Trump's $1 trillion infrastructure promise has an obstacle: His own budget cuts

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SOURCE: WZVN ABC 7

URL: http://www.abc-7.com/story/35620284/trumps-1-trillion-infrastructure-promise-has-an-obstacle-his-own-budget-cuts

by Patrick Gillespie


NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- President Trump says he's creating a $1 trillion plan to rebuild America's roads, bridges and runways.

"We will create the first class infrastructure our country and our people deserve," Trump said Wednesday in Cincinnati. "It's time to rebuild our country to bring back our jobs."

Trump has dubbed this week as "infrastructure week."

But an analysis of the Trump budget finds that it cuts infrastructure spending overall by $55 billion, according to the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton Budget Model, a non-partisan research organization. (Coincidentally, Trump graduated from the Wharton School in 1968).

Over 10 years, Trump's budget does allocate $200 billion of federal money for infrastructure spending. But it also cuts $255 billion in existing infrastructure programs which it calls wasteful, including grants for highway renovation, Native American water facilities and rural airports.

The White House's Office of Management and Budget contests the UPenn tally of the budget. It says the cuts proposed for one year can't be assumed to be the same for 10 years.

Kimberly Burham, managing director at the Penn Wharton Budget Model, says such assumptions are reasonable and common when conducting a budget analysis, even if they aren't ideal.

The White House OMB says some cuts are for programs in which not all the funds go to infrastructure. It further adds that major cuts in UPenn's tally aren't considered cuts by the administration but are programs it won't be renewing once they run out of their current funds.

But Trump isn't convincing many that his infrastructure plan will become law anytime soon.

The Office of Economic Cooperation and Development cut its forecast for U.S. growth on Wednesday, citing the slow pace of Trump's economic reforms.

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