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Eugene

(61,872 posts)
Wed Mar 27, 2019, 06:42 PM Mar 2019

U.S. lawmakers blast Trump's plan for diplomatic, foreign aid cuts

Source: Reuters

POLITICS MARCH 27, 2019 / 10:54 AM / UPDATED AN HOUR AGO

U.S. lawmakers blast Trump's plan for diplomatic, foreign aid cuts

Lesley Wroughton, Patricia Zengerle
5 MIN READ

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. Congress rejected President Donald Trump’s proposed cuts to diplomacy and foreign aid budgets as dangerous to national security on Wednesday, setting the stage for a budget battle with the White House.

Representative Eliot Engel, Democratic chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said Trump’s proposal was “dead” as soon as it arrived in Congress, during the second of two House of Representatives hearings where Secretary of State Mike Pompeo took questions from lawmakers for some seven hours.

“This budget ... signals to the world that the Trump foreign policy is one of disengagement,” Engel said.

The senior Republican on the House subcommittee that oversees State Department spending, Hal Rogers, described the budget plan at an earlier hearing as “woefully inadequate” to cover the administration’s foreign policy and security goals.

The proposal slashes the State Department and aid budget by about $11 billion to $40 billion, he said.

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Read more: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-diplomacy-pompeo/u-s-lawmakers-blast-trumps-plan-for-diplomatic-foreign-aid-cuts-idUSKCN1R81MG
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