Trump’s 2026 budget proposal calls for $163B in cuts to federal spending
Several Republicans criticized the proposal, taking issue with defense numbers.
The White House on Friday released President Donald Trump’s proposed budget for the 2026 fiscal year, which calls for $163 billion in cuts to federal spending.
Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought, in a letter to Congress alongside the proposal, said the cuts to discretionary funding would lead to “significant savings.”
“The President is proposing base non-defense discretionary budget authority $163 billion — 22.6 percent below — current-year spending, while still protecting funding for homeland security, veterans, seniors, law enforcement, and infrastructure,” Vought wrote.
While budget proposals are essentially a wish-list for the administration, they serve to illustrate the president’s priorities and what the White House hopes is a jumping off point for negotiations with Congress.
The cuts proposed would come from the Department of Education, the Department of Health and Human Services, USAID and the Environmental Protection Agency, among others.
However, Trump is proposing a 13% increase to defense spending to bring it to $1.01 trillion for the next fiscal year, Vought said.
The administration’s also proposing $175 billion to go toward the southern border and $134 million to strengthen trade enforcement.
Trump’s proposal was met with criticism from Republican Sen. Roger Wicker, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, who pushed back on the White House account of defense spending.
“For the defense budget, OMB has requested a fifth year straight of Biden administration funding, leaving military spending flat, which is a cut in real terms,” Wicker wrote in a statement.
“OMB is not requesting a trillion-dollar budget. It is requesting a budget of $892.6 billion, which is a cut in real terms. This budget would decrease President Trump’s military options and his negotiating leverage,” Wicker said.
Several Republicans who have been unafraid to challenge President Trump also issued statements critical of his budget request.
Sen. Susan Collins, chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, said she has “serious objections to the proposed freeze in our defense funding given the challenges we face the proposed funding cuts to — and in some cases elimination of — programs like LIHEAP, TRIO, and those that support biomedical research.
“Ultimately, it is Congress that holds the power of the purse,” she said.
Sen. Mitch McConnell, who chairs the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense, also took issue with the defense spending numbers in Trump’s proposal.
“America cannot expect our allies to heed calls for greater annual defense spending if we are unwilling to lead by example. Fortunately, Presidential budget requests are just that: requests. Congress will soon have an opportunity to ensure that American power — and the credibility of our commitments — are appropriately resourced. I hope and expect that my colleagues will join me in placing America’s national security first as we begin the FY26 appropriations process,” McConnell said.
Sen. Patty Murray, the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee, expressed alarm the request could severely slash programs many Americans rely on.
“President Trump has made his priorities clear as day: he wants to outright defund programs that help working Americans while he shovels massive tax breaks at billionaires like himself and raises taxes on middle-class Americans with his reckless tariffs,” Murray said in a statement.
“This preliminary budget proposal is exceptionally light on details we desperately need — but this much is clear: Trump wants to eviscerate programs that matter most to working families,” Murray said.
Where Trump’s 2026 budget proposal would cut funding
The budget proposal takes aim at programs that the administration has attacked in the past.
It would cut funding at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), which a senior White House official said had “abusive regulatory decrees” on gun owners. Cuts would also be in store for the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), which the official claimed is used to “target conservative organizations.”
The budget also calls for huge cuts at the Department of Health and Human Services, including for programs at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). It also has many cuts at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
The proposed budget also eliminates USAID’s foreign aid, instead putting some foreign aid under the State Department’s budget.
There was one notable program that the administration is looking to gut: a benefit program called LIHEAP, which helps subsidize energy bills for low-income individuals across the U.S.
The cutting of funds to this program also runs counter to one of President Trump’s campaign promise that he will lower energy bills for Americans on Day 1. A senior White House official, when asked about the proposed cuts to LIHEAP, claimed there was abuse and fraud relating to the program.
“We don’t need a benefit hammock that keeps people out of the workforce. So LIHEAP is actually a fairly critical one of our reductions for accomplishing a lot of trying to get people back to work and dealing with the excessiveness of that, of that benefit,” the senior White House said.
