The President's Budget as a Source of Agency Policy Control

摘要

This Article began with the observation from Paul O'Neill, former deputy director of OMB, that policy debates are "reflected, recorded, and battled over" in budget numbers and that "the numbers are the keys to the doors of everything."79 By identifying and elucidating the levers OMB has at its disposal to control agency policymaking through the President's budget process, I have sought to show that this observation is correct. It is through the budget that OMB finds itself "in the stream of every policy decision made by the federal government."80 While OIRA's control of agency policymaking through regulatory review is important, it is only one mechanism through which OMB may exercise policymaking authority over federal agencies.