^{Slowly at first, then all at once.}

In 2023, I predicted that WIFIA’s mandatory appropriations for interest rate re-estimates would amount to about $2 billion if half the portfolio was drawn at 20Y UST rates around 4%.

Well, that seems to be happening — from the WH FY 2026 Budget Technical Appendix:

About $1.6 billion for FY2024-FY2025, combined with about $400 million FY2022-FY2023, results in the predicted $2 billion. But wait — there’s more. Depending on rates and the timing of disbursements, I estimate another $600 million is on the way in the next year or so, notwithstanding the budget’s agnosticism. The total economic cost could be close to $3 billion.

Of course, this is a highly technical, off-budget item. But it is still a real cost to taxpayers.

In prior years, it was easier to ignore. But now the numbers seem to scream off the page for anyone who cares to look. And that’s the problem — the Project 2025 radicals in Vought’s OMB might care, and they’re looking at all the details of federal loan programs, as the WH FY2026 Budget shows. The narrative effectiveness of these Solyndra-scale numbers, technical as they are, should not be underestimated in a volatile political and ideological context.

I can’t help but see WIFIA’s mandatory appropriations as a kind of time-bomb buried in the depths of the budget, just waiting to be activated to assist a program-wrecking agenda. Will someone — in Vought’s OMB or elsewhere — set the timer going? That I don’t know. But I think it’s worth keeping a close watch on any hint that WIFIA’s mandatory appropriation numbers might be surfacing as an issue. There are counter-narratives, but they would need to be developed and disseminated before the full blast hits. I’ll keep the whole story (or non-story, if the bomb simply remains buried) summarized on this new page: WIFIA Mandatory Spending