The budget would not balance for 15 years, breaking Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign promise to pay off the entire national debt within eight years. Mr. Trump’s first budget proposed to achieve balance in 10 years. The budget released on Monday forecasts trillion-dollar deficits for four straight years, starting in 2019. Those are largely the result of Mr. Trump’s tax cut, which has been financed through increased government borrowing.
Budget details released by White House officials highlight several areas of conflict between Democrats and Mr. Trump, starting with immigration enforcement. Along with renewing the wall funding fight that led to a record government shutdown late last year, Mr. Trump is asking for more personnel at United States Customs and Immigration Enforcement and a policy change meant to end so-called sanctuary cities, which do not hand over undocumented immigrants to federal officials when they are arrested in local crimes.
Representative John Yarmuth, Democrat of Kentucky and chairman of the House Budget Committee, said the president’s budget “once again lays out an irresponsible and cynical vision for our country, without any regard for its human cost.” He added, “Given the important budget hurdles we face this year that will require bipartisan and responsible solutions, the president’s budget is a dereliction of duty.”
Disapproval from Democratic presidential candidates was just as blunt. “This is a budget for the military industrial complex, for corporate C.E.O.s, for Wall Street and for the billionaire class,” Senator Bernie Sanders, Independent of Vermont, said in a statement. “It is dead on arrival.”
Even some prominent Republicans greeted the president’s request somewhat coolly, because it did not go far enough to reduce the growing national debt.
Representative Steve Womack, Republican of Arkansas, and the ranking member on the Budget Committee, noted that only by cutting mandatory spending could the federal government seriously reduce deficits and debt.
“President Trump’s budget takes steps in the right direction, but there is still much work to do,” Mr. Womack said in a statement.