By Dennis Sadowski
Catholic News Service
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s proposed fiscal year 2018 budget sent shivers through social service, education and environmental communities, prompting church leaders and advocates to question the administration’s commitment to people in need.
The leaders repeated in interviews with Catholic News Service that a budget is a moral document that reflects the nation’s priorities and that they found that the spending plan revealed May 23 backs away from the country’s historical support for children, the elderly and the poor, and protecting the environment.
Their concern focuses on the deep cuts — totaling $52 billion in fiscal year 2018 and $3.6 trillion over the next decade — in international aid, senior services, health care, hunger prevention, job training, air and water protection, and climate change research. The cuts essentially are paying for a corresponding $52 billion boost in military spending.
“We say there’s a human component here. It’s not just about defense. It’s not just about deficits,” said Bishop Frank J. Dewane of Venice, Florida, chairman of the U.S. bishops’ Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development.
“Too often we think the budget is a number. It’s not. Right behind those numbers are human beings and they look like you and they look like me,” he told CNS.
Sister Donna Markham, president and CEO of Catholic Charities USA, echoed Bishop Dewane’s contention, saying she was “profoundly disturbed” by the White House plan. “You can’t have people who are suffering and expect them to bring themselves out of poverty when we cut off their access to food and health care and job training. It’s absolutely ridiculous,” she said.
“Clearly, it’s saying where the values are of this administration. And their values do not align with our values as people of faith who are charged with looking out for those among us who are most in need,” Sister Markham added.
But rather than directly engage the White House, officials at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, Catholic Charities USA, Catholic Relief Services and other agencies are planning to turn to Congress, which they see as a firewall to minimize the depth of the cuts being proposed. They have four months of work before a budget must be in place Sept. 30, the start of the next fiscal year.
Democrats in Congress, as expected, have opposed the change in spending priorities. Many Republicans have as well, describing the plan assembled by Mick Mulvaney, director of the Office of Management and Budget and a Georgetown University graduate, simply as a starting point.
That still worries social service administrators such as Gregory R. Kepferle, CEO of Catholic Charities of Santa Clara County in San Jose, California.
“By just presenting this extreme case, it’s a classic negotiating ploy (to) be as obnoxious and extreme as possible and then move to the middle,” Kepferle said. “It still means devastating cuts to the poor and more money for the rich. It’s a breathtaking transfer of wealth from the poorest of the poor to the wealthy.”
Through fiscal year 2027, the budget outline incorporates more than $800 billion in reduced Medicaid spending envisioned in the House-approved American Health Care Act, which is under review in the Senate. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps, will see $192 billion in reduced spending over the decade.
In Trump’s plan, deep cuts are proposed for teacher training, after-school and summer programs, Women, Infants and Children nutrition assistance, and the Senior Community Service Employment Program. The $200-million McGovern-Dole International Food for Education program and the $3-billion Community Development Block Grant program are among the better-known programs slated for elimination.
The Environmental Protection Agency would lose $2.5 billion, about 31 percent of its current budget.
