US Senate passes aid, public broadcasting cuts in victory for Trump

WASHINGTON – The US Senate has approved President Donald Trump’s plan for billions of dollars in cuts to funding for foreign aid and public broadcasting, handing the Republican President another victory as he exerts control over Congress with little opposition.

The Senate voted 51 to 48 in favour of

Mr Trump’s request to cut US$9 billion (S$11.58 billion) in spending

already approved by Congress.

Most of the cuts are to programmes to assist countries suffering from disease, war and natural disasters, but the plan also eliminates all US$1.1 billion the Corporation for Public Broadcasting was due to receive over the next two years.

Mr Trump and many of his fellow Republicans argue that spending on public broadcasting is an unnecessary expense and reject its news coverage as suffering from anti-right bias.

Standalone rescissions packages have not passed in decades, with lawmakers reluctant to cede their constitutionally mandated control of spending.

But Mr Trump’s Republicans, who hold narrow majorities in the Senate and House, have shown little appetite for resisting his policies since he began his second term in January.

The US$9 billion at stake is extremely small in the context of the US$6.8 trillion federal budget, and represents only a tiny portion of all the funds approved by Congress that the Trump administration has held up while it has pursued sweeping cuts, many ordered by billionaire Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, or Doge.

As at mid-June, Mr Trump was blocking US$425 billion in funding that has already been appropriated and previously approved by Congress, according to Democratic lawmakers tracking frozen funding.

However, Mr Trump and his supporters have promised more of the “rescission” requests to eliminate previously approved spending, in what they say is an effort to pare back the federal government.

The House of Representatives passed the rescissions legislation without altering Mr Trump’s request by 214-212 in June. Four Republicans joined 208 Democrats in voting no.

But after a handful of Republican senators balked at the extent of the cuts to global health programmes, Mr Russell Vought, director of the Office of Management and Budget, said on July 15 that Pepfar, a global programme to fight HIV/Aids launched in 2003 by then President George W. Bush, was being exempted.

The change brought the size of the package of cuts to US$9 billion from US$9.4 billion, requiring another House vote before the measure can be sent to the White House for Mr Trump to sign into law.

The rescissions must pass by July 18. Otherwise, the request would expire and the White House will be required to adhere to spending plans passed by Congress.

Republican ‘no’ votes

Two of the Senate’s 53 Republicans – Senators Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine – joined Democrats in voting against the legislation.

“You don’t need to gut the entire Corporation for Public Broadcasting,” Ms Murkowski said in a Senate speech.

She said the Trump administration also has not provided assurances that battles against diseases such as malaria and polio worldwide would be maintained.

Most of all, she said, Congress must assert its role in deciding how federal funds are spent.

Republican Senate Majority Leader John Thune of South Dakota called Mr Trump’s request a “small, but important step toward fiscal sanity”.

Democrats scoffed at that, noting that congressional Republicans earlier in July passed a massive package of tax and spending cuts that nonpartisan analysts estimated would add more than US$3 trillion to the nation’s US$36.2 trillion debt.

Democrats charged Republicans with giving up Congress’ constitutionally mandated control of federal spending.

“Today, Senate Republicans turn this chamber into a subservient rubber stamp for the executive, at the behest of Donald Trump,” said Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer of New York.

“Republicans embrace the credo of cut, cut, cut now, and ask questions later,” he added.

The cuts would overturn bipartisan spending agreements most recently passed in a full-year stopgap funding Bill in March.

Democrats warn a partisan cut now could make it more difficult to negotiate government funding Bills that must pass with bipartisan agreement by Sept 30 to avoid a shutdown.

Appropriations Bills require 60 votes to move ahead in the Senate, but the rescissions package needs just 51, meaning Republicans can pass it without Democratic support. REUTERS