Representative Jake Auchincloss (D-MA) said Democrats will not vote to fund the government unless President Donald Trump stops overriding Congress spending.

Auchincloss said, “Checks and balances, the separation of powers is going to be the dominant theme of this first year of Donald Trump’s presidency — the presidency. Article 2 is in a boxing match with Congress. Article 1 and the court’s Article 3 over our ability to prevent an imperial presidency. The Supreme Court has, at least here, held its own in round one. Round two is going to be Congress and the presidency boxing over appropriations. Congress has claim on the power of the purse. Speaker Mike Johnson is definitely not a prize fighter. And so Democrats are going to have to step up and insist that to fund the government this spring the president needs to respect the fact that one, he cannot use emergency powers to spend money that we did not appropriate. And number two, he  has to appropriate the funds that we have called for. That is the power of the purse. That is not up for debate.”

He added, “We have one moment of maximum leverage in this first year, and that is to fund the government in March, because the Republicans can’t fund it on their own. They need our votes and what we must demand for our votes is that Article 2 respects Congress’s power of the purse, and that Elon Musk gets out of American’s personal information and sensitive payment systems.”

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