Judge Affirms 'Americans Have a Right to Know How Taxpayer Money Is Being Spent'

Advocacy groups that sued U.S. President Donald Trump's administration this spring for taking offline a legally mandated website that details federal spending celebrated on Monday after a federal judge ordered the restoration of the Public Apportionments Database.

"The law is clear that the federal government must make its appropriations decisions public," said Adina Rosenbaum, Public Citizen Litigation Group attorney and counsel on the case, in a statement. "So this case turned on a straightforward point: The administration must follow the law."

The nonprofit Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, represented by CREW lawyers and the Public Citizen Litigation Group, sued the Office of Management and Budget and OMB Director Russell Vought in April for taking down the database the previous month. That suit and another from the Protect Democracy Project were filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

Responding to both on Monday, U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan—nominated to the federal bench by former President Bill Clinton after being appointed to D.C. courts by Republicans—ordered the Trump administration to restore the database.

Sullivan's 60-page opinion begins by noting that under the U.S. Constitution, Congress decides how American taxpayer dollars are spent, and the executive branch allocates funding according to congressional instructions—and in 2022, Congress passed and the president signed a law requiring the executive branch to launch the publicly available database.

"Defendants argue that this public disclosure law is an unconstitutional encroachment on the executive branch's decision-making authority," the judge detailed. "Relying on an extravagant and unsupported theory of presidential power, defendants claim that their apportionment decisions—which are legally binding and result in the actual spending of public funds—cannot be publicly disclosed because they are not final decisions about how to administer the spending of public funds."

"However, the law is clear: Congress has sweeping authority to require public disclosure of how the executive branch is apportioning the funds appropriated by Congress," he wrote. "Under the law, the decision of the executive branch must be made public within two days of the decision. And if defendants need to make a new decision, that new decision must also be made public within two days."

"Plaintiffs in this lawsuit monitor these decisions, and they have the right to report on and republish this information," he added. "There is nothing unconstitutional about Congress requiring the executive branch to inform the public of how it is apportioning the public's money. Defendants are therefore required to stop violating the law!"

Nikhel Sus, deputy chief counsel at CREW, said Monday that "we applaud the court's thorough and well-reasoned decision, which reaffirms Congress' constitutional authority to require public disclosure of how taxpayer dollars are spent."

"Americans have a right to know how taxpayer money is being spent," Sus stressed. "Ensuring public access to this information serves as a critical check on the executive branch's abuse and misuse of federal funds."

Cerin Lindgrensavage, counsel for Protect Democracy, also welcomed the decision, which she said "makes clear that the executive branch cannot simply ignore appropriations laws they disagree with on policy grounds, no matter what President Trump or OMB Director Russell Vought thinks."

"Congress passed a law making sure the American public could see how their taxpayer dollars are being spent," she added, "and we will continue to hold the administration accountable for making good on that promise."

Sullivan paused his decision to give the Trump administration a few days to decide whether to appeal. Either way, his order is a blow to the president's ongoing effort to gut the federal government in secret.