The president introduced his budget proposal in early February. Budget proposals – whether instantly rejected or worked all the way through congressional processes – get conversations started about what’s important to this country, and where and how Congress should invest taxpayer dollars.

President’s Budget Proposal

The President introduced his budget proposal in early February. It had a lot of surprises – many of them were good.

Like other Congress’s receiving an opposite party president’s proposal, this Congress declared the president’s proposal “dead on arrival.” Nevertheless, we hope that some of the best parts of this budget will survive the rocky congressional process, because they provide answers and funds to address real problems that need solutions.

Budget proposals – whether instantly rejected or worked all the way through congressional processes – get conversations started about what’s important to this country, and where and how Congress should invest taxpayer dollars. See information below on other voices in this conversation – the budgets proposed by Republican House leaders and by the Congressional Progressive Caucus.

Programs that serve Indian country span from children’s programs to climate resilience and from water rights to community safety. Funding proposals for these government-to-government programs are both specific and broad, and the numbers are mostly good.

The funding offered in these areas is specific to problems and challenges named as priorities by native communities.  For youth, for example, a comprehensive cross-agency program – Generation Indigenous – sets up funding in several agencies to focus on educational outcomes, access to the internet, the availability of teacher housing, Indian Child Welfare Act implementation, tribal criminal justice, and reducing the suicide rate. 

After hearings in both the Senate and the House last year highlighting the tearing cost of Indian youth suicide, members of both parties are likely to agree on the span of programs needed to rebuild meaning and opportunity for young lives, beginning very early.

• Funding in the Health and Human Services (HHS) budget would support native language programs, while $138 million in the Bureau of Indian Education (in the Department of the Interior) would be directed to improve the physical conditions of schools.
• A wide range of social services programs in the HHS budget - -mostly benefitting children - would receive a 27 percent increase.
• The Native American Housing Block Grant would receive a modest increase to $700 million. 
• Another $80 million would support community facilities, with one quarter of those funds directed to facilities for youth, such as pre-school centers and transitional housing.

In addition, the President’s budget proposal would invests significantly in educational, employment, job training, community-building and children’s programs that benefit Native Americans along with all other communities.

Our sense is that the President’s budget proposal includes responses and supports for a strong and resilient agenda for Indian country. When respected as partners in government-to-government enterprises, tribal governments are able to bring solutions to the table that are consistent with the values of their communities. Federal government investment in these programs fulfills promises made long ago, and carries forward a commitment to a country where every person can thrive.

House Republican Budget

About a month after the President submitted his budget to Congress, leaders in the House of Representatives took two steps. (1) They announced that they would not invite witnesses from the administration to talk about the programs in their agencies and the purposes of the funding they seek. (A very unusual step.) (2) They introduced their own budget. (Not at all unusual, regardless of which party is in charge.)

The Republican budget proposal contrasts sharply with the one that the President proposed. Although it is short on details, it includes a $30 billion cut in entitlement programs over the next two years. (Entitlement programs are the ones that provide assured benefits – such as food assistance or medical care to people who meet certain qualifications.)

Many low income Native Americans, like other low income families, rely on programs such as Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, or SNAP (food assistance) benefits, which are among the largest of the entitlement programs and are therefore likely to bear the heaviest part of these cuts. To cut these programs, Congress can’t just set a lower number for the total funding of the program. Instead, Congress would have to change who is eligible for the program, or change the rules about the benefits of the program. So a family whose current food assistance doesn’t last till the end of the month may face a few more days without food, or a family that receives Medicaid benefits may find that they have a larger “co-pay” for each visit, or that not all household members are eligible.

Congressional Progressive Caucus Budget

The Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC) is an informal group of about seventy members – mostly in the House of Representatives. Most years the caucus offers an alternative budget that would fund a different set of priorities. This year, their budget – named “The People’s Budget: Prosperity Not Austerity” calls for “major reinvestments in our country through infrastructure, education, and wage growth to increase opportunity for all. The People’s Budget is a down payment on a brighter future for all Americans, ensuring every family struggling to make ends meet has a fair shot at the American Dream.”

While the CPC budget is light on details, its highlights include

• Investments in roads and bridges – to repair infrastructure build clean energy resources and provide good jobs,
• Increased support of high quality education for every student,
• Debt-free college education,
• Expanded access to health care through the Affordable Care Act and authority for states to transition to single-payer plans,
• Expanded access to mental health care and treatments for opioid and heroin addiction, and
• Creation of 3.6 good paying jobs to push our economy back to full-employment, which will provide the necessary economic conditions to spur across-the-board wage growth for hardworking Americans.

These three budget proposals mark the scope of the budget debates that could take place in Congress, if the partisan political veil is lifted so that ideas can be offered and discussed. But during this election year, it is more likely that this debate will take place in town meetings and in the press. Watch for opportunities to lift up the federal budget items that are most important to communities and families in Indian country, and speak out about them with the candidates and in letters to the editors of your local media.