The General Accounting Office has released a report on the CAPPSII airline-profiling system that is so damning, the head of the program resigned before the report shipped.
The Supreme Court decided in Bowsher v. Synar that the GAO is part of the legislative branch, not the executive,1 and therefore Presidents and their legal advisors consistently maintain that the GAO can have no role in executing the laws. That conclusion follows naturally from the earlier Chadha decision, which held that the only way in which the legislative branch may affect the legal rights duties or responsibilities of persons outside the legislative branch is by legislation—passage in both houses (bicameralism) followed by presentment of the act to the President (presentment) for signature or veto (which can then be overridden).2
In light of these very clear precedents, the White House announced at the time GW Bush signed the Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act of 2004 that it would treat the report as advisory only. This is a reasonable legal position, and probably the one a court would adopt, although one could also argue that the favorable report requirement can't be severed from the appropriation and that therefore the unconstitutionality of the one implies the invalidity of the other.
(Thanks, Pat!)
