Donald Trump's Budget Proposal Contains Nearly $2 Trillion in Devastating Cuts for the Poor

Welcome to WHAT NOW, a morning round-up of the news/fresh horrors that await you today.

Name your favorite social welfare program and it’s probably going to see massive cuts in President Trump’s 2018 budget proposal, which is slated to be released later today.

The marquee item in what the administration is billing as a “taxpayer-first budget”—which dishonestly implies that low-income Americans are not also taxpayers—comes out to $800 billion in cuts to Medicaid, a figure contingent upon the Republican health care plan becoming law, CNN reported.

There will also be proposed cuts to SNAP, or food stamp, benefits, the Children’s Health Insurance Program, and SSDI disability insurance. Overall, Axios reported, there will be roughly $1.7 trillion in proposed cuts to social programs.

The plan is also expected to offer more “flexibility” for states to impose new work requirements for people trying to access anti-poverty programs, which would be open season for red states to implement more of the measures they love the most, like mandating drug tests for people applying for public assistance.

WHAT ELSE?

• In a New Yorker profile of former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, published online today, she powerfully explained why she decided to resign rather than defend Trump’s Muslim ban:

I thought, based on all the evidence I had, that it was based on religion. And then I thought back to Jim Crow laws, or literacy tests. Those didn’t say that the purpose was to prevent African-Americans from voting. But that’s what the purpose was.

• Seven months after the Access Hollywood tape of Trump making demeaning remarks about women succeeded only in ruining Billy Bush’s TV career, the former Today host told The Hollywood Reporter he’s planning a return and acknowledged the “irony” that the other guy on the tape still managed to become president.

WHAT’S NEXT

• Trump is in Tel Aviv, Israel, today, where he’ll almost certainly bring peace to the region with either a two-state or a one-state solution, whichever one people like best, seriously, he doesn’t really care.
• We should also find out on Wednesday how costly and how many people will be affected by the GOP’s American Health Care Act when the Congressional Budget Office releases its final score for the bill, which was already blindly approved by the House.

WHAT FRESH HELL

In case you were happily off the grid yesterday, Trump capped off his visit to Saudi Arabia by sinisterly placing his hands on a large, glowing orb. Everything is fine!