Congress’ Zombie Apocalypse: $516 Billion in Undead Spending

By Charlton Allen

Washington, DC, has long been the stage for ghoulish fiscal horror, but a recent report by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) shows just how dire the unchecked spending situation has become. The report, titled “Expired and Expiring Authorizations of Appropriations for Fiscal Year 2024,” reveals a staggering $516 billion in appropriations tied to expired authorizations – programs legally dead but still consuming resources and dragging taxpayers along as unwilling victims.

Nearly two-thirds of this $516 billion – $320 billion, to be precise – funds programs whose authorizations expired more than a decade ago. According to the CBO, 49% of the acts tied to this funding have been expired for over ten years. These aren’t harmless oversights. As investigative journalist Jeremy Portnoy put it, they’re fiscal zombies – rotting relics of bad governance.

Where Do the Zombies Feast?

The real horror isn’t just the expired authorizations; it’s what happens to the money. Once appropriated, these funds vanish into the shadowy executive branch labyrinth, where often they’re repurposed – Washington’s favorite euphemism, meaning the money is redirected without oversight.

Under the Biden-Harris administration, were these funds quietly returned to the Treasury or did they go to padding bureaucratic budgets, bloated climate initiatives, or ideological experiments disguised as “equity” programs? It’s as if zombies were handed a blank check and invited to snack freely on taxpayer dollars, while Congress refused to ask what’s on the menu.

Let’s not let Congress off the hook, either. The undead appropriations shuffle along because lawmakers lack the courage to kill them. Sunsetting expired authorizations would require Congress to do something radical: read bills, conduct audits, and make tough decisions. But in Washington, punting the problem down the road is always easier than risking political fallout by cutting even the most absurd programs.

The result? A full-blown zombie infestation. The CBO report shows that $516 billion in appropriations is tied to expired laws from 177 statutes, with nearly $470 billion coming from just 24 of those laws. These aren’t stray ghouls – they’re ravenous hordes devouring fiscal resources while Congress looks the other way.

Where’s DOGE When You Need It?

Enter the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), promising to turn this undead mess into a cautionary tale of accountability. As envisioned by Donald Trump’s incoming administration, DOGE is to be led by two titans of disruption: Elon Musk, the efficiency-obsessed engineer, and Vivek Ramaswamy, a relentless critic of bureaucratic bloat. Together, they’d form a budgetary wrecking crew, poised to take on Washington’s fiscal zombies.

DOGE plans not to just audit programs - but to annihilate inefficiency. The apparently simple mission is: no authorization, no funding.

If Congress refuses to renew an expired program, DOGE will step in to sever the funding and bury the zombie once and for all. For taxpayers, DOGE isn’t just a new agency – it’s the lean, mean, zombie-slaying machine we’ve been waiting for, ready to send expired programs to their long-overdue final resting place.

Cut the Spending, Bury the Zombies

Here is the harsh truth: America is $36 trillion in debt, and Congress keeps letting zombies feast. To grasp the scale of $36 trillion in national debt, imagine 36 trillion coffins lined up end to end. The line would stretch far enough to make nearly 94,000 round trips to the Moon and back – a chilling reminder of just how far into the fiscal abyss we've gone. Every dollar wasted on expired authorizations is a dollar that could fund national priorities, pay down the debt, or – radical idea – not be spent at all.

DOGE offers a bold solution, but Congress doesn’t need a new agency to act. Lawmakers could end this fiscal nightmare tomorrow by passing automatic sunset provisions for authorizations, requiring regular audits, and banning appropriations for programs without explicit reauthorization. These aren’t revolutionary ideas – they’re basic governance.

Sure, it’s fun to mock Washington’s fiscal absurdities. But the joke stops being funny when the punchline is bankruptcy.

By Charlton Allen

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Charlton Allen is an attorney, writer, and former public official with a proven track record of creating efficiencies, streamlining processes, and saving taxpayers money. He is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of The American Salient, where he examines conservative principles and the challenges of modern governance.