The White House claims that they want to consolidate welfare programs in the name of efficiency, but the reality is that the consolidation will make it easier for Trump to cut the budgets of programs that benefit the poor and needy.
Politico reported on the consolidation plan:
The Trump administration is preparing to release a sweeping plan for reorganizing the federal government that includes a major consolidation of welfare programs — and a renaming of the Health and Human Services Department.
The report, set to be released in the coming weeks by the White House OMB, seeks to move safety-net programs, including food stamps, into HHS, two sources with knowledge of the plan told POLITICO. The plan would also propose changing the name of the sprawling department, while separately seeking cuts at USAID and the State Department.
The target of this consolidation is telling. There are many functions that overlap in the federal government. For example, a very strong case could be made for reorganizing and consolidating national security functions. The Department of Homeland Security was plopped on top of a bureaucratic turf war, and the nation could greatly use streaming, clarity, and more functional communication in the national security, but the Trump administration chose welfare programs for a specific reason.
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The renaming and consolidating of programs would make it easier to cut their budgets with less public outcry.
Conservatives claim not to like the federal government, so it is contradictory to believe that they want it to run better and more efficiently. The welfare reorganization plan, which is the Heritage Foundation’s plan, is about cutting programs for people who need them the most. One of the most consistent threads running through the Trump administration is a lust for cutting assistance for the needy.
Luckily, the big changes that Trump will propose must get congressional approval, so they’ll be dead on arrival, but the point here is to hurt people, and discussing harming the vulnerable as efficiency is flat out devious.
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Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
