The President-elect’s administration extremely evaluating the decision on not submitting a budget to Congress next year.
Despite the requirements by the Congressional Budget Act which requires that the President should submit the fiscal 2018 budget to Congress between the 2nd of January and the 6th of February, the President-elect could easily throw the ball to outgoing president Obama and state that it was his obligation to comply with the law before the new president is inaugurated into office on the 20th of January.
The move by the president-elect to avoid sending the budget to Congress might be unprecedented although it’s not illegal. This would be totally different from what has happened in the last 26 years after the Congressional Budget Act which took effect in the mid-1970s, ever since, all incoming presidents have submitted budgets.
The budgets or the amendments to the outgoing president’s final budgets were often submitted months after the February deadline which is on the first Monday of that month. The budgets were condensed versions of the usual presentation which contains numerous volumes. However, a financial plan that highlights the new president’s priorities was continually unleashed for over 4 periods.
The President-elect’s unwillingness to submit budget appears to be eccentric as it defies all his predecessors who according to long time federal budget watchers have always been eager to submit their budgets.
The submission of the budget is crucial as it serves as an opportunity for the president-elect’s plan to be seen and for the headline to trend for a week or longer as the budget’s details are released, analyzed, promoted at congressional hearings, and discussed in other forums.
This move by the president-elect triggers the question on why his administration may intend to gamble by not submitting the budget.
The main reason is that it would allow Mr. Trump to avoid the complaints and criticism from those the budget proposals would affect and hence render them powerless to criticize Mr. Trump’s administration.
