Waters: Trump Budget is Extremely Harmful

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, in response to the Trump Administration’s release of its full budget request to Congress for Fiscal Year 2018, Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-CA), Ranking Member of the Committee on Financial Services, issued the following statement:

“Donald Trump has once again revealed who he really is, with a cruel and senseless budget that abandons Main Street and the vulnerable.

“The Trump budget mirrors efforts by Congressional Republicans to roll back Wall Street reform and take us back to the bad old days of weak oversight, lax enforcement and taxpayer bailouts. The budget proposes to functionally terminate the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the only federal agency with the sole purpose of protecting consumers, and once again expose communities across the country to predatory financial institutions.

“The Trump budget would create suffering for whole communities, increase poverty, hunger and homelessness, and reduce economic development opportunities across the nation. Trump’s budget would drastically cut the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s rental assistance programs, including public housing and the Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher Program, eliminate the Community Development Block Grant, HOME Investment Partnerships, and the National Housing Trust Fund, and terminate the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness when over half a million people do not have a place to live. The Trump budget would also punitively raise rents and increase financial instability for the most vulnerable in this country and make it much more difficult for families to make ends meet, including by making it more difficult to pay for rent and basic utilities.

“The Administration’s budget also eliminates funding for Community Development Financial Institutions, which work in communities to increase economic opportunity and extend credit and capital to help meet the needs of the underserved.

“The budget proposes major reforms to the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) that would raise premiums and fees for policyholders, costing them $8.9 billion over ten years, even though many policyholders are currently struggling with unaffordable premiums. The budget would also eliminate the funding for flood mapping and raise fees on NFIP policyholders to make up for that expense. While the Administration has suggested that taxpayers should not pay for a benefit that only benefits NFIP policyholders, the benefits of the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) mapping efforts reach much farther than the NFIP. In fact, taxpayers save over $2 for every $1 spent on flood mapping.

“In all, this budget would be extremely harmful to Americans all across the country, and again demonstrates that Trump was dishonest when he said he would stand up for hardworking Americans.”

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