Trump’s $1.5T Defense Plan Forces Cuts Across Government
“We’re fighting wars. We can’t take care of day care,” Trump said. “It’s not possible for us to take care of day care, Medicaid, Medicare.”
President Donald Trump is asking Congress to approve a $1.5 trillion defense budget for 2027, the largest in U.S. history, while cutting domestic programs to help pay for it.
The proposal boosts military spending by roughly 42% to 44% and reduces non-defense spending by about 10%, cutting billions from housing, health care, and other domestic programs. The White House says the increase is tied to current conflicts, including the war in Iran, and would fund troop pay raises, shipbuilding, and missile defense systems.
Trump has been direct about the tradeoffs behind that approach, tying federal spending to what he sees as core responsibilities.
“We’re fighting wars. We can’t take care of day care,” Trump said at a White House event. “It’s not possible for us to take care of day care, Medicaid, Medicare.”
The administration says it is cutting what it calls “woke” and wasteful programs across multiple agencies, and those reductions stretch across a wide range of domestic priorities. The budget cuts low-income housing, heating assistance, refugee resettlement, and grants tied to renewable energy and public health, while scaling back or eliminating other programs that have received federal support in recent years.
At the same time, the plan increases funding for immigration enforcement, law enforcement, and aviation safety, while also directing money toward National Guard mobilizations in Washington, D.C., and other security-related efforts. The proposal also includes cuts to refugee resettlement, unaccompanied migrant children programs, and several public health accounts, reflecting a broader shift away from federal social spending.
Republicans backing the proposal point to rising threats from China, Russia, Iran, and other adversaries as justification for the increase, arguing that the U.S. must invest more heavily in military readiness.
“America is facing the most dangerous global environment since World War II,” said Sen. Roger Wicker and Rep. Mike Rogers.
Budget Director Russell Vought said Trump promised to reinvest in national security and ensure the country is protected “in a dangerous world,” while critics argue the cuts would fall hardest on programs tied to daily life, including housing, energy, and health care.
Congress will ultimately decide what survives, and lawmakers are expected to rewrite significant portions of the proposal as they negotiate spending bills in the months ahead. The debate is unfolding as the federal government continues to run large deficits and carry a national debt that has climbed past $39 trillion, adding pressure to decisions on both defense and domestic spending.
Congress can rewrite the details, but not the reality: fund the military at this level or keep the rest of the government intact.
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Comments
Here we go back to the 1960s—guns or butter. Voters will most likely pick butter like Europeans did.
Well, our government’s primary responsibility is to protect us.
People who want butter should pay for their own damn butter.
I fear that the butter-lovers will prevail, however, as you say.
They will prevail. People want their immediate needs and wants taken care of no matter what. That is the danger that comes with elections. The ‘butter’ side has the easy sale. Our enemies live for our elections since they don’t have to be bothered with them. The history of democracies reveals that the people are the greatest threat, especially when there are few politicians who will tell them ‘no’.
Why should I expect the government to buy me my butter?
It definitely doesn’t buy me my guns.
I know you remember the 1960s?
I prefer the guns myself. 🙂
This is bad
My hot take is that this isn’t the sort of thing you just throw out there when a heavily-contested midterm election is just around the corner.
The number one cause of inflation is the deficit, the government spending money it doesnt have. Either taxes go up, or that silent nefarious income tax, inflation, will self correct the economy.
Raising taxes is the last thing we need. Keynesian economics is way last century.
To combat inflation from the fiscal policy side you either raise taxes or cut spending. To combat inflation from the monetary policy side you raise interest rates.
All of those are unappealing to various entrenched and powerful constituencies.
The problem today is we have spending of $7 Trillion but only about $5 Trillion in revenue. That’s with an existing $38+ Trillion National Debt (just on the books not off balance sheet unfunded liabilities) which is costing us about $1.2 Trillion each year in interest costs with about $10 Trillion set to roll over this year. If the bondholders want their $ back instead of rolling the debt over we’re cooked.
My prediction is that when the new Fed Chair comes in were gonna see something similar to the immediate post WWII policies from the Fed where they basically worked to expand the ability of Treasury to spend while artificially lowering long term interest rates. Good for those who want to finance but very bad for Mom and Pop savers looking for safe but decent returns on savings accounts/CD and gov’t bonds. Plus the easy access to excess/cheap capital runs inflation very hot which is the whole point of the policy; to allow the Treasury to pay back bondholders with $ that are ‘worth less’ than they would be in a free market where actual price discovery for lending rates (interest rate) took place.
Pessimistic? Sure but I don’t see another realistic way out from under the debt load. Not with a looming cut in SSA benefits of 25% ish in 6 years. Not with a refusal to cut spending. No way the political class allows SSA to be cut, we gonna make up the shortfall from general Treasury accounts and borrow even more $ from our grandkids future and pay it back with highly inflated $.
There isn’t going to be a 25% cut in SSA benefits. They’ll raise the retirement age/earnings cap before that happens.
Nope. IMO what’s going to happen is moving funds from normal Treasury to SSA to cover the shortfall. Wouldn’t be the first time.
Raising the retirement age is gonna be a tough sell to Gen X and younger. All of us paid the current level of SSA/ Medicare taxes our entire adult working lives and already have had ‘our’ retirement age in teaser from 65 to 67.
You might get the earnings cap lifted but there’s already a cap on max benefits in addition to the massively progressive benefit structure. Taking the earnings cap higher turns it unquestionably socialist removing the fig leaf that there’s a meaningful connection between earnings, taxes and benefits. IOW that in isolation turns it into a welfare program.
Frankly I’d bet on something like a single universal benefit level being part of your proposed solutions.
Bottom line is Boomers are dying off at 10K each day. Younger generations by and large ain’t interested in more sacrifice to prop up Boomer wealth and lifestyles. That means any sacrifice is gonna have to be equally shared with equivalent economic pain distributed to Boomers drawing benefits v simply raising taxes on younger generations and telling them (once again) to ‘pay more, work longer’ to get less benefits than Boomers.
“”what’s going to happen is moving funds from normal Treasury to SSA to cover the shortfall.””
What’s been going on for the past century is exactly the opposite. The SS “trust fund” has always been a myth. Current retirees are being paid from the current SS income stream and the politicians have spent the rest and replaced with an IOU and that’s why the Boomer bulge is going to trash the system. Not enough “contributors” anymore. Plus, of course since the pols spent the excess taxes on everything else, some other programs will have to find other funding, i.e. through borrowing and raising the deficit/debt even more. Personally, I don’t see anything but a death spiral as entitlements and debt service eat so much of the income stream that there isn’t anything left for other needs like defense.
The federal government rakes in obscene amounts of tax money, annually.
All of our present, obscene ~$39 trillion indebtedness is the result of decades of Dhimmi-crats’ drunken sailor spending profligacy, combined with their stubborn refusal to reform and rein in Social Security and Medicaid/Medicare spending, as well as to rein in spending on the myriad other entitlement programs.
But, messaging-wise, the Dhimmi-crats will obviously take full advantage of this announcement, in advance of the congressional mid-term elections.
“See! That mean old Trump doesn’t care about Medicare and daycare!”
Voters in “blue” states, at least, will be sufficiently gullible to fall for this line of attack.
Because the people don’t know the purpose of their constitution which is to protect them from the created government.
“The proposal boosts military spending by roughly 42% to 44% and reduces non-defense spending by about 10%, cutting billions from housing, health care, and other domestic programs.”
The former is a core federal function; the latter is not.
The central issue in three words: Too much government.
That’s what makes communism so attractive to the takers. You don’t work, you still get paid. What we NEED is a return to a system where if you don’t work, (or if you don’t have a contributor in the family) you don’t eat. Can’t happen because the takers outnumber the workers and they all get to vote. Even the illegals, in some jurisdictions. So the government issues debt that sooner or later ends up owned by our enemies. Death spiral.
Of all the things listed above the only one I care about is medicare. I was forced to pay into and now I;m forced to use it. The least the feds can do is make it solvent and reduce the large number of hoops I and providers have to jump through which have to be driving up costs to everyone include the cost of administrating the program.
Do we need an increase of 40% in defense spending? I don’t know, There seems to be so much waste on how the money is spent.
The federal government should not be in the business of feeding people, housing people, resettling refugees, or paying for childcare. Full stop. Let private charity do that.
However, I did not vote for Trump to morph into GWBush’s foreign policy in order to slurp the military/industrial complex, so my kids and grandkids could go fight n die in some mideast craphole.
Generally agree. However the feds have been running such programs for quite some time now and there are whole generations who have lived with making use of these programs. Trump is really playing with fire suggesting we cut these programs to fund a war that was unpopular from day 1.. I honestly don’t have much hope of this passing. Not a single Dem will support this (except perhaps Fetterman) and there are too many Rhinos in Congress who just will not support this, viewing it as political suicide.
“Trump is really playing with fire suggesting we cut these programs to fund a war that was unpopular..” When he said that he just wrote the campaign adds for every D in the midterms and maybe beyond.
With all the fraud on Medicare
If we get a handle on that the cuts have to be minimal. I’m on Medicare too and they have definitely started to get tighter , apparently not so much in California where hospice people miraculously live
All welfare should be done on the state level anyways
Welfare should be done on the personal level… period. If you’re lazy (or “efficient”) you can delegate the decision making to a church or (non-governmental) community organization, but government employees should stay the hell out of the process.
Like this woman, who epitomizes the approach of direct charity. True, the consequences aren’t always what one would like, but they can’t help but hone your wisdom and future decision-making abilities… and furthermore, any negative consequences fall on the decision-maker and no one else.
Yep. On a personal level and in person beginning with Family taking care of Family members unable to care for/provide for themselves. It ain’t the role of Uncle Sugar to do it nor for Uncle Sugar to send the rest of us a bill for it. If you PO your Family, decided to divorce them, choose to become estranged from them… that’s a personal problem not a public one.
If we don’t accept any refugees (we’re full up) we won’t have any costs including personnel costs.
Maybe all this spending can be supported with a National Bake Sale?
The grim reality: we are broke
How about a telethon with Trump as MC. He can take over the labor day spot formerly occupied by Jerry Lewis. Vance can be his sidekick.
In the absence of zero-based budgeting, everyone understand the game. Start with what you spent last year. ask for 50% more, settle at 0nly a 25% increase and everyone thinks he has won.
25% is still ridiculously large for an increase. How about 3% over inflation.