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The Trump team is preparing budget cuts far more radical than anything the Republican party has pushed in the past – starting by taking an axe to “Sesame Street.”¹

Instead of taking on inflated and unnecessary defense spending, Trump is going after funding for Violence Against Women grants, environmental protection, the Paris agreement on climate change and plans to privatize the Corporation for Public Broadcasting while completely eliminating the National Endowments for the Arts and the Humanities. Trump’s proposed $10.5 trillion in cuts is almost double anything Republicans have supported before.² If the blueprint for his budget is any guide, he will also offer massive tax cuts for corporations and slash the social safety net.³

Trump wants to punish poor people to pay for tax breaks for his billionaire buddies. If we are going to expose this agenda to the American people, we need to make sure Democrats stand fiercely united and resist any calls for accommodation from Washington centrists.

Tell Democratic leaders: Hold the line against Trump cuts. Click here to sign the petition.

When Republicans in the House proposed $5.5 trillion in cuts a few years ago, a handful of conservatives voted against them and demanded even more destructive defunding. One of those Republicans, Mick Mulvaney, is Trump’s pick to lead the Office of Management and Budget. Key members of Trump’s budget transition team used to work at the big business friendly Heritage Foundation, and reports indicate Trump’s scandalous budget proposal, expected in the coming weeks, will be based on these radically conservative blueprints.⁴

Based on that blueprint, the reported Trump proposal would:^5,6

• Privatize the Corporation for Public Broadcasting
• Offer a handout to massive corporations
• Cut Social Security benefits and raise the retirement age
• Privatize Medicare and allow states to undermine Medicaid
• Eliminate funding for Violence Against Women grants as well as community policing and legal aid for poorer Americans
• Scrap funding for the Paris agreement on climate change and offices devoted to energy efficiency and reducing fossil fuel emissions
• Reduce funding for civil rights enforcement and community policing
• Eliminate the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities
• Slash food and housing assistance for the impoverished
• Repeal common-sense rules on Wall Street banks

Past Republican proposals targeted 62 percent of their cuts at low-income programs – and Trump’s plan looks even worse.⁷

Tell Democratic leaders: Hold the line against Trump cuts. Click here to sign the petition.

We do not have a spending problem. We have a defense spending problem. We spend more on defense than we do on all other areas, combined. More than half the discretionary budget goes to the military-industrial complex, and the “non-discretionary” budget – things like Social Security – is funded for decades, or longer with small fixes.⁸Trump and his Republican backers are not serious about spending, they are simply declaring war on the poor as an excuse to pass massive tax breaks for their wealthy campaign donors and corporate pals.

Some Democrats will face the temptation to compromise in order to show their friends at Washington cocktail parties that they are “serious” about spending. If they do so, they will be complicit in making America sicker, poorer, less prosperous and less well-educated. We need to declare in no uncertain terms that Democrats must do everything in their power to resist the Trump cuts.

Tell Democratic leaders: Hold the line against Trump cuts. Click below to sign the petition:

https://act.credoaction.com/sign/trump_cuts?t=7&akid=21445.11103932.G_QgJq

Thank you for speaking out,

Murshed Zaheed, Political Director
CREDO Action from Working Assets

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1. Alexander Bolton, “Trump team prepares dramatic cuts,” The Hill, Jan. 19, 2017.
2. Bryce Covert, “Trump preparing budget with most extreme cut in government spending yet,” ThinkProgress, Jan. 19, 2017.
3. Republican Senate Committee, “2017 Blueprint for a Balanced Budget.”
4. Bolton, “Trump team prepares dramatic cuts.”
5. Republican Senate Committee, “2017 Blueprint for a Balanced Budget.”
6. Covert, “Trump preparing budget with most extreme cut in government spending yet.”
7. Ibid.
8. Charles Osterndorf, “Bernie Sanders is right—America spends too much money on its military,” The Daily Dot, Aug. 26, 2015.