Acting Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), Russell Vought, speaks to reporters during a press conference at the White House in Washington, USA, on March 11, 2019.
Jonathan Ernst | Reuters
The head of the White House budget office on Thursday refused to direct staff and resources to help with the Biden government’s spending plans, in a growing dispute over what the office’s responsibilities are during the transition process.
Director of the Office of Administration and Budget, Russ Vought, dismissed the obstruction allegations raised by President-elect Joe Biden’s transition team, adding that his agency will not cooperate with the alleged efforts to “dismantle” Trump’s administration policies.
“Our system of government has one president and one government at a time,” said Vought in a letter to Biden’s transition chief, Ted Kaufman.
Vought’s letter, publicly shared on his Twitter account, increases the dispute between President Donald Trump’s government and Biden’s new team.
Members of the Biden transition did not provide immediate comment on Vought’s letter. But Andrew Bates, a spokesman for Biden, retweeted a critical message noting that Vought, “While calling the charges false … in fact, confirms that he is preventing the OMB career team from working on the budget request for the next year.”
Biden, in a speech on Monday, singled out the political leaders of the OMB and the Department of Defense for creating “roadblocks” that hamper their efforts to prepare for the presidency.
“At the moment, we are simply not getting all the information we need from the outgoing government in the main areas of national security,” said Biden at the time. “It is nothing less than irresponsibility, in my view.”
Acting Defense Chief Christopher Miller responded later that day, saying in a statement that the Pentagon’s efforts “have outpaced those of recent administrations by more than three weeks.”
In a virtual briefing on Wednesday, new White House press secretary Jen Psaki and Biden adviser Yohannes Abraham criticized these agencies again.
“There is no doubt that the process will be delayed by what we found by the outgoing OMB,” said Abraham. “Budget production takes many hours per person and requires the analytical support that has been part of OMB’s involvement with previous transitions that we have not received.”
Historically, the OMB has provided new administrations with economic and budget information well in advance of the inauguration day, in order to prepare them to quickly present the new president’s budget. The document is technically due on the first Monday in February, but has already been postponed in the past.
Bloomberg, citing people familiar with the matter, reported on Thursday that Vought is preventing members of Biden’s team from meeting with budget officials in order to finalize and publish new regulations before the Trump administration comes to an end.
In his letter to Kaufman, Vought said the record shows that “OMB has fully participated in the appropriate transition efforts”.
Vought said the budget agency held more than 45 meetings with the Biden team and “provided all requested information” about ongoing programs. He also said that Biden’s team was briefed on the Trump administration’s coronavirus relief efforts, including Operation Warp Speed, the White House vaccine development and distribution plan.
“What we haven’t done and won’t do is use the current OMB team to write the [Biden transition team’s] legislative policy proposals to dismantle the work of this government, “said Vought’s letter.
“The OMB team is working on the policies of this administration and will do so until the last day of this administration in office. Redirecting the team and resources to prepare your team’s budget proposals is not a transition responsibility for OMB.”
Vought added: “The OMB will not participate in the development of policies that weaken border security, dismantle the president’s deregulating successes and devise budgets that will bankrupt America.”