The Trump administration proposed a $163 billion dollar cut to the federal budget for the next fiscal year that would deeply impact the lives of working families across the country in an effort to increase homeland security spending by nearly 65% from 2025 enacted levels, as reported by Reuters. If implemented, Trump’s proposed budget would eradicate several education, health and housing programs, in addition to decimating programs that benefit the most vulnerable in our society.
Several of the proposed cuts would come at the expense of working family’s health and safety while benefiting billionaires. In addition to cutting funding for federal law enforcement, including the F.B.I, Trump also schemes to cut funding for the Internal Revenue Service, criticizing their efforts to investigate tax evasion. The proposed budget could cost low-income families here in New Jersey important federal programs that provide rental assistance to families, by cutting aid by more than $26 billion next fiscal year, and end a federal initiative that supports low-income families in paying their monthly heating bills.
According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, more than 300,000 New Jersey residents received federal rental assistance, with more than half getting Housing Choice Vouchers, formerly known as Section 8, in 2023. In total, the state got some $2 billion in rental assistance in 2023.
The budget also targets the Department of Education, eradicating about 15% of the department’s budget, and would cut funding in half for the Department of Housing and Urban Development, which oversees housing assistance programs.
Trump has proposed gutting as much as $4.5 billion in funding for K-12 schools by consolidating 18 grant programs into one program. Here in New Jersey, public schools receive about $1.2 billion for education from the federal government each year, with most of the money going to low-income students and students with disabilities, according to NJ Spotlight News.
Trump’s proposed budget cuts also include massive cuts to health and science, including the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, roughly cutting their budgets in half. At a time when health officials have raised concerns over outbreaks of measles and the continued threat of bird flu, this decision could further jeopardize the public’s health and safety.Both the CDC, and the NIH, are part of the Department of Health and Human Services, is responsible for running a program to help low-income residents pay their electricity bills. That program, known as LIHEAP is funded by $4 billion with bipartisan support in Congress, would be eradicated by the cuts.
Every New Jersey Democrat in Washington called on Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., the Health Secretary to protect the program in a letter. “Our residents in New Jersey depend on LIHEAP for their health, safety, and well-being,” the letter stated.
In our state, the program provides an average of $490 a year to roughly 245,000 low- and moderate-income households, assisting them with their heating and cooling bills.
The proposed budget has been criticized by an advisor to Governor Murphy, Congresswoman Watson Coleman, and Congressman Frank Pallone.
“In the first 100 days of the Trump administration, our state has witnessed unauthorized cuts to some of our most essential programs,” Tyler Jones, an advisor to Governor Murphy, said in a statement to NJ Spotlight News. “From education to health care, mental health resources, and beyond, we have felt the disruptive impacts of the administration’s actions. This budget proposal would formalize these measures and authorize the administration to take further steps to put our residents at risk.”
“There is so much in this budget that is harmful for New Jerseyans, and folks all across the country,” said Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman (CD-12). “It slashes funding for the CDC, raising the risk of infectious disease outbreak barely two years after the end of the COVID-19 pandemic. It cuts funding for housing for folks working their way up into the middle class. This budget amounts to a declaration of war on working families by this administration,” Rep. Watson Coleman said. “I will fight to prevent this budget from ever becoming law with every lever of power at my disposal.”
Rep Frank Pallone (CD-6) spoke to the impact of proposed cuts to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, part of the Commerce Department, which would see a $1.5 billion cut. The Environmental Protection Agency would lose more than half of its budget, losing $5 billion. The Superfund program, which cleans toxic waste sites, would also be targeted, losing about $250 million in funding, particularly impacting New Jersey, as our state has more Superfund sites than any state.
The cut for EPA “puts polluters in the driver’s seat to the detriment of every American’s health,” said Rep. Pallone, the highest-ranking Democrat on the House committee that regulates the agency.
“There’s no doubt Trump is going to continue to illegally do whatever he can to dismantle federal agencies so he can consolidate power in the White House,” said Rep. Pallone. “It’s time for Republicans to grow a spine and join us in opposing these dangerous actions.”
These proposed cuts not only threaten the livelihoods of working families, but threaten the health and safety of the public, as Trump continues to ignore the needs of the everyday worker in favor of billionaires. To learn more about the proposed budget, you can read this article in the New York Times, which includes a break down of the proposed cuts.
