“There is actually a law called the anti-deficiency act that stipulates that the Executive Branch must spend the amount of money allocated by Congress to a particular agency,” Sarah observes. “So you can’t just not spend the money, at least according to the statute.” I don’t think this would constrain Trump and his allies. Elon in particular is going to want to head down this road. His WSJ op-ed with Vivek lays out a clear plan to shrink the workforce by reducing the number of regulations they are responsible for. In a battle between Elon and the bureaucracy, I’d bet on Elon. I’d be very concerned if I was a rank-and-file federal employee.