(AFP) – US Republicans early Friday approved President Donald Trump’s plan to cancel $9 billion in funding for foreign aid and public broadcasting, vowing it was just the start of broader efforts by Congress to slash the federal budget. The cuts achieve only a tiny fraction of the $1 trillion in annual savings that tech billionaire and estranged Trump donor Elon Musk vowed to find before his acrimonious exit in May from a role spearheading federal cost-cutting.
But Republicans — who recently passed a domestic policy bill expected to add more than $3 trillion to US debt — said the vote honored Trump’s election campaign pledge to rein in runaway spending. “President Trump and House Republicans promised fiscal responsibility and government efficiency,” House Speaker Mike Johnson said in a statement just after the vote. “Today, we’re once again delivering on that promise.”
Both chambers of Congress are Republican-controlled, meaning a mostly party-line House of Representatives vote of 216 to 213, moments after midnight, was sufficient to approve the Senate-passed measure. The bill now heads to the White House to be signed by Trump, who praised his backers in the House. “REPUBLICANS HAVE TRIED DOING THIS FOR 40 YEARS, AND FAILED… BUT NO MORE. THIS IS BIG!!!” he wrote on Truth Social.
Most of the cuts target programs for countries hit by disease, war, and natural disasters. But the move also scraps $1.1 billion that the Corporation for Public Broadcasting was due to receive over the next two years. Conservatives say the funding — which goes mostly to more than 1,500 local public radio and TV stations, as well as to public broadcasters NPR and PBS — is unnecessary and has funded biased coverage.
The bill originally included $400 million in cuts to a global AIDS program that is credited with saving 26 million lives, but that funding was saved by a rebellion by moderate Republicans.
– ‘Dark day’ –
The vote was a win for Trump and fiscal hawks seeking to support the mission of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), launched by Musk as Trump was swept to power, for radical savings. Congress had already approved the cash that was clawed back, and Democrats framed the bill as a betrayal of the bipartisan government funding process. They fear Trump’s victory clears the way for more “rescissions packages” canceling agreed spending.
“Instead of protecting the health, safety, and well-being of the American people, House Republicans have once again rubber stamped Donald Trump’s extreme, reckless rescissions legislation,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said in a joint statement with fellow top Democrats.
Republicans need some Democratic votes to keep the government funded past September, and the minority party had threatened to abandon any plans for cooperation if the DOGE cuts went ahead. Jeffries and fellow Democrats seemed to suggest as much on Friday. “Tonight’s vote… makes it clear that House Republicans are determined to march this country toward a painful government shutdown later this year,” they said in the statement.
Although they are in the minority, Democrats have leverage in funding fights because a budget deal would need at least 60 votes in the 100-member Senate, and Republicans only have 53 seats. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer called it “a dark day for any American who relies on public broadcasting during floods, hurricanes, tornadoes, and other disasters.” White House budget chief Russell Vought told an event hosted Thursday by the Christian Science Monitor that the administration was likely to send another rescissions package to Congress.
– Frankie TAGGART
© 2024 AFP
