I was searching for how the Vice President's Office was described in the federal budget (yes, it's under the appropriation for the Executive Office of the President), but I found something even more interesting. There was an unusual provision included in the 2006 realignment of the federal appropriations structure and repeated in the FY 2007 budget - a clause that might give the Vice President access to $15,000,000 of our tax money to "respond to changing national needs and priorities":
2006 Administration-requested financial restructuring initiative
Extend the general provision for limited transfer authority ... to provide for a 10-percent transfer authority among all of the following accounts: The White House, Special Assistance to the President and Official Residence of the Vice President, Office of Management and Budget, United States Trade Representative, Office of National Drug Control Policy, Council on Environmental Quality, and Office of Science and Technology Policy. Transfers from the Special Assistance to the President and the Official Residence of the Vice President account are subject to the approval of the Vice President.
You can find the full text of the change in
FY 2006 Budget Change and the language the Vice President is currently operating under in FY 2007 Federal Budget for the Executive Office of the White House.
The change was described in 2006 as follows:
This initiative provides enhanced flexibility in allocating resources and staff in support of the President and the Vice President, and permits more rapid response to changing national needs and priorities.
As I understand it, this law allows redistribution of 10% of the total funds appropriated to within any of six budget accounts (dollar figures below are the appropriations for FY 2007):
• Special Assistance to the President and the Official Residence of the Vice President = $4M
• Office of Management and Budget = $76M
• United States Trade Representative = $42M
• Office of National Drug Control Policy = $23M
• Council on Environmental Quality = $3M
• Office of Science and Technology Policy = $5M
These six budget accounts total $153M , meaning that 10% (or $15,300,000) can be redistributed freely among any of these accounts. One possibility is that $15.3M could be transferred to the account for "Special Assistance to the President and the Official Residence of the Vice President", an account which has the special provision that "transfers from the Special Assistance to the President and the Official Residence of the Vice President account are subject to the approval of the Vice President." Perhaps that's benign - the Vice President just wishes to have legislative authority to make sure that no one takes away the funds for roof repairs in the Vice Presidential residence. But if there are not controls on how the funds from this appropriation are spent, the Vice President could have a slush fund of up to $15,000,000 to spend.
Can anyone else shed more light on these funds? It's hard to believe that this is hiding in plain sight, but given some other things we have seen coming out of the White House I can not reject that possibility without some further information.