Trump unveils spending plan
PRESIDENT Donald Trump proposed drastic cuts in spending on the arts, science, foreign aid and environmental protection yesterday, in a security-focused budget blueprint that could struggle to pass Congress.
Translating campaign promises into dollar-and-cent commitments, the Republican leader proposed scrapping dozens of programs like public broadcasting and climate funding, while boosting Pentagon spending by $52 billion.
Trump, in the preface to the proposal, described it as “a budget that puts America first”, and that makes safety and security the “number one priority – because without safety, there can be no prosperity”.
The State Department and the Environmental Protection Agency would be the biggest losers, seeing their funding reduced by around a third.
That could be a harbinger of steep reductions in foreign aid and funding to UN agencies, with knock-on effects around the world.
The national endowments for the arts and humanities would be scrapped and funding for the National Institutes of Health – a biomedical research facility – would be cut by almost $6 billion.
“This is a hard-power bud- get, it is not a soft-power budget” said White House budget chief Mick Mulvaney.
The former congressman said he trawled through Trump’s campaign speeches for inspiration.
The Pentagon would be the major winner if Trump’s proposed spending priorities go through, with a nearly 10 percent boost – which would create a defence budget already bigger than that of the next seven nations combined.
Separately, around $4 billion will be earmarked this year and next to start building a wall along America’s border with Mexico.
Trump has repeatedly claimed that Mexico will pay for the wall – which will cost at least $15 billion, according to estimates by Bernstein Research, a consulting firm.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, in Tokyo, said he would willingly accept Trump’s challenge to tighten the budget.
“Clearly the level of spending that the State Department has been undertaking is unsustainable,” Tillerson said. “We are going to be able to do a lot with fewer dollars,” he said.
Trump’s broad-brush proposal covers only a small fraction of the $3.8 trillion federal budget – which is dominated by health care, pension and other baked-in costs.
The text will be heavily revised and fleshed out by Congress, before a full budget is released around May.
In that sense, the plan is as much a political statement as a fiscal outline, a fact not lost on the White House.
The budget is a signal to Trump’s supporters that he is a “man of action” and not a “typical politician”.
Trump is looking to rally his base amid multiple controversies including his Twitter outbursts, Russian meddling in the election that brought him to power and a simmering rift with Congressional Republicans over health care reform.
According to Gallup, Trump has approval ratings of 40 percent, a low for any modern president weeks into his tenure. But security has been a major vote winner. An Economist/ YouGov poll found that 51 percent of Republicans believe the US will be safer from terrorism at the end of his term.
Diplomats and some former defence officials have already warned that less spending on areas like democracy promotion and humanitarian aid will spell more trouble down the road. The Environmental Protection Agency, which helps monitor air, water and other standards, would also see significant cuts. That is in keeping with Trump’s promise to gut regulation.
Trump’s top adviser Steve Bannon has promised a broader “deconstruction of the administrative state”.