Senate Democrats are now floating “concepts” of ways to restrict President Trump’s rescissions and impoundment powers as a prerequisite for them offering to support a government funding deal. One Republican senator tells the Sun that he could back such a reform measure, though he predicts that it would likely go nowhere in a Republican-controlled Congress. 

The government is set to shut down at the end of the day on September 30 if no funding deal is reached. The majority and minority leaders in the Senate, John Thune and Chuck Schumer, have yet to meet about a deal and currently have no meeting on the books. 

A member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Senator Chris Murphy, tells reporters that he needs binding language in any long-term funding deal, known as a continuing resolution, which could be used in court by plaintiffs to force the executive branch to disperse funds should they try to deploy impoundment powers going forward. 

“We passed the [continuing resolution] in March, and the president didn’t pay any attention to it,” Mr. Murphy told reporters on Tuesday. When Democrats voted to keep the government open back in March, Mr. Schumer saw his approval rating among fellow Democrats plummet due to his seeming weakness in the face of Mr. Trump’s presidency. 

According to a tracker provided by House and Senate Democrats, the president is estimated to be impounding more than $400 billion worth of congressionally appropriated funds. After the March funding deal, the Republicans went on to pass a rescissions package to claw back money designated for public broadcasting and foreign aid. 

“The budget — whether it’s a CR or not — isn’t worth the paper it’s written on if the president is going to act illegally and refuse to spend the money that’s in it,” Mr. Murphy says. “If we want to make it harder on the president to ignore congressional spending directives, we can do that. If the president’s going to act illegally, he’s going to act illegally, but we could make it a lot harder for him to win in court.”

Senator Tim Kaine says that Democrats are starting to float “concepts” about what that language might look like to restrict Mr. Trump’s authority over appropriated funds, though no agreement has yet been reached. 

“A number of us have floated concepts, yeah. ‘Why don’t you do it this way?’” Mr. Kaine tells the Sun. “It is really important. It’s got to be wordsmithed right so you can’t end run it, and I know the appropriators are trying to figure that out.”

One departing Senate Republican, Senator Thom Tillis, tells the Sun that he would support language to restrict some of those presidential powers, though he doubts such a measure would pass the GOP-controlled Congress. 

“Frankly, I hope that we can make progress on anti-rescissions, anti-impoundment [measures] because I don’t like the Article II branch thinking they’re an appropriator,” Mr. Tillis says. “Whether or not it can pass political muster here — probably not.”

The chairman of the House Budget Committee, Congressman Jodey Arrington, similarly tells the Sun that any limits on the president’s authority will go nowhere in the House. Rather, he says, the issue needs to be resolved solely in court. Specifically, he says the president’s recent so-called pocket rescission — which is a legally questionable move to unilaterally cut funding without congressional input — is likely to face lengthy legal challenges. 

“I think the courts are going to be the arbiter of that — of whether the president has the authority to do the pocket rescission. That’ll be litigated, and the arbiter will be the courts on it, and most likely, either side is going to appeal it all the way” to the Supreme Court, Mr. Arrington says.