welcome back, everyone. i m ayman mohyeldin alongside louis burgdorf. it s the bottom of the hour. let s start with the morning s top stories. president trump has formally submitted his 2020 budget to congress and it appears his promises to slash the government s debt will be easier said than done. he s proposing a $4.75 trillion budget with a focus on increasing military spending. the defense department s budget is to be boosted by $33 billion to $718 billion or more than half of the entire proposed federal discretionary budget. the plan also calls for $8.6 billion to be set aside for construction of trump s wall along the southern border with mexico. the budget would slash $845 billion from medicare over the next ten years. it would also remove $241 billion from medicaid over that same period. now the blueprint also aims to
slash $228 billion from the food assistance program known as snap while proposing reforms including mandatory work requirements and food box delivery service instead of cash benefits. president trump s budget shows instead of shrinking the national debt he ll add to it. the white house was questioned yesterday on the figures showing that the budget would not actually be balanced for 15 years instead of eight years as candidate trump promised. the president promised during the campaign. he promised he would eliminate the national debt within eight years. as you know, the debt at the end of his first year was at 20 trillion. last year it went to 21 trillion. last month 22 trillion. what happened to that promise? look, again, the administration nearly doubled the national debt and when this president ran for office he made a commitment he would attempt to tackle the debt within eight years. this president did that in the
very first year he came to office by sending forth a budget that balanced within ten years and had more spending reductions than any in history. democratic leaders in congress pronounced president trump s budget doa, dead on arrival setting the stage for another fight between both sides. chuck schumer said in part the trump administration s latest budget proposal is a gut punch to the american middle class and a handout to the wealthiest few and powerful special interests that would worsen income in equality. nancy pelosi said that the cruel and short sighted cuts in president trump s budget request after road map to a sicker, weaker america. house democrats will reject this toxic, destructive budget request which would hollow out our national strength and fail to meet the needs of the american people. six in ten voters in swing counties want to see more new elected president next year.
we ve seen how lawmakers are preparing that they are starting investigations and nancy pelosi taking impeachment off the table. thinking about how to react broadly to what comes out of robert mueller s investigation once those results are clear. at the white house, you know, i think they ve been preparing this for some time. they added some staff including on the communication staff to talk to reporters like myself. so they are bracing for it as well. but at the same time juggling that with everything else that they have to juggle as they, you know, prepare for other policy issues at the white house. let s go back to the budget story for a moment. a lot of criticism coming out of the democrats for the president s budget. many describing it as dead on arrival. he s asking for much more than he asked for the budget, i m not good for the math. $8 billion for the southern border wall. how does it hurt middle class american and the national debt over the long run? i think number one i
involved when a budget like this gets unveiled. it s a policy document. it shows what the president wants generally but not likely to get passed. to get to your specific question some of the issues that would affect middle class and poor americans, cuts proposed in food stamps, cuts proposed on medicare and medicaid. and the spending reductions come at the same time that the tax cuts have been implemented. the government is getting less revenue from taxes while also reducing spending and that will hurt the deficit and debt over the next few years. jeff mason live in washington, d.c. stick around for us. we ll see you on morning joe . vice president mike pence met with dick cheney during a private gathering on sunday. according to the transcript obtained by the washington post their discussion turned into a vigorous back and forth over trump s foreign policy. at the closed door retreat