Tonight, the House is expected to vote on H.R. 3, the Spending Cuts to Expired and Unnecessary Programs Act. This measure rescinds approximately $14.7 billion in previously appropriated but unspent funds, a good first step towards reducing federal spending. All members of Congress should vote for this legislation.
Since the passage of the 1974 Budget Control and Impoundment Act, presidents have proposed 1,174 rescissions totaling $76 billion. Every president from Gerald Ford to Bill Clinton successfully rescinded funds. The last president to submit a rescissions package to Congress was Bill Clinton in 2000. The unanimous Democrat opposition to the Trump rescissions package is confusing since Clinton’s rescissions packages had a 67% passage rate.
Trump’s nearly $15 billion rescissions package is the largest in history. Some of the proposed rescissions are listed below:
- $4.3 billion from the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program
- $5 billion from Children Health Insurance Fund and $1.8 billion from the Child Enrollment Contingency Fund. The funds rescinded from this program either cannot be spent because the authority to obligate the funding ended last year or is not needed to operate the program. The nonpartisan CBO confirmed that this rescission would not affect the program, and no children will lose health insurance as a result of this rescission.
- $800 million from Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovations
- $356 million in unobligated balances of conservation programs that were not extended in the Agricultural Act of 2014, and $144 million in unobligated balances of the Environmental Quality Incentive Program. These funds are in excess of the amounts needed to sustain the programs in FY 2018.
- $142 million from the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008. This rescission allows the private sector and local governments to play a greater role in addressing affordable housing needs.
- $523 million from the Title 17 Innovative Technology Loan Guarantee Program
- $500 million from the Farm Security and Rural Investment Programs
- $50 million in prior year balances from the Department of Agriculture’s Watershed and Flood Prevention Operations Program. These funds are in excess of the amounts needed to sustain the programs in FY 2018.
- $150 million in prior year balances from the National Service Trust. This rescission will not impact the agency’s operations.
- $148 million from Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service
- $133 million from Railroad Unemployment Insurance Extended Benefits