Murray, DeLauro File Amicus Brief with Appeals Court to Uphold Key Spending Transparency Website

Washington, D.C. - Late Monday, Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Senate Appropriations Committee Vice Chair, and Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-03), House Appropriations Committee Ranking Member, filed an amicus brief in support of ongoing litigation before the D.C. Circuit Court over the Trump administration's illegal attempts to take down a statutorily-required spending transparency website that makes public the Office of Management and Budget's (OMB) apportionments.

In March 2025, OMB Director Russ Vought illegally took the website down in an effort to keep the public in the dark about how the administration is allocating taxpayer dollars. In April 2025, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) and Protect Democracy sued. In July, the D.C. District Court ruled the website must be restored, and in August, the D.C. Circuit Court denied the Trump administration's request for a stay. Murray and DeLauro's amicus brief urges the D.C. Circuit Court to uphold the district court's ruling.

"Should OMB be allowed to ignore its legal obligations and dismantle the apportionments database, Congress will suffer a wide range of harm to its ability to fulfill its constitutional mandates," Murray and DeLauro write in the brief. "Without access to apportionment data, Congress cannot effectively determine whether OMB is exceeding its statutory authority when doling out appropriations to the federal agencies in real time. Congress's ability to determine whether to initiate oversight hearings in response to any problematic or unlawful apportionment actions is impaired, as is its ability to determine whether and how to develop and advance legislative responses to prevent harms to programs or constituents if a problematic or unlawful apportionment prevents the dispersal of funding. Congress needs apportionment data to determine how much new funding to appropriate, how much previously appropriated funding to rescind, and how to evaluate the balance between the two. And Congress has repeatedly, vociferously, and on a bipartisan basis, sought to vindicate its interests in obtaining this information."

"In short, allowing the Executive Branch to circumvent the legal requirements of the FY 2022 and 2023 Acts [which require the website] would directly harm Congress's ability to perform its two constitutional functions: legislation and oversight. Congress's passage of the FY 2022 and 2023 Acts was a direct response to a long history of Executive efforts to upend the constitutionally allocated separation of powers by abusing the apportionment process. Relieving OMB of its obligations to follow the law will directly undermine Congress's lawmaking authority, limit its effectiveness as a co-equal branch of government, and partially remove control over the purse strings from the branch of government most directly accountable to the American people," write Murray and DeLauro. "For the foregoing reasons, the decision below should be affirmed."

Read the full amicus brief HERE.

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