Trump to Propose Significant Increase in Defense Spending President won’t push to cut spending on Social Security, Medicare By Nick Timiraos and Kristina Peterson
https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-to-address-taxes-health-care-in-speech-to-congress-1488135776
WASHINGTON—President Donald Trump’s first budget will seek a sizable increase in military funding but won’t make changes to the largest future drivers of government spending: Social Security and Medicare.
Work to prepare the president’s first budget proposal, expected to be released in mid-March, ramped up last week following the Feb. 16 confirmation of Mick Mulvaney as director of the Office of Management and Budget.
The White House plans to send federal agencies their proposed budget allocations on Monday, a person familiar with the matter said. Mr. Trump will preview some of the budget priorities in his speech to Congress on Tuesday and release a budget outline in mid-March after gathering information from federal agencies.
The budget outline due next month will include only targets for discretionary spending programs and not any new proposals on taxes or mandatory spending programs, such as Medicare and Medicaid, said John Czwartacki, a White House budget office spokesman. The decision to defer the release of part of the budget blueprint is due in part to the delay in Mr. Mulvaney’s confirmation, he said, and those additional proposals will be included in Mr. Trump’s full budget submission later this year.
“It would be premature for us to comment or anyone to report on the specifics of this internal discussion before its publication,” said Mr. Czwartacki.
The president’s budget proposal marks the opening of the monthslong process to set funding levels for the following year. Spending bills originate with Congress and need 60 votes to clear procedural hurdles in the Senate.
In his address to Congress, Mr. Trump also is expected to emphasize two of his top legislative priorities: simplifying the tax code and dismantling the Affordable Care Act and replacing it with something else, White House officials said Sunday.
Speaking Sunday on Fox News, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said the budget outline won’t include any changes to entitlement spending programs. “We are not touching those now. So don’t expect to see that as part of this budget,” he said.
Mr. Mnuchin, in an interview last week, said an increase in military spending “is an important priority, and I think it’s likely that you’ll see that reflected in the president’s budget.”
By pushing for more military funding and taking entitlement spending changes off the table, the Trump administration also would need to propose funding cuts for nondefense programs to avoid sending deficits much higher.
Mr. Trump, for example, is expected to seek cuts at the Environmental Protection Agency and in other areas of domestic spending.
Congressional Republicans have said they would look to Mr. Trump’s speech for hints about the first budget proposal his administration will send to Capitol Hill, expected in mid-March. CONTINUE AT SITE
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