Trump To Demand Big Domestic Budget Cuts
Trump to demand tough budget cuts for domestic programs. Politico: "President Donald Trump is expected to renew his call for drastic reductions to nondefense programs in rolling out his budget request Monday, even with hundreds of billions in new cash at hand. While Congress busted strict spending caps last week — allowing for an extra $300 billion to be spent over the next two years — the Trump administration is still urging severe austerity for some arms of the federal government. Trump’s budget will lay out 'an aggressive set of spending reforms' to reduce the deficit by $3 trillion over a decade, according to a preview released by the White House on Sunday."
Budget Includes $23B For Immigration Enforcement
Trump's budget to request border wall funding. The Hill: "The budget request that President Trump is releasing Monday will propose more than $23 billion for border security and immigration enforcement — including funds for a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, the White House said Sunday. The request on border security comes as the Senate is about to start a free-wheeling debate on immigration. Congress has until March 5 to provide a legislative solution that helps people who came to the U.S. illegally when they were children and have benefited from the Obama administration's Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program... Congress last week approved legislation to increase budget caps by about $300 billion for fiscal 2018 and 2019. In light of this budget deal, the administration is proposing an investment of $18 billion in that time period to construct a border wall, the White House said. The White House also said it will request $782 million to hire 2,750 additional law-enforcement officers and agents at the U.S. Customs and Border Protection and Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The administration is also requesting $2.7 billion to pay for ICE to have an average of 52,000 illegal aliens a day in detention — the highest-ever level for the agency."
Budget Deal Abandons Goal Of Ending Deficit
New Trump budget will give up on longtime Republican goal of eliminating deficit. WaPo: "Trump on Monday will offer a budget plan that falls far short of eliminating the government’s deficit over 10 years, conceding that huge tax cuts and new spending increases make this goal unattainable, three people familiar with the proposal said. Eliminating the budget deficit over 10 years has been a North Star for the Republican Party for several decades, and GOP lawmakers took the government to the brink of default in 2011 when they demanded a vote on a amendment to the Constitution that would prohibit the federal government from spending more than it takes in."
Family First Act Upends Child Welfare Funding
While everybody slept, Congress did something extraordinary for vulnerable children. The Intercept: "Tucked quietly into the most recent congressional measure to keep the government open was the most sweeping and ambitious piece of child welfare legislation passed in at least a decade. It’s an attempt to reshape the entrenched foster care system as a raging opioid epidemic swells the population of children in need. The measure overcame the opposition of group homes, which pocket thousands of dollars per month for each child warehoused in their custody. The Family First Prevention Services Act upends the funding structure for the child welfare system by allowing states to use federal matching funds for programs addressing mental health, substance abuse, family counseling, and parent skills training — to keep at-risk children from entering the foster care system in the first place."
More from OurFuture.org:
The Real Reason Workers Can’t Get A Raise. Robert Borosage: "Beneath the recent stock-market gyrations, the mechanics that shackle average workers' wages have been exposed - not in the White House or Congress, but in the supposedly apolitical operations of the Federal Reserve."
SF Rising Steps Up to Make College For All a Reality. Celi Tamayo-Lee: "Education holds the key to a brighter future for us all. In San Francisco, we made College For All a reality, and now we want to make it real for everyone in our state. How do we get there? One heart, one mind, and one signature at a time."
