President Obama unveiled his federal budget proposal for the 2013 fiscal year on Monday. Here is an agency-by-agency breakdown of the plan. This post will be updated as information becomes available.
President Obama's proposed 2013 budget slashes spending at the Agriculture Department by about $700 million, or 3 percent compared to this year’s spending levels, by cutting farm subsidies and closing hundreds of tiny regional offices.
As in previous years, Obama wants to eliminate direct payments to farmers, which accounted for about 44 percent of farm aid in fiscal 2011. Phasing out the payments is part of a plan to save $32 billion in the next decade by also providing disaster assistance to farmers and reducing subsidies to crop insurance companies. Continue reading...
The Obama administration signaled its intent to get tough on trade in its budget proposal for the Commerce Department, pledging funding for a new trade enforcement arm a day before Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping is scheduled to meet with President Obama.
The president is seeking a 5 percent increase to the Commerce budget, to $8 billion. Continue reading...
The Defense Department's core fiscal 2013 budget at $525.4 billion reflects the already announced one percent reduction from the current year, which comes from reducing Army and Marine personnel and ending or limiting purchases of expensive new equipment. It spells out in more detail the how the administration plans to cut future expenses related to the personnel reductions, by establishing commissions to take on the controversial tasks of reducing or closing military bases and updating military retirement programs.
The Pentagon's proposed overseas contingency operations spending of $88.5 billion in fiscal 2013 is down from $115.3 billion and reflects the planned reductions in Afghanistan and withdrawal of combat troops from Iraq. It also contains $2.9 billion to pay for Iraq-related Defense Department costs including replacing munitions and equipment and the operation of the Pentagon office in Iraq that supervises receipt of U.S. military equipment and other security assistance. Continue reading...
For education, President Obama hopes to increase spending to $69.8 billion in 2013, which is 2.5 percent more than the current budget of $68.1 billion.
Obama’s budget proposal Monday for the next fiscal year seeks level funding or slight increases for several education programs, including competitive grants that reward public education reforms and innovation. And he wants to spend $14 billion on one-time “strategic investment” in key areas, including synchronizing education with labor needs, improving teacher quality and making college more affordable. Continue reading...
The new budget proposal would raise funding for the Energy Department by 3.2 percent to $27.2 billion, boosting money for clean energy, research and development, and advanced manufacturing. As in the past, the administration has again proposed to eliminate tax incentives worth about $4 billion a year for oil and gas companies.
The biggest single proposed spending increase is in the department’s National Nuclear Security Administration for extending the life of nuclear weapons in the nation’s stockpile and for financing a uranium processing facility. Continue reading...
Environmental Protection Agency
The Obama administration proposed trimming the Environmental Protection Agency’s budget 1.2 percent Monday, cutting money to the states and for hazardous cleanup even as it boosted money to restore the Chesapeake Bay.
The $8.3 billion funding request represents a $105 million cut below EPA’s 2012 enacted level. In it, the White House slashed funding for the Superfund Remedial Program by $33 million but pledged to provide the money “necessary for EPA to be prepared to respond to emergency releases of hazardous substances and circumstances that place the public at imminent risk of exposure and harm.” Continue reading...
President Obama’s proposed budget includes $2.5 billion for the Food and Drug Administration, basically the same amount enacted by Congress for fiscal 2012.
When user fees are added, the agency’s budget increases to $4.5 billion, up from $3.8 billion the previous year. The majority of the user fees comes from the pharmaceutical industry. Those fees are used to expedite the review of drugs. Continue reading...
Health and Human Services Department
Overall, the Department of Health and Human Services’ proposed discretionary budget of $76.4 billion would barely budge under the Obama administration’s spending plan. However, this masks some notable shifts in how the money would be allocated.
The budget text declares that one of the administration’s “highest priorities” is to fund implementation of the 2010 health-care law that is among the president’s signature achievements. This includes assisting states with developing the complex technical infrastructure needed to set up the law’s “exchanges” — or state-based marketplaces through which individuals and small businesses will be able to purchase private health insurance with federal subsidies beginning in 2014. The administration is also developing federally facilitated versions of the exchanges to stand up in states that are unable or unwilling to run their own in time. Continue reading...
The new budget proposal would trim funding for the Department of Homeland Security by 0.5 percent, or $191 million below the 2012 enacted level of $39.5 billion.
The budget would maintain core operations, including the continued deployment of 21,186 Customs and Border Protection officers and 21,370 Border Patrol agents. And the proposal contains $6.1 billion for FEMA’s Disaster Relief Fund.
Department of Housing and Urban Development
The Department of Housing and Urban Development’s 2013 budget request includes a steep increase for a program known as Project Rebuild that aims to help local governments rehabilitate, redevelop or demolish vacant properties left behind by the housing crisis.
The program, announced in September as part of the president’s proposed American Jobs Act, is modeled on the long-running Neighborhood Stabilization Program. It is part of the administration’s broader efforts to keep struggling borrowers in their homes, create jobs in hard-hit communities and revitalize areas ravaged by foreclosures. Continue reading...
President Obama’s proposed fiscal 2013 budget contains $52.6 billion to fund the National Intelligence Program run under Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper. This is less than the $55 billion sought last year but closer to the amount approved for fiscal 2012 by Congress.
This money pays for activities of the CIA and 15 other intelligence agencies within the Defense, State, Homeland Security and Justice departments and well as Clapper's organization. The vast majority goes to Pentagon agencies such as the National Security Agency, which does electronic interception, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency which does satellite imagery and the National Reconnaissance Office which builds and manages intelligence satellites. The Military Intelligence Program budget for fiscal 2013 is not published nor are the details of the National Intelligence Program spending. Continue reading...
The proposed White House budget would slash $200 million from a Department of the Interior program that helps six states with offshore oil and gas development — Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, California, Alaska and Alabama. The states have been slow to obligate money provided for the program, leaving more than half a billion dollars in unobligated funds. Continue reading...
President Obama’s fiscal 2013 budget proposes $36.5 billion in spending for the Justice Department, an increase of $1.9 billion from the previous year.
More than $700 million is proposed to combat financial, mortgage and other fraud, an increase of $55 million over the previous budget. The proposed funding would go toward more FBI agents, criminal prosecutors, civil litigators, in-house investigators and forensic accountants to investigate and prosecute financial fraud. Continue reading...
President Obama’s spending plan for the Labor Department consolidates some of the agency’s multiple job-creation programs, some of which are underperforming.
The fiscal 2013 budget would boost spending slightly, by 1 percent, to $12 billion. Spending would increase for worker-protection programs. Continue reading...
As expected, NASA’s budget axes a partnership with the European Space Agency that was to send two robotic probes to Mars later this decade. With the agency’s budget declining 0.3 percent to $17.7 billion, the Mars program lost out to the massively over-budget James Webb Space Telescope, the successor to the aging Hubble Space Telescope. The Webb will continue toward a 2018 launch.
Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.), a prime champion of the new telescope, cemented congressional support for the project last fall after House Republicans threatened cancelation. Baltimore will be home to the telescope’s operations center. Continue reading...
In 2009, President Obama vowed to double the budget of theNational Science Foundation. Economic reality quickly caught up with that plan, but the president’s budget request for 2013 does provide a 5 percent boost for the NSF, sending its budget to $7.4 billion.
More than 40 percent of the funds, $3.2 billion, would be given as grants to researchers at universities and other institutions. Continue reading...
The State Department would receive a modest boost in revenue, in part to offset costs for increased responsibilities in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The administration’s plan calls for $43.4 in funding for the department’s so-called “core” budget, with an additional $8.2 billion for “overseas contingency operations,” which includes civilian-led missions in war zones. Total spending would rise by 1.6 percent over 2012 levels. Continue reading...
In a year of widespread budget cuts, the Transportation Department is a bright spot.
Mandatory and discretionary federal transportation funding would climb about 2 percent, or by $1.4 billion from the previous year, with major investments in highways and public transportation. Continue reading...
The Obama administration proposed Monday increasing theTreasury Department’s budget to $14 billion, an increase of nearly 7 percent over its 2012 budget, with new funding directed toward enforcing the nation’s tax laws.
The Internal Revenue Serviceaccounts for the vast majority of the Treasury Department’s budget. The IRS would receive $12.8 billion in 2013 under Obama’s plan, compared to $11.9 billion 2012. The administration says the additional resources would go to intensify enforcement of the tax code, which it claims can return $5 for every dollar spent. Continue reading...
Department of Veterans Affairs
The Department of Veterans Affairs would get $64 billion in discretionary spending under President Obama’s fiscal 2013 budget proposal, a 4.5 percent increase in funding that includes medical care for returning veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan.
The VA’s mandatory budget, which is mostly for disability compensation and pensions, would jump to $76.3 billion, a 16.2 percent increase. Overall, the VA budget would reach $140.3 billion, an increase of 10.5 percent. Continue reading...
Read Obama’s full budget proposal below:
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