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Trump Budget Tag

While everyone is gushing over Oprah Winfrey, the Democrats in D.C. can hide the fact that they're holding the spending bill hostage over the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival (DACA) program. Before Christmas, Congress passed a short term spending bill to keep the government running until January 19. The Democrats have made it clear they want full legalization of DACA recipients while Republicans have mentioned a wall and actual reforms to our immigration system.

I've been keeping an eye on tax reform and ideas to make changes to 401(k) retirement funds have caught my eye. At first, tax writers wanted to tax your earnings before you place money in the fund. Then over the weekend they floated the idea of changing the pre-tax limit to $2,400 instead of $18,000. Of course this has caused an uproar, which led President Donald Trump to tweet out on Monday that tax reform will not include changes to your 401(k). House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady (R-TX) has said not so fast and the option remains on the table.

Last month, I blogged how Congress floated around making changes to 401(k) retirement plans in order to make up for lost "revenue" due to tax cuts. That change was taxing the earnings before a person places money into the fund. Another idea has come up and it's even worse. Now they are thinking about changing the pre-tax limit to $2,400 instead of $18,000. That's an 87% change and could force people to put even less into their retirement. It also adds fuel to Sen. Rand Paul's (R-KY) opposition to the Senate budget bill that passed, which allows a clearer path to tax reform, but didn't cut spending enough. Common sense tells us that he is correct.

The rush to promote the idea of sanctuary cities was one of the left's first reactions to Trump's election victory last fall. Democrats, who pushed the expansion of executive power for eight years under Obama, suddenly liked the idea of local control. Trump's new budget takes aim at sanctuary cities and would put them in a tricky spot. Andrea Noble reports at the Washington Times:
Trump budget would force sanctuary cities to comply with immigration laws A day after Attorney General Jeff Sessions issued guidance that narrowly defined a “sanctuary city,” the Justice Department is attempting to broaden its authority to compel such jurisdictions to cooperate with immigration authorities.

Sunday night, Congress reached a budget deal that funds the federal government through the end September which is also the end of the fiscal year. The budget, which has a pricetag of over $1 trillion (approximately $700 million per page), is being touted as a bipartisan effort though conservatives are less than thrilled.

The internet exploded this week with the "news" that President Trump's budget proposal included cutting and/or completely eliminating the Meals on Wheels program.  The headlines were outrageous clickbait that had little to do with the actual budget proposal. For example, New York Magazine has an article entitled, "White House Says Cutting Meals on Wheels is 'Compassionate'," Rolling Stone has one entitled "Meals on Wheels Seniors Respond to Trump: Cut Something Else," the BBC writes that "Meals on Wheels cut back prompts backlash," and Slate declares that "Trump's budget director says Meals on Wheels sounds great but doesn't work." The problem with these and the many other such headlines is that Trump is not cutting, and is certainly not eliminating, Meals on Wheels.