government) is a tremendously tall order. Even if Congress passed it, Trump would veto it, and then a whole lot more Republicans would have to find the spine to stand up to Trump and help form the two-thirds majorities in both houses needed to override a veto.

Yes, that many Republicans defying Trump seems unthinkable.

But then, just less than a week ago, the notion that the stock market would see one of its worst weeks ever just because of the crackpot obsessions of one 78-year-old man seemed unthinkable too.

When the markets plummeted upon opening Thursday, Bacon was already reportedly mulling some sort of House action to rein in Trump on tariffs. I emailed Amodei’s office asking if he had been in conversations with other House members about taking action to reassert congressional authority over tariff policy and whether Amodei agreed (as Bacon had put it) that “Congress should take back its tariff authorities.”

In a statement provided by his office Friday, Amodei ignored the question. Instead, he tossed around some Trump talking points and brushed off “Wall Street wigging out.”

“We’ll be closely monitoring key indicators of economic stability,” Amodei added, “such as job reports, inflation, and consumer spending, but nobody said this was going to be instant gratification, and as the President said, ‘We’re dealing with a very sick patient.’ Under Biden, we saw the largest trade deficit in U.S. history, and the status quo is simply not sustainable. We need significant changes to steer our country toward self-reliance.”

A couple things:

First, really, Amodei? “Nobody said this was going to be instant gratification”? Fine, let’s give Amodei the benefit of the doubt and assume he was talking about “instant gratification” as a result of Trump’s tariffs. But let’s also not forget that while campaigning Trump promised that “Starting on Day 1, we will end inflation and make America affordable again,” as well as “Prices will come down. You just watch: They’ll come down, and they’ll come down fast.” Trump has been promising nothing but instant economic gratification for the last, oh, three years. And so far he’s delivered exactly the opposite of that.

Second, when Amodei says 2024’s trade deficit is the largest ever, he’s presumably referring to a dollar amount, which is the dumbed-down way of looking at it. Each and every year countless measurements are the largest in history, like the world’s population, for instance, or, say, the sum total of inane hyperbole spewed by Republican members of Congress. Rather than a dollar amount, a far more concrete and informative assessment of the trade deficit is determined by measuring it as a percentage of GDP. In 2024 the trade deficit was 3.1% of GDP, while in 2006 it was more than 5%. But thanks for bringing it up, congressman.

Meanwhile, to reiterate, Amodei failed to answer the question he was asked, which essentially boils down to whether he too, like at least a half dozen of his fellow Republicans in Congress (Bacon and five senators), is ready to take the U.S. Constitution seriously and reestablish the legislative branch of the United States government as, you know, a going concern.

Courts are slow, and the Supreme Court is stuffed with Trumpers. Congressional Democrats are sidelined (and many of them, including Nevada ones, have demonstrated a willingness to pretend everything will be fine). And Republicans have majorities in Congress, though to clarify, they don’t really control it; they’ve surrendered their control to Trump.

But assuming Trump can be reined in, a number of congressional Republicans are going to have to participate in the reining.

Some of the damage Trump has already inflicted on the economy, the rule of law, national security, international cooperation, science, human rights, the First Amendment, the system of checks and balances that underly the Constitution, democracy, and the practical workings of the federal government is so severe that fixing what he has broken will take years, assuming it’s fixable.

It’s tempting to write off Amodei, in the expectation that he’ll just continue to pretend this is all normal while supplying rote apologies for Trump laced with aw shucks quips and mealy-mouthed let’s-wait-and-sees.

But over the years Amodei has demonstrated on occasion there might be more to him than that. Since he’s the state’s only Republican in Congress, Nevada better hope there is.

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2012603Broad Environmental AssaultAir, Climate Change, Dirty Energy, Lands/Forests, Toxics/Public Right to Know, Water

2012600Regional Haze Air PollutionAir, Dirty Energy, Lands/Forests

2012597Clean Water SafeguardsWater, Wildlife

2012593Carbon Pollution Endangerment FindingClimate Change

2012568Minnesota Boundary Waters Land ExchangeLands/Forests, Water

2012554Land Conservation CutsLands/Forests

2012536Safeguards ShutdownOther

2012514Drinking Water ProtectionsWater

2012506Offshore Drilling Safety ReformsDrilling, Dirty Energy

2012468Hardrock MiningLands/Forests

2012447Migratory Bird Treaty ActWildlife

2012411Coal Ash PollutionDirty Energy, Water

2012410"Oil Above All" Energy StrategyAir, Lands/Forests, Drilling, Dirty Energy

2012395Public Health Basis of the Clean Air ActAir

2012387Broad Assault on Lands & WildlifeLands/Forests, Wildlife

2012385Public Land Grab by Federal Police AgentsLands/Forests

2012329Nuclear Energy SubsidyDirty Energy

2012317Fossil Fuel FundingDirty Energy

2012311Clean Energy FundingClean Energy

2012308Clean Water ProtectionsWater

2012292Keystone XL Tar Sands PipelineClimate Change, Dirty Energy, Water

2012262Flood Insurance ReformLands/Forests, Water, Other

2012241Climate Change EducationClimate Change

2012236Sea Turtle ProtectionsOceans, Wildlife

2012234National Ocean PolicyOceans

2012233Restriction on Dirty FuelsDirty Energy

2012170Environmental Assault in the Transportation BillClimate Change, Dirty Energy, Other, Transportation, Water

2012168National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) in TransportationOther, Transportation

2012164Public Lands AssaultLands/Forests, Toxics/Public Right to Know, Wildlife

2012162National MonumentsLands/Forests

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Amodei

In the crazy bill introduction category, Sens. Paul (R-KY), Lee (R-UT) and Heller (R-NV) and Rep. Amodei (R-NV) introduced companion bills entitled the “Endangered Species Management Self-Determination Act” (H.R. 3533; S. 1731), which give complete control over endangered species management to states – regardless of whether such states actually wantto do what’s best for imperiled species or are equipped to do so.

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Please OPPOSE all efforts to weaken the Endangered Species Act including bill S. 1731/H.R. 3533, which would harm imperiled species by:

Automatically removing them from the lists of endangered and threatened species after five years, whether or not they've recovered.
Letting politics win over science by requiring that state governors give their consent before species in their states can be listed under the ESA, and requiring a joint resolution of Congress to approve the listing of species as threatened or endangered.
Undermining citizens' ability to enforce the ESA in court and to help protect imperiled species by filing citizen listing petitions

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Congressman Mark Amodei will be recognized by the US Chamber of Commerce for his “sustainable business” advocacy on August 10 at the Reno-Sparks Chamber of Commerce. It marks the evolution of the Chamber of Commerce and Mark Eugene Amodei from climate deniers to climate pretenders.

Clean energy jobs are now pouring into northern Nevada and Amodei’s district, thanks to the Biden Administration and the Inflation Reduction Act. Yet Amodei and the US Chamber continue to dismiss and deny any benefits to our economy, let alone our planet. Not surprising, given Amodei’s shaky reputation rooted in moonlighting as a state senator while getting paid to run the Nevada Mining Association, the lobbying arm of Nevada’slargest polluters.

Nevada ranks in the top 10 in the country for clean energy jobs. Just in the last year, more than 11,500 union-based jobs have been created here and 40,000 high paying clean energy jobs are projected in the next 10 years.

Thanks to the Inflation Reduction Act, Amodei’s 2nd Congressional District of Nevada, where I’ve lived for the past six decades, has the second highest number of new clean energy jobs and the fourth largest investment at $9.02 billion, according to a new report from Climate Power.

Yet Amodei voted to gut the IRA’s incentives to encourage more production and consumption of electric vehicles, aligning himself with MAGA Republicans whose climate-killing refrain is “drill baby, drill.”

New leadership at the Reno-Sparks Chamber of Commerce has received praise for trying to take it in a different direction. This is welcome news. Past regimes opposed planet-friendly efforts by raising corporate PAC money to defeat candidates who don’t tow the big business-first line.

Contrary to the myth both the national and local Chambers love to spread, their members are not small businesses like Truckee Meadow Herbs on Wells Avenue in Reno or Great Basin Brewery in Sparks. The national Chamber is composed of the largest corporations in the world. The Reno-Sparks Chamber’s members are the largest corporations in our region, many of whom are the big money behind Gov. Joe Lombardo, who last month showed his fealty to fossil fuel profiteers over stabilizing our climate when he pulled Nevada out of the US Climate Alliance.

Reno is the fastest-warming city in the US. In the past 40 years, we’ve wiped out 60% of the world’s wildlife and half of Nevada’s sagebrush.

What’s Amodei and the Chamber’s solution? To gaslight us into thinking their greenwashing will make a difference. After all, Amodei belongs to a party bought and paid for by dirty fossil fuel CEO’s, and one of his top donors, Honeywell International, is a greenwashing, fossil-fuel burning profiteer.

Perhaps the “sustainability” award for Amodei from the US Chamber makes sense. They work hard to sustain the obscene profits of their corporate donors by keeping climate regulations weak.

As rising temperatures break records this summer, I lament this is the coolest summer my grandkids will ever see in their lives. As long as Amodei and the Chamber call the shots, we won’t have a shot at a livable planet.

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https://www.alternet.org/2019/06/how-post-offices-can-beat-payday-lenders/

The fight to curb payday loans has reached one of America’s oldest institutions: the Postal Service. Democratic representatives Bill Pascrell of New Jersey and Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts recently introduced an amendment to the Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act authorizing post offices to provide small loans, savings accounts, and other financial services. The amendment sets aside $1 million to cover any overhead. It passed the House of Representatives on June 25.

Pascrell is a longtime supporter of the Postal Service. In an April 2019 article for this magazine, he argued that the USPS is an essential institution that has been bogged down by privatization efforts. Rather than take away money from the agency, Pascrell said that Congress should expand its functions. Post offices, he noted, could bring loan and ATM access to unbanked Americans, many of whom rely on payday lenders that charge exorbitant interest rates. problem ... ;in the United States. In 2017, 6.5 percent of U.S. households were “unbanked” (no bank access), and 18.7 percent were “underbanked” (reliant on financial institutions that were not banks). Almost half of the country could not pull together $2,000 within thirty days in the event of an emergency (or at least they would struggle greatly to). Many of these people would have to take out payday loans to deal with such a shock.

“They turn to the unregulated predatory payday lenders, to check cashiers,” Pascrell told me. These lenders, he said, “keep families in poverty.”

Typical payday lenders charge interest rates of 390 percent per year, a figure so high that one out of five recipients default. A recent move by the Trump administration to slash regulation around payday loans risks making this problem even worse.

Pascrell’s solution is not wholly new. Several large countries—including China, India, Italy, and France—currently offer loans and savings accounts at post offices. American post offices offered loan and deposit services from 1911 to 1966, when millions of low-income individuals relied on them. In 1947, the post office managed $3.4 billion, the equivalent of $35 billion today, making it one of the largest financial institutions in the U.S.

But Lyndon Johnson cut the project in the 1960s as a part of a larger effort to trim government agencies. Afterwards, predatory lenders stepped in to fill the gap, offering small loans that commercial banks often avoid. To turn a profit, this new crop of lenders set sky-high interest rates that have left poorer Americans trapped in debt.

The postal service still offers one banking service: postal money orders. An inspector general report estimates that it provides roughly $21 billion of these orders—which operate like prepaid checks—to those who have no other place to store their money. The report also noted that “ZIP Codes with higher population, more poverty, and lower education levels sold more money orders.”

Pascrell and Pressley’s legislation—which also had the support of Nevada Republican Mark Amodei—would greatly expand this banking system, making post offices install new ATMs, set up deposit accounts, and hand out low-interest loans to customers. Its odds of passing the Senate are slim. But if the bill were implemented, it would offer low-income Americans inexpensive access to the U.S. financial system. A USPS inspector general study found that postal banking could provide loans at a 90 percent discount compared to what payday lenders charge.

Given its vast reach, Pascrell argued that the Postal Service was uniquely prepared to help solve America’s payday lender problem. “It’ll be a little push from us,” he said. “But they’re basically ready to do this.”

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