Agency-by-agency look at Trump’s budget

By The Associated Press

How President Donald Trump’s proposed $4.1 trillion federal spending plan would affect individual government agencies.

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AGRICULTURE

Up or down? Down 5 per cent

Highlight: The proposed budget would limit subsidies to farmers, including a cut in government help for purchasing crop insurance. Crop insurance is an overwhelmingly popular program with farm-state senators in both parties, and previous farm bills have only increased spending. The budget would also limit spending on environmentally friendly conservation programs and some rural development dollars that help small towns build infrastructure.

Trump isn’t the first president to try to limit farm subsidies. Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush also proposed major reductions, but farm-state lawmakers have always kept them going. The Republican chairmen of the Senate and House agriculture committees both said Tuesday they oppose Trump’s proposed cuts.

Total spending: $132.3 billion.

Spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $18 billion.

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COMMERCE

Up or down? Down 15.4 per cent

Highlight: The budget would eliminate three economic development agencies and several grant programs aimed at preserving the environment and dealing with climate change. The Minority Business Development Agency, the Economic Development Administration and the Manufacturing Extension Partnership would be eliminated.

The budget would also eliminate several grant programs run by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration: the Sea Grant, the National Estuarine Research Reserve System, Coastal Zone Management Grants, the Office of Education and the Pacific Coastal Salmon Recovery Fund.

Total spending: $8 billion.

Spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $7.8 billion.

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Defence

Up or down? Up 3.3 per cent

Highlight: The Pentagon’s proposed 2018 budget would fund increases of almost 43,000 in the size of the active duty military and 13,000 in the Reserves. It provides troops a 2.1 per cent pay raise, adds F/A-18 fighter jets and seeks a new round of base closures, which Congress routinely rejects. It also increases the amount of money used for training Afghan forces and conducting counterterror operations in Afghanistan. The budget includes $64.6 billion for military operations in Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan and Africa.

Total spending: $647 billion.

Spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $639.1 billion.

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EDUCATION

Up or down? Down 46.9 per cent

Highlight: Eliminates after-school and teacher training programs, ends subsidized federal student loans and loan forgiveness programs for public servants, funds year-round Pell grants and expands funding for school choice for low-income students.

Total spending: $61 billion

Spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $59 billion

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ENERGY

Up or Down? Down 5.7 per cent

Highlight: Trump’s budget would sell off nearly half the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve, 270 million barrels, over the next 10 years as a way to reduce the budget deficit. The reserve is an emergency fuel storage maintained underground in Louisiana and Texas. Budget director Mick Mulvaney said the sale would not cause a security risk because of an increase in oil production from fracking. The administration says the plan would bring in a projected $17 billion over 10 years.

The budget also would hike spending for the National Nuclear Security Administration, which is responsible for maintaining the nuclear stockpile, while cutting other energy spending. The budget seeks $120 million to revive the mothballed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository, which is hugely unpopular in Nevada and was largely stopped by the efforts of former Democratic Sen. Harry Reid.

Total spending: $28 billion

Spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $28 billion

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ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY

Up or down? Down 31 per cent.

Highlight: The budget cuts EPA by nearly one-third, eliminating more than 3,800 jobs while imposing dramatic cuts to clean air and water programs. Adjusted for inflation, the proposed budget would represent the nation’s lowest funding for environmental protection since the mid-1970s. The Superfund pollution cleanup program would be cut by $330 million, to $762 million.

Total spending: $5.7 billion.

Spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $5.7 billion.

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HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

Up or down? Down 1.3 per cent

Highlight: The budget initiates deep cuts to health insurance programs for people with modest incomes, including coverage for children. Those cuts would go beyond the House GOP bill that repeals much of the Affordable Care Act, also known as “Obamacare,” and limits future federal financing for Medicaid.

Total spending: $1.1 trillion

Spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $65.3 billion

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HOMELAND SECURITY

Up or down? Down 3.2 per cent

Highlight: The budget asks Congress for $2.6 billion for border security that would include a down payment for Trump’s long-promised wall and increased technology along the U.S.-Mexican border. The budget calls for $314 million to hire 500 new Border Patrol agents and 1,000 agents for Immigration and Customs Enforcement. It also requests a $1.5 billion increase for ICE to arrest, detain and deport immigrants in the country illegally. The plan also proposes cutting about $667 million in grants administered by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. That includes proposed cuts to the Urban Area Security Initiative and eliminating the Transportation Security Administration’s law enforcement grants.

Total spending: $49.4 billion

Spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $44.1 billion

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HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT

Up or down? Down 22.9 per cent

Highlight: The budget would eliminate HUD’s Community Development Block Grant program, a $3 billion effort that funds local improvement projects, affordable housing construction and other social supports like meals for seniors and enrichment programs for low-income children. The budget proposal says the program is not well targeted to poor populations and hasn’t showed measurable impact on communities. The administration’s budget also seeks to cut costs to the department’s rental assistance programs — a $2 billion decrease to $35.2 billion. Rental assistance programs comprise about 80 per cent of the agency’s total funding.

Total spending: $40 billion.

Estimated spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $40 billion.

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INTERIOR

Up or Down? Down 9.2 per cent

Highlight: The budget calls for opening Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas drilling, where it is now prohibited, while eliminating offshore oil revenues used by Gulf Coast states to restore disappearing shorelines. Arctic drilling, a contentious issue that would require congressional approval, would generate an estimated $400 million a year in tax revenues by 2022, according to the White House. Elimination of revenue-sharing to the four Gulf Coast states — Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas — would generate $1.6 billion over the next five years, the document says. The proposal also includes money for seismic surveys to provide data for possible offshore drilling in the Atlantic Ocean where it is now barred.

The budget would cut $10 million from a program to manage wild horses and burros in the West and allow the Bureau of Land Management to sell or euthanize thousands of horses that now roam in Nevada, Oregon and other western states. More than 70,000 wild horses and burros roam federal lands across the West, a number that officials call unsustainable.

Total spending: $12.5 billion

Spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $11.7 billion

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JUSTICE

Up or down? Down 19.1 per cent

Highlight: The budget adds $26 million for 300 new assistant U.S. attorneys to fight gangs, violent crime and illegal immigration. Attorney General Jeff Sessions has identified those areas as his top priorities. The plan calls for 230 of these prosecutors to be stationed in yet-to-be-named cities deemed hot spots for violence.

Another 70 will be assigned to border states, focusing on those who enter and re-enter the country illegally after deportation, as well as document-fraud, human smuggling, drug trafficking and other immigration-related offences.

Total spending: $31.6 billion.

Spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $27.7 billion

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Labour

Up or down? Down 3.3 per cent.

Highlight: Trump is proposing cuts in job training programs including $434 million for the Senior Community Service Employment Program, $238 million by closing Job Corps centres, and $68 million for the Bureau of International Labor Affairs. He is proposing $90 million for apprenticeships that result in jobs and a parental leave program of six weeks.

Total spending: $45.8 billion.

Spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $9.7 billion

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NASA

Up or down? Down 1.2 per cent

Highlight: The budget cancels five planned missions to observe Earth and monitor climate change, saving $191 million. It eliminates an Obama-era mission to send astronauts to an asteroid. It also slashes NASA education spending by two-thirds and makes smaller cuts to exploration and space operations, along with increases in spending to explore other planets.

Total spending: $19.1 billion.

Spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $19.1 billion

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STATE

Up or down? Down 31.7 per cent

Highlight: Eliminates funding for the U.N. children’s agency, UNICEF, as part of a $780 million cut to international organizations. Also eliminates $1.6 billion in funding for climate change and slashes assistance for refugees and global health. That includes $222 million cut in an international fund for fighting AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. Proposal also ends $523 million for international family planning programs.

Total spending: $40.2 billion.

Spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $40.2 billion, includes $12 billion from the Overseas Contingency Account.

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TRANSPORTATION

Up or down? Down 2.2 per cent.

Highlight: Trump proposes that the government pay $200 billion toward the $1 trillion cost of improving the nation’s infrastructure — rebuilding aging roads, bridges, water systems and more. Private investments would pay the rest, under his plan. He’s also suggesting cutting grants to Amtrak long distance services by $630 million and reducing the Highway Trust Fund by $95 billion over a decade.

Total spending: $75.7 billion

Spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $16.2 billion

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TREASURY

Up or down? Up 6.7 per cent

Highlight: Treasury oversees the Internal Revenue Service and the agency responsible for managing the government’s payment systems. The IRS would see a 2.1 per cent budget cut, but says it will continue to seek less costly ways of delivering taxpayer services. Trump’s budget would provide increased investment for cybersecurity as well as implementing the sanctions program to combat terrorist financing. The budget would also seek initial funding to replace the aging Washington facility for the Bureau of Engraving and Printing that produces the nation’s paper currency.

Total spending: $601 billion

Spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $12.1 billion

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VETERANS AFFAIRS

Up or down? Up 3.7 per cent

Highlight: The budget proposes a $4.3 billion increase in discretionary spending, mostly to pay for medical care at more than 1,200 VA facilities nationwide serving about 9 million enrolled veterans. That’s a 5.8 per cent increase as the Department of Veterans Affairs expands its network to include more private health providers. The budget also calls for $2.9 billion in mandatory budget authority for 2018 and $3.5 billion in 2019 to pay for expansion of the Veterans Choice private-sector program. To help pay for rising costs from that program, the VA would cap the amount of educational benefits veterans receive under the GI bill to roughly $21,000 a year and halt “individual unemployability” benefit payments to out-of-work disabled veterans once they reach retirement age.

Total spending: $183.1 billion

Spending that needs Congress’ annual approval: $78.8 billion

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