The Unitary Executive, Expanded: Constitutional Questions for 2025

The Proposition

The question before us is not whether the president has the authority to direct the executive branch, he manifestly does, but whether the current exercise of that authority has exceeded the constitutional boundaries that distinguish a president from a sovereign. The distinction matters, even if neither party has shown consistent interest in maintaining it.

WHAT HAPPENED

• The president issued executive orders directing agencies to ignore congressional appropriations for programs he opposes
• The Office of Management and Budget issued a memorandum pausing all federal grants and loans pending review
• Multiple federal agencies were directed to cease enforcement of regulations promulgated under prior administrations
• The Department of Justice declined to defend existing federal laws in court
• The impoundment of congressionally appropriated funds was challenged in multiple federal courts

THE CONSERVATIVE DIAGNOSIS

The conservative case for executive power is well-established: Article II vests the executive power in a single president, who directs the departments and agencies of the federal government. The unitary executive theory, correctly understood, holds that the president controls the executive branch. It does not hold that the president controls the government.

The distinction is constitutional. Congress appropriates funds. The president spends them. When the president declines to spend appropriated funds, he is not exercising executive power; he is exercising legislative power, the power of the purse, which Article I vests exclusively in Congress. The Impoundment Control Act of 1974 was enacted precisely to prevent this, after Nixon attempted the same maneuver. The law is clear. The question is whether clarity constrains.

THE LIBERAL ERROR

The progressive tendency is to object to executive overreach only when the executive belongs to the opposing party. The Obama administration's use of executive orders on immigration (DACA), the Biden administration's student loan forgiveness by executive action, both represented expansions of presidential power that progressives defended on policy grounds while conceding the constitutional point. The precedents they set are the precedents now being invoked.

THE CONSTITUTIONAL QUESTION

The impoundment question is the most consequential constitutional issue of 2025. If the courts permit the president to decline to spend appropriated funds at his discretion, the congressional power of the purse becomes advisory rather than mandatory. If the courts block impoundment, the president faces the choice between compliance and defiance, neither of which has a comfortable precedent.

The conservative constitutionalist must recognize an uncomfortable truth: the unitary executive theory, as currently practiced, bears the same relationship to the Founders' intent that the living Constitution bears to the original document. Both are theories of convenience that expand the power of the branch their proponents happen to control.

WHAT PRUDENCE REQUIRES

A constitutionalist must defend the separation of powers regardless of which party benefits from its violation. This requires opposing impoundment under Republican presidents with the same vigor as opposing executive amnesty under Democratic presidents. The number of elected officials who maintain this consistency can be counted without removing one's shoes.

SOURCES

• Constitution of the United States, Articles I and II
• Impoundment Control Act of 1974 (P.L. 93-344)
• Congressional Research Service, "Presidential Impoundment of Appropriated Funds" (2025)
• Nixon v. United States (impoundment precedents)

POLLERBULL SIGNAL

• What moves odds: Constitutional crises do not move polls. They move judicial nominations, which move legal precedent, which moves the structural boundaries of presidential power for decades.
• What would falsify this: If Congress reasserts its appropriations authority through legislation that both parties support, the separation of powers has proven self-correcting. Current evidence suggests it has not.