A new continuing resolution introduced by House Appropriations Committee Chairman Hal Rogers (R-Ky.) on Monday (April 4), which includes a proposal to slash $832 million from U.S. State and foreign operations spending, was flatly rejected by U.S. President Barack Obama the next day.
The bill hoped to cut $12 billion in discretionary spending, covering funding rescissions, reductions, and program terminations.
U.S. lawmakers only have until Friday (April 8) to pass either a full fiscal 2011 budget or another short-term spending bill to avert a possible shutdown of the federal government. They are also set to begin deliberations for the fiscal 2012 budget.
On Tuesday (April 5), Obama dismissed the House Republicans’ new one-week budget plan.
“That is not a way to run a government,” Obama said in an impromptu news conference at the White House, as reported by The New York Times. “I can’t have our agencies making plans based on two-week budgets.”
>> Rajiv Shah Makes Case for Robust Foreign Aid Budget
Rogers’ bill sought to slash $212 million in U.S. contributions to international financial institutions, $466 million for various foreign assistance accounts including development assistance and the Economic Support Fund, and another $237 million for United Nations and peacekeeping activities.
The bill, meanwhile, aimed to fund the entire $3 billion foreign military financing commitment for the U.S.-Israel Memorandum of Understanding for fiscal 2011.
Read more about U.S. foreign aid reform.
