War Funds
Trump has promised to rebuild the U.S. military through a spike in spending. He’s also pledged to build a border wall that could cost tens of billions of dollars, a spending increase that isn’t reflected in the budget.
The regular defense spending caps would rise by $489 billion over 10 years in the budget, but the budget is taking credit for cutting projected war funding from $70 billion in 2017 to $10 billion in 2027, an accounting trick that appears to erase the cap increase.
Overall, the budget claims nearly $600 billion in savings from paring back war funding, a gimmick that the Obama administration also used.
Repealing Obamacare
The administration budget expects the repeal and replacement of Obamacare to produce $250 billion in deficit savings over a decade, far more than the $150 billion the Congressional Budget Office estimated for an earlier version of the GOP health bill that narrowly passed the House earlier this month.
A final CBO score for the House-passed bill, which will reflect last-minute changes, is scheduled to be released Wednesday and is expected to show even lower budget savings.
Senate Republicans have shown deep unease with the Medicaid cuts in the House-passed Obamacare repeal bill. The budget claims that Trump can convince Congress to cut Medicaid by an additional $610 billion.
By contrast, Trump’s budget doesn’t even try to cut some of the government’s largest -- and most popular -- programs, like Social Security and Medicare.
"Anytime you project a balanced budget and keep Social Security and Medicare off the books, you have a credibility problem," said Holtz-Eakin.