This year’s Trump administration budget proposes a roughly 14 percent cut for the Department of the Interior (DOI), including key programs that focus on climate change. Earlier today, Democratic members of the Natural Resources Committee questioned Scott Cameron, a high-ranking DOI official, on why the president wants these sweeping cuts to critical climate change programs. We didn’t get a lot of clear answers.
Republicans forced massive tax cuts for the super-rich through Congress when they had unified control of the federal government. Now they’ve turned around and claimed that we don’t have enough money to protect the environment. Chair Grijalva and Committee Democrats are pushing for real action on climate, and they’re holding the Trump administration accountable for making the climate crisis worse by ignoring it and cutting programs designed to help.
In this chapter of Watchdog we’re investigating President Trump’s climate change cuts.
The Trump Budget guts the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), the sole science agency for the Department of the Interior, and key programs focused on climate research. The USGS provides the public with the best available science on the water, energy, minerals, and other natural resources we rely on. USGS investigates the health of our ecosystems, the quality of our environment, and the impacts of climate change and land-use patterns over time.
The Climate Adaptation Science Center would be cut by more $20.6 million (about 46 percent of its overall budget). The Climate Adaptation Science Center researches how climate change impacts our natural resources. Cuts of this magnitude will significantly hamper our ability to prepare for and adapt to climate change.
The Trump budget completely eliminates the biological carbon sequestration program, which currently has 34 employees. This move would eliminate all research into how to better understand and improve how carbon is stored in natural ecosystems.
The geologic carbon sequestration program would be cut by roughly $1.9 million (64 percent of its budget), harming research into efforts to store carbon dioxide deep underground.
President Trump’s Interior budget steeply cuts Western drought funding at the Bureau of Reclamation, including a 71 percent cut to the WaterSMART Grants program that addresses drought and aims to increase water supplies through conservation, water-use efficiency and water reuse projects.
The Trump budget cuts the Title XVI Water Reuse Program by 95 percent, virtually eliminating it. These cuts will leave our country less prepared for future droughts and exacerbate current water shortages. Without a response, climate-induced drought will dramatically reduce our nation’s water supply and affect millions of Americans.
The president’s budget effectively eliminates funding for the Land and Water Conservation Fund — the main funding source for federal and state governments to acquire land from willing sellers for conservation. LWCF funds protect unique landscapes and ecosystems, safeguarding the ecosystem services human communities depend on. This budget proposal comes after Congress united to permanently authorize the Land and Water Conservation Fund in the John D. Dingell, Jr. Conservation, Management, and Recreation Act.
The Trump budget cuts $163.6 million (97 percent) from the National Park Service’s Land Acquisition and State Assistance programs.This severe cut jeopardizes NPS’s ability to acquire important wildlife habitats and conservation lands, leaving park units and wildlife less prepared for the disruptions caused by climate change.
The Trump budget cuts $2.7 million (7 percent) from the already underfunded National Conservation Lands System (NCLS) at the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), an agency under DOI. This cut would leave BLM with limited funding to manage the more than 34 million acres of national monuments, wilderness areas, trails, and other landscape types managed under NCLS — amounting to only $3 per acre. These lands preserve biodiversity and the ecosystem services on which communities rely; by limiting BLM’s ability to adequately manage and protect them, the administration is wasting a valuable resources in the fight against climate change. Studies show that the ecosystems most resilient to climate change are those least disturbed by human activity, such as the 224 wilderness areas and 517 wilderness study areas managed under the National Conservation Lands System. The president’s proposed budget cuts threaten the management of these resilient ecosystems.
Trump eliminates the Cooperative Landscape Conservation program from the Fish and Wildlife Service budget, which facilitates federal-state and public-private partnerships designed to increase resiliency, primarily to climate change, of both natural and built environments. The program has leveraged funds and coordinated conservation planning to avoid duplication across agencies. Eliminating it serves no good environmental or budgetary purpose.
President Trump eliminates funding for Science Support Programs ($17.3 million) including Adaptive Science, a program that develops and applies conservation science to climate change, especially its impacts on wildlife and cultural resources, and to emerging concerns such as wildlife health concerns and invasive species.
The budget cuts State and Tribal Wildlife Grants through the Fish and Wildlife Service by $33.3 million. These grants leverage funds to support state and tribal management of wildlife and support efforts to improve state and tribal resilience to drought and coastal flooding.
The president’s budget eliminates $18 billion over 10 years in tax incentives for renewable energy, residential energy efficiency, and plug-in electric vehicle deployment — while preserving more than $28 billion in estimated tax expenditures for the oil, gas, and coal industries. This move biases tax expenditures in favor of carbon-producing fuels.
The Trump budget cuts $2.2 million (44 percent) from the Energizing Insular Communities program in the Office of Insular Affairs within DOI. These severe cuts jeopardize the implementation of renewable energy plans and the execution of high-priority projects across Guam, American Samoa, the U.S. Virgin Islands and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, such as micro-grids, solar energy generation, consumer efficiency, and integrated resource planning.
President Trump’s Department of the Interior proposes completely eliminating funding for the Tribal Climate Resilience program, currently funded at about $10 million. This program supports resilient ocean and coastal management efforts for tribes, including the Great Lakes area. This program is vital to address coastal erosion and land management issues arising from climate change. A funding cut for this program will hurt tribes’ ability to prevent some of the most serious effects of climate change for their communities.
The Trump budget includes an increase of $7.9 million (66 percent) for the BLM Coal Management Program for the purpose of allowing new coal mines to open faster.
