Photo illustration: Sarah Grillo / Axios. Photo: Brendan Smialowski / AFP via Getty Images
The Trump administration violated the Impoundment Control Act by pausing NIH grant reviews and withholding funds, the Government Accountability Office said in a report this week.
Why it matters: The act is intended to ensure that funds Congress appropriates are properly spent and that presidents can't interfere with its constitutional power of the purse.
Catch up quick: The administration's sweeping overhaul of federal health agencies included the cancellation of more than 1,800 NIH grants in response to an executive order to cut funding for DEI initiatives.
- HHS' communications freeze mandated by the Trump administration also caused agencies to stop publishing grant review meeting notices in the Federal Register, which resulted in a further reduction of grant awards.
Zoom in: Those actions amounted to a violation of the Impoundment Control Act by "withholding funds from obligation and expenditure," GAO concluded.
- HHS indicated that the funding pause on Federal Register notices has since been lifted.
- But GAO said HHS' response to its findings "did not include information regarding current obligations of NIH funds for FY 2025."
- OMB referred Axios to Director Russ Vought's public comments. Vought told CNN in a recent interview that the NIH was a "bureaucracy that we believe has been weaponized against the American people."
The big picture: Democrats in Congress may be less likely to work with Republicans and pass appropriations bills if the Trump administration won't honor those funding levels and unilaterally withholds funds.
- "President Trump is illegally blocking funding for medical research and shredding the hopes of patients across the country, who are counting on NIH-backed research," Senate Appropriations Ranking Member Patty Murray wrote in a statement on the report.
