Trump budget to cut
Medicaid, food stamps, put 'taxpayer first,' officials say, by Samuel Chamberlain,
5/22/17 Fox News
President Trump is calling for major
cuts to Medicaid and food stamps -- alongside increases for national and border
security -- as part of what administration officials call a
"taxpayer-first budget" set to be released Tuesday.
White House budget director Mick
Mulvaney drew up the blueprint, which he said would balance the budget by
2027. "This is the first time that an
administration has written a budget through the perspective of the people
paying the taxes," Mulvaney told reporters Monday night.
The White House plan leaves Social
Security and Medicare untouched, but calls for $800 billion in cuts to Medicaid
and a $193 billion reduction in food stamps over the next ten years.
"We are no longer going to measure
compassion by the number of people on those programs. We're going to measure
compassion by how many people we can get off those programs," said
Mulvaney, who added that there would be a work requirement for some Americans
to continue receiving food stamps.
"If you're on food stamps and
you're able-bodied, then we need you to go to work," Mulvaney said.
The budget blueprint also provides $2.6
billion for border security, including $1.6 billion for the construction of a
wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, one of Trump's cornerstone campaign
promises. The remaining $1 billion will be used to bolster exiting border
defenses by hiring new agents and upgrading equipment used to track illegal
crossings.
Mulvaney will present the budget to
lawmakers on Tuesday and testify before House and Senate committees later this
week. The fleshed-out proposal follows up on a partial release in March that
targeted the budgets of domestic agencies and foreign aid for cuts averaging 10
percent.
Fox News' Kristin
Fisher and Fox Business Network's Adam Shapiro contributed to this report.
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