‘Bad precedent:’ Ex-GOP rep warns  Republicans' new budget move will haunt them

Former Rep. Charlie Dent (R-PA) laid into congressional Republicans on Wednesday over their support for President Donald Trump’s plan to claw back more than $9 billion in federal spending already approved by Congress.

Speaking on MSNBC, Dent, who used to serve on the House Appropriations Committee, said that the move to cancel already-approved funding would set a “really bad precedent” going forward, and that it could permanently weaken Congress’s power.

“What the president is trying to do here is establish his priorities through this recessions package outside the appropriations process,” Dent said. “Congress is ceding a lot of its power of the purse authority under Article I to the executive branch, and it's going to contaminate the ability of Congress then to negotiate the fiscal year 2026 appropriations bills.”

The $9 billion in cuts were largely identified by the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, the new government initiative briefly led by Tesla CEO Elon Musk to identify wasteful spending. Among the spending items identified for cuts are money for foreign aid and public broadcasting.

While the cuts have already passed the House and appear likely to pass through the Senate, the issue, Dent argued, wasn’t necessarily the cuts themselves, but rather, the precedent it would set going forward. Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) was among three Senate Republicans to vote against advancing the bill in the upper chamber, who also voiced concerns over the ambiguity of the cuts.

“The rescissions package has a big problem, nobody really knows what program reductions are in it,” Collins said.

Dent backed Collins’ opposition, noting that she, of all members of Congress, would know the potential fallout from the $9 billion in cuts moving forward.

“Sen. Collins understands this better than anybody, she's chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, and she's got to negotiate this,” Dent said.

“How is she going to be able to negotiate with the Democrats, pass a bill knowing it goes to the president who might just then say (they're) going to rescind funding you don't like? If the Democrats get full control, what will stop them from rescinding money over defense, border security or immigration enforcement? It's a really bad precedent.”

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