OMB Director Russ Vought slams GAO for calling pause of funding EV charging program ‘illegal’

President Trump’s Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought is condemning the Government Accountability Office for saying the Transportation Department’s pause on funding of a Biden-era electric vehicle charging program is illegal.

The GAO determined that the DOT’s impoundment of congressionally approved funds goes against the 1974 law known as the “Impoundment Act” that limits a president’s ability to impede or block money appropriated by Congress.

Mr. Vought shot back on social media that the GAO is “a quasi-independent arm of the legislative branch that played a partisan role in the first-term impeachment hoax.”

“They are going to call everything an impoundment because they want to grind our work to manage taxpayer dollars effectively to a halt,” Mr. Vought said. “These are non-events with no consequence. Rearview mirror stuff.”

A GAO spokesperson told The Washington Times the “GAO’s Impoundment Control Act (ICA) decision does not take a position on the policy goals of electric vehicle charging infrastructure program. Our legal decisions only examine the procedural issues and compliance with the law.” 

 “GAO’s mission is to provide nonpartisan, fact-based information to Congress, to help it carry out its constitutional legislative, appropriations, and oversight functions and protect the power of the purse. We stand behind the quality of our work.”

The National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure program was launched in 2021 with $5 billion as an effort to establish a national network of charging stations.

It was panned by the Trump administration as a waste of money when the Federal Highway Administration informed state transportation directors that the NEVI program was under review.

Democrats on the House and Senate Budget panels requested GAO’s thoughts on the matter, and the agency is looking into additional possible impoundments.

“This legal decision affirms what we’ve long known: the president is breaking the law to block funding Congress passed on a bipartisan basis and that is owed to the American people — simply because he disagrees with it,” said Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee.