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A top House Democrat argued Thursday that "even a fraction" of President Trump's proposed spending cuts would be "an absolute disaster" for the State Department.

"[T]he White House wants to cut nearly one-third of the international affairs budget next year," New York Rep. Eliot Engel, the top Foreign Affairs Committee Democrat, said Thursday morning. "That obviously would be a disaster. In fact, slashing our international engagement by even a fraction of that, at a time when we're facing serious challenges around the world, would be an absolute disaster."

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson disagrees, and has said recent State Department budgets have run at "historically high" and unsustainable levels. But Engel countered that rising threats around the world make this year a uniquely bad time to cut diplomatic spending, and urged lawmakers to assert their congressional power under the Constitution.

"Congress, as we all say many times, is a co-equal branch of government, and, according to the Constitution, we appropriate funds or you appropriate funds," he told a House Appropriations subcommittee panel. "We don't just have to roll over because any White House says so. This year, we're going to have to put that idea to the test."

Trump asked Congress to cut diplomatic funding by nearly one-third, a $10 billion reduction that would lower spending to levels below George W. Bush's budget requests at the end of his administration.

"What the President is asking the State Department to do is, I think, reflective of a couple of expectations," Tillerson said while traveling in Japan. "One is that as time goes by, there will be fewer military conflicts that the U.S. will be directly engaged in; and second, that as we become more effective in our aid programs, that we will also be attracting resources from other countries, allies, and other sources as well to contribute in our development aid and our disaster assistance."

Engel accused the Trump team of indulging an "isolationist" outlook.

"History has shown us what we can get by retreating into a defensive, isolationist crouch," he said. "If we aren't carrying the mantle of global leadership, make no mistake, someone else will pick it up, and we may not like what we see. Don't want Russia picking it up, don't want China picking it up, don't want any of these countries that don't share our values picking it up, and they will if we retreat."

Also from the Washington Examiner

Rep. Sean Duffy, R-Wis., said Friday he supports the Trump administration's tougher new policy against North Korea, and said using pre-emptive military force could end up alleviating some of the threat posed by the hostile country.

Duffy said on CNN that North Korea's continued development of nuclear weapons and intercontinental ballistic missiles might not be a threat to the United States at the moment, but given a longer leash the regime might end up trying to kill Americans on American soil.

"There's a real threat from North Korea," Duffy said. "Not only do they have nuclear weapons, but they're advancing their ballistic missiles technology and if they advance it further, they can be a real threat to Europe and, if we take

03/17/17 8:08 AM

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Top House Democrat: Any State Department cuts 'an absolute disaster' - Washington Examiner

Arch conservatives have come to define the House Republican brand this decade, pushing the Treasury to the edge of default in 2011, shutting down the government in 2013 and supporting the most right-wing contenders in last years presidential primary.

Now, however, Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) is dealing with a different rebellious flank within the House Republican Conference as he pushes a massive health-care bill toward the floor next week. Larger in number but softer in tone than their conservative counterparts, moderate Republicans are shaping up to be at least as big a hurdle to achieving the long-held goal of repealing the 2010 Affordable Care Act and replacing it with a more market-oriented series of policies.

These Republicans are getting their share of meetings with Ryan and his leadership team, voicing their concerns about the impact specific pieces of the bill would have in their districts. They are making clear that any negative fallout from these policy moves would place their seats in jeopardy in next years midterm elections, a fate that Ryan understands would open the door to losing the House majority.

And, of course, these moderates are making their case in a much quieter fashion than members of the House Freedom Caucus, a group of roughly 30 conservatives who have used their high-profile media appearances to gain several audiences with President Trump to question Ryans direction in the health-care fight.

We have our own way of evaluating things and making our points heard, and its not necessarily through the press, the way that they do it, Rep. Ryan Costello (R-Pa.), a second-term lawmaker from the Philadelphias western suburbs, said Thursday.

This is new math for Ryan. In his first year on the job, he mostly faced the same battles that his predecessor, John A. Boehner, had in his five years as speaker: The right wing always caused the most trouble.

Eventually those rabble-rousers from the Freedom Caucus helped push Boehner (R-Ohio) out the door by threatening to oppose his hold on the speakers gavel, and they had enough votes to likely block him.

[GOP health-care plan: Key House panel calls for work requirements, additional cuts in Medicaid]

For sure, conservatives far outnumber moderates in the increasingly right-tilting caucus that Ryan oversees. But the vast majority of those conservatives are amenable to Ryans policy provisions, leaving 30 or so members of the Freedom Caucus as the biggest troublemakers.

Meanwhile, according to an analysis by the FiveThirtyEight blog, there are roughly 60 Republicans who are either members of the mainstream Tuesday Group or sit in districts that leaned toward Hillary Clinton in the presidential election.

The speaker can afford just 21 defections from his ranks and still pass the bill by the slimmest of margins, so Ryan convened a meeting Thursday with three representatives each from the ideological caucuses, including the Freedom Caucus, the more traditionally conservative Republican Study Group and the moderates in the Tuesday Group.

In the fight over Ryans health bill, the American Health Care Act, Republican strategists suggest the members of the far-right corner of the conference do not have enough votes to sink the legislation on their own.

Theres also a particularly strong belief among House GOP leaders that if Trump puts his full force behind the legislation, these Freedom Caucus members will buckle.

Take Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.), the caucus chairman, who is currently leaning against the legislation. Trump won Meadowss district in western North Carolina by nearly 30 percentage points, a much bigger margin than Republican Mitt Romney won there in 2012.

Thats not the case with almost three dozen Republicans who come from districts that Clinton won or that Trump won by less than 4 percentage points.

These Republicans saw the Congressional Budget Office estimate of 24million more uninsured from Ryans legislation and gasped. They know their constituents might be frustrated with Obamacare, but they tend to be more diverse and from the suburban professional ranks, unwilling to throw people off insurance with no substitute.

We just need to make sure that we are helping the people who are most in need, Rep. Carlos Curbelo (R-Fla.) said.

Curbelo won a second term from his South Florida district in a rout even though Trump lost there by 16 percentage points.

But 2018 will be a very different race. Like the vast majority of Republicans in tough districts, Curbelo has never run with a Republican holding the presidency.

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), a longtime reliable ally of leadership, also wont commit to supporting the health legislation despite a meeting Wednesday with Ryan. He barely survived his 2016 election after his suburban Southern California district swung sharply to Clinton.

Many of these wavering Republicans come from states that adopted the expanded Medicaid rolls the ACA allowed, a provision that would be phased out under the current Ryan proposal.

Thats one of the great concerns for Rep. Daniel Donovan (R-N.Y.), whose district in Staten Island and Brooklyn actually supported Trump by a wide margin. His meetings with local health industry officials have been brutal.

Theyre all against the current form of the bill, theyre all concerned, Donovan said.

He wants to prevent his Freedom Caucus counterparts from speeding up the phaseout of the Medicaid expansion.

Our health-care system is broken, it needs to be repaired, but I think we have to help those people that were harmed by the Affordable Care Act without harming the people that were helped by it, Donovan said Thursday.

The underlying theme of the Tuesday Group Republicans is to make their voices heard quietly, in the speakers office or on the House floor, to try keep the bill from going too far to the right. You sort of want to keep your powder dry until youre able to look at everything and sift through it, Costello said.

Ultimately, however, the test for these Republicans will be how they respond if Ryan and Trump appease the conservatives.

Rep. Charlie Dent (R-Pa.), chairman of the Tuesday Group, delivered a warning that his moderates might be willing to topple the entire legislation if it means a bad deal for their districts.

He wouldnt commit to how many were in those ranks, but for the first time these moderates have leverage, if they choose to use it.

Enough to make a difference, Dent said.

Read more from Paul Kanes archive, follow him on Twitter or subscribe to his updates on Facebook.

Link:
The sleeping giants of the Obamacare debate: Republican moderates in the House - Washington Post

President Trumps America First budget released Thursday that calls for steep cuts to the State Department and Environmental Protection Agency in order to increase defense spending was called by some Republicans as a pie-in-the-sky wish list that will never pass Congress in tact.

It is not uncommon for a presidents initial skinny budget to face an uphill fight with congressmen who control the governments purse strings. But the early resistance is notable since Republicans control both the House and Senate. Even House Speaker Paul Ryan appeared to hedge his optimism on the plan that he called a blueprint.

For better or worse, Trumps budget appears to make good on some of his key campaign promises. He calls for an increase in defense spending by $54 billion, which The Associated Press points out is the largest increase since President Reagans military buildup of the 1980s. The defense increase will be paid for by cuts to the EPA, State Department and federal funding for the arts.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who often finds himself at odds with Trump, said plainly, It is clear that this budget proposed today cannot pass the Senate.

Trump said in a statement that to keep Americans safe, we have made the tough choices that have been put off for too long.

Republicans leaders spread out across the country have found items in the budget that would likely not still well with their voters.

Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, spoke out against the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative and Rep. Hal Rogers, R-Ky., called out the budget cut on the Appalachian Regional commission, which assists communities in his region. He called Trumps budget cuts draconian, careless and counterproductive.

I just want to make sure that rural America, who was very supportive to Trump, doesnt have to take a disproportionately high cut, Rep. Robert Aderholt, R-Ala., told the AP.

Republicans praised the president for beefing up the Pentagon, but they were far less enthusiastic about accepting Trump's recipe for doing so without adding to the nation's $20 trillion debt.

"While we support more funding for our military and defense, we must maintain support for our farmers and ranchers," said North Dakota Republican John Hoeven, blasting a 21 percent cut to the Agriculture Department's budget.

KRAUTHAMMER: TRUMP'S BUDGET PROPOSAL IS 'DEAD ON ARRIVAL'

Democrats have spoken out against the budget they say would devastate the work done by agencies like the EPA. Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., tweeted, Democrats in Congress will emphatically oppose these cuts & urge our Republican colleagues to reject them as well.

White House Budget Director Mick Mulvaney said this is not a take-it-or-leave-it budget. He told The Washington Post that the message were sending to the Hill is, we want more money for the things the president talked about, defense being the top one, national security. And we dont want to add to the budget deficit. If Congress has another way to do that, were happy to talk to them about it.

Edmund DeMarche is a news editor for FoxNews.com. Follow him on Twitter @EDeMarche.

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Trump's first budget faces early Republican resistance - Fox News

Be careful what you wish for. We're less than a month into total Republican control of the presidency and both House and Senate, and certain, totally predictable things are evident.

Where money is involved, Republicans are doing exactly what Republicans do: catering to the wealthy, banks, Wall Street and preparing to make budget cuts that take away from those who are already mired in poverty. Cut Medicare? Who cares. Recipients aren't donors anyway.

The middle class has been hanging on by a thread, and Republican policy will completely destroy it. Admittedly, Obamacare is failing and Republicans have a golden opportunity to create a better plan. What has been proposed so far would massively increase the number of uninsured people, and the poorest of those would lose their doctor and resume going to the ER instead, placing enormous strain on hospitals and increasing overall costs to those who are insured.

Yes, Republicans won the election, but victory is getting what you want. Now we must face the reality: Do we want what we got?

George Warfield St. Charles

See more here:
Republican policy takes aim at the middle class - STLtoday.com

NPR

Trump Friend Argues Against Republican Health Care Plan NPR March 17, 20174:49 AM ET. Heard on Morning Edition. Steve Inskeep talks with Christopher Ruddy, CEO of the conservative Newsmax network and a friend of Trump. He wrote an article arguing for President Trump to ditch the Republican health care plan.

Go here to read the rest:
Trump Friend Argues Against Republican Health Care Plan - NPR