NOTUS did a deep dive into the Trump administration’s likely illegal grab of funds allocated by Congress.

Across federal agencies, the Trump administration’s aggressive slash-and-burn approach to federal programs, grants and contracts has repeatedly challenged Congress’ power of the purse. The administration has claimed it has the discretion to redirect funds to programs aligned with Trump’s agenda — and Republican congressional leaders have largely let them do it.

The outcome: Billions in taxpayer dollars have become virtually untraceable — a level of opaqueness in government funds that’s raising questions around the legality of the administration’s actions. Some of these taxpayer funds expire on Sept. 30. If they’re not spent by then, like all funds Congress appropriated specifically for 2025, they disappear.

NOTUS attempted to trace the money appropriated for more than 100 government programs to understand where taxpayer dollars are going, only to hit dead ends repeatedly. Data is outdated or conflicting, agencies have been vague in their explanations, and in many cases, there’s no publicly available evidence that appropriated money is being spent at all.

NOTUS points out that now, near the end of the fiscal year, the federal government has “not yet spent anywhere close to 2025 fiscal year budgetary resources.” But it’s “near-impossible to know” the numbers.

Possibly even worse than not using the allocated money is the likelihood that it’s being spent in ways that Congress did not intend, as per an anonymous Hill staffer quoted in the NOTUS article.

This staffer said that they are primarily learning about shifts in spending through those affected by the changes reaching out to staff and Congressional offices to ask for explanations or help.

The Government Accountability Office has opened more than 40 investigations into whether the administration is illegally withholding funds in violation of Congressional instructions. GAO has already found that the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Energy and the Department of Health and Human Services are among the many agencies violating the law.

This latest bit of Trump corruption is not as obviously hair raising as the BS indictment of former FBI director James Comey, his shakedown of ABC or the acceptance of Qatar’s $400 million bribe luxury jet that will likely cost taxpayers over $1 billion to install the necessary security equipment – and which Trump gets to take with him when he leaves the White House.

But all that is being done out in the open. It’s just as crucial, if not more so, that we learn what the administration is trying to hide.