US President Donald Trump’s budget ‘one of the cruelest’ in US history

Senator Bernie Sanders speaks during a rally in front of the Capitol March 22, 2017 in Washington, DC. (Photo by AFP)

Key Democratic figure Senator Bernie Sanders lambasts US President Donald Trump’s proposed budget in part for depriving nearly one million children from early education.

The Vermont senator outlined some of the reasons that would make the budget “one of the cruelest in American history” in a barrage of tweets on Monday.

He made the remarks in regard to Trump’s first federal budget blueprint, unveiled earlier this month.

“Far from compassionate, Trump's budget — if enacted — would be one of the cruelest in American history. It must be defeated,” said the Democratic candidate for the 2016 presidential election, referencing earlier comments by Mick Mulvaney, the director of the Office of Management, (pictured below) about the document’s “compassion.”

The 75-year-old challenged the idea by exemplifying a single mother from Detroit and how she could suffer under the “draconian cuts in Trump's budget.”

“’Compassion’ from Trump for this single mother means $6.2 billion in cuts to affordable housing, which could force her out of her apartment,” he said. “If an eviction notice arrives, she won't have a lawyer because this ‘compassionate’ budget would eliminate the Legal Services Corporation.”

He further argued that the proposed budget would harm education, especially for children.

“The budget could cut as much as $1 billion from Head Start, meaning some 95,000 children will be thrown out of early education & child care,” he wrote, adding that, if enacted, it would eliminate “the 21st Century Community Learning Centers Program—leaving 1.1 million kids in the streets or home alone after school.”

Apart from that, he argued that it would cut $6.2 billion in affordable housing and 31 percent of the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) budget.

It would also put college “more out of reach,” he said.

Trump’s director of the Office of Management said during an NBC interview on March 19 that Trump's supporters would like the budget.

“The president knows who his voters are,” Mulvaney said. "His voters are folks who pay taxes as well.”

The former GOP representative from South Carolina further stated that “For the first time in a long time, you have an administration that is looking at the compassion of both sides of the equation.”

In a message from the president at the start of the proposed plan, Trump asserts that the cuts are “sensible and rational” while aimed at eliminating “wasteful spending.”