How the Trump Budget Threatens the American People

The following article by Harry Stein and Gregg Gelzinis was posted on the Center for American Progress website May 26, 2017:

President Donald Trump’s budget¹ would do nothing to create jobs and would slash programs that help working families. Trump breaks his promise not to cut Social Security and Medicaid, threatening the livelihoods of millions of seniors, children, and people with disabilities. This budget poses a direct threat to Americans across the country, while rigging the system even more for the wealthiest Americans and biggest corporations.

How the Trump budget undermines economic security for working families¹⁰

• Cuts vital infrastructure investments, such as the Highway Trust Fund, by $95 billion over 10 years. This could eliminate more than 250,000 jobs by 2027. State breakdown available.
• Ends the Supporting Effective Instruction State Grants program, which could support the salaries of nearly 35,000 teachers nationwide. State breakdown available.
• Eliminates the Minority Business Development Agency, which helped create and retain almost 27,000 jobs in fiscal year 2015.
• Ends the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program, leaving some 6.7 million low-income families without help paying their utility bills.
• Eliminates the Weatherization Assistance Program, which upgrades roughly 40,000 homes each year to save households an average of $283 on their utility bills annually. State breakdown available.
• Freezes Pell Grants, raids the program’s surplus, and makes college less affordable. State breakdowns available.
• Eliminates subsidized student loans, which help more than 6 million undergraduate borrowers per year. This could increase costs for new borrowers by more than $5,200. Congressional district breakdown available.
• Cuts Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act programs, which could result in 571,000 workers losing job training, career development, and job search services. State breakdown available.
• Gives huge tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations at the expense of working families. For the same cost as President Trump’s estate tax repeal, for example, he could feed more than 6 million hungry seniors through Meals on Wheels.

The Trump budget’s attack on people with disabilities¹¹

• Breaks President Trump’s promise not to cut Social Security by slashing Social Security Disability Insurance and Supplemental Security Income by $72 billion over the next decade.
• Slashes affordable housing for people with disabilities by cutting the Section 811 program.
• Cuts roughly $1.4 trillion from federal Medicaid over 10 years when combined with the cuts in the American Health Care Act, which jeopardizes coverage for the more than 15 million people with disabilities who receive Medicaid.
• Cuts the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program by roughly 29 percent. By 2027, a cut of this size could eliminate nutrition assistance for nearly 3.5 million households that include someone with a disability. State and congressional district breakdowns available.
• Eliminates funding for the Limb Loss Resource Center, the Paralysis Resource Center, and even the Special Olympics education fund.

The Trump budget threatens the health and safety of American families¹²

• Breaks President Trump’s promise not to cut Medicaid. The Trump budget ends Medicaid as we know it and slashes federal Medicaid roughly in half by 2027, when it is currently projected to cover 87 million Americans.
• Provides tax giveaways for the wealthy as part of repealing the Affordable Care Act. Residents of New York County, where Trump lives, would get $2.2 billion annually. But the 977 counties that swung most heavily for Trump would receive a total of only $582 million annually.
• Reduces funding for the National Institutes of Health by more than $7 billion, including cutting roughly $1 billion for cancer research. State and congressional district breakdowns available.
• Cuts the Environmental Protection Agency’s budget by $2.6 billion, or 31.4 percent, which threatens clean air and water for all Americans.
• Blocks access to vital women’s health services by slashing all federal funding to Planned Parenthood.
• Reduces annual workplace safety inspections by 2,318 and specifically cuts funding for coal mine safety inspections by $6 million.
• Cuts the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program by roughly 29 percent. A cut of this magnitude could eliminate nutrition assistance for more than 8 million households by 2027. State and congressional district breakdowns available.
• Cuts the Public Housing Capital Fund by $1.27 billion, which could mean that 212,000 potentially unsafe homes may not get the repairs they need.

The Trump budget neglects basic protections and funds a deportation force instead¹³

• Supports a mass deportation agenda that would damage the economy and lower federal revenues by as much as $900 billion over a decade.
• Cuts funding for Violence Against Women Act programs that reach 7 million individuals and families every year.
• Eliminates nearly 10 percent of employees from critical civil rights offices, which could result in at least 3,226 uninvestigated civil rights abuses.
• Eliminates the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs by merging it with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, cutting a total of 390 full-time positions from both agencies. This could cost workers who are victims of discrimination millions in lost compensation.
• Cuts funding for the Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity, which could result in the agency failing to handle 225 complaints of housing discrimination per year.
• Eliminates the Legal Services Corporation, which could mean that almost 2 million low-income people would lose legal representation every year.

Harry Stein is the director of fiscal policy at the Center for American Progress. Gregg Gelzinis is a special assistant for the Economic Policy team at the Center.

Endnotes