[Civsoc-mw] US budget and USAID/foreign aid

[Diana Cammack]

Fyi. D

 

The Washington Post

Democracy Dies in Darkness

 

Foreign aid under the ax in State Department budget proposal

By Carol Morello May 23 2017
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/foreign-aid-under-the
-ax-in-state-department-budget-proposal/2017/05/23/55bc0600-3f15-11e7-adba-3
94ee67a7582_story.html?utm_campaign=buffer&utm_content=bufferac0e1&utm_mediu
m=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_term=.039a0aa27708 

 

The White House is proposing a State Department budget that would make deep
cuts in long-term development aid, humanitarian food assistance and
peacekeeping missions around the world.

 

The detailed budget unveiled Tuesday also proposes eliminating all funding
for climate-change programs and for two prominent institutions in
Washington, the U.S. Institute for Peace and the Woodrow Wilson
International Center for Scholars. The only money earmarked for the two
would be for closeout costs such as severance pay.

 

The Trump administration's proposed reductions include health programs that
fight HIV/AIDS, malaria and polio. The plan would eliminate an emergency
food aid program that purchases food from U.S. farmers. It would continue
funding for NATO but cut contributions to U.N. peacekeeping by more than
half, a $1.6 billion reduction.

 

State Department officials said that despite the cuts, the United States
would remain a leading donor to humanitarian and health needs.

 

"The president's budget provides strong support for foreign aid while
reflecting the reality that resources are not unlimited," said Nikki Haley,
the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

 

The administration is asking for $25.6 billion for the core budget of the
State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID),
plus $12 billion for overseas contingency operations. That is 32 percent
below current spending, though 2017's budget was inflated by supplementary
spending beyond what was originally approved. It is still a sharp drop from
2016 spending.

 

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said the proposal reflects President
Trump's goal of a leaner, more efficient government that prioritizes
national security and U.S. economic interests.

 

"As we advance the President's foreign policy priorities, this budget will
also help lay the foundation for a new era of global stability and American
prosperity," he said in a statement.

 

In one concrete example of the new approach, the White House would drop more
than two dozen countries receiving economic and development assistance and
direct the rest not to nations most in need but those deemed most critical
to U.S. national security.

 

The plan would also cut in half the Bureau of Educational and Cultural
Affairs, which funds initiatives such as the Fulbright Program that sends
hundreds of U.S. scholars to study abroad and brings their foreign
counterparts to study in the United States. The bureau was originally slated
for extinction, but the $285 million allocated is expected to be enough for
the Fulbright if other exchange programs are eliminated.

 

The proposed cuts are expected to meet stiff resistance in Congress, where
members have been lobbied for weeks by organizations in the field of foreign
assistance.

 

"Thank goodness it's Chapter 2 in a very long book," said Peter Yeo, vice
president for advocacy at the United Nations Foundation, which supports that
agency's work. "This is hardly the time to be cutting humanitarian
assistance, when we're dealing with four emerging famines and the Syrian
refu-gee crisis. Congress is never going to go along with this type of
stuff."

 

Schumer criticizes Trump's budget proposal

Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) calls President Trump's
budget "a comic book villain-bad budget." (The Washington Post)

 

Groups involved in development programs and human rights criticized the
foreign aid proposal as an abdication of the United States' role in the
world.

 

"If enacted, these cuts would result in the wholesale dismantling of
America's humanitarian and development work, increase suffering and make the
world a more dangerous place," said Michelle Nunn, president of Care USA, an
anti-poverty group that gets 25 percent of its budget from the U.S.
government.

 

On Monday, 225 business executives, including several from Fortune 500
companies, wrote a letter to Tillerson, saying development aid helps build
markets for U.S. companies and creates jobs.

 

Military, defense and security at home and abroad.

"We depend on the U.S. government being advocates for the rule of law,
fighting corruption and strengthening government institutions," said Laura
Lane of UPS, the package-delivery company, which does business in 220
countries. "We can't grow and prosper without it."

 

Several organizations plan to flood Congress this week, asking members to
reject the foreign aid cuts. Care USA has lined up 350 attendees of its
national conference in Washington to lobby on Capitol Hill. Oxfam America is
sending a "Famine Food Truck" around the District, featuring a giant photo
of a gaunt woman and child in Somaliland, to draw attention to famines in
Yemen, South Sudan, Somalia, Nigeria and the Chad Basin.

 

"The level of need is greater now than perhaps ever before," said Paul
O'Brien, vice president of policy at Oxfam America, citing famines caused by
population growth, climate change and war. "The United States needs to
demonstrate leadership in the fight against suffering."

 

With months to go before Congress determines appropriations, few
organizations have a Plan B beyond trying to protect current funding levels.

 

"Plan A is to fight the cuts," said Tom Hart, head of the One Campaign,
which fights poverty and disease, primarily in Africa. "We have a receptive
audience on both sides of the aisle who don't support the cuts President
Trump is proposing. That's where we're pouring our efforts. We're trying to
push back against the notion 'America First' means we can't support those in
need abroad."

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