Trump proposes record spending, trillion-dollar deficit

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump proposed a record $4.7 trillion budget today, pushing the federal deficit past $1 trillion but counting on optimistic growth, accounting shuffles and steep domestic cuts to bring future spending into balance in 15 years.

Reviving his border wall fight with Congress, Trump wants more than $8 billion for the barrier with Mexico, and he's also asking for a big boost in military spending. That's alongside steep cuts in health care and economic support programs for the poor that Democrats – and even some Republicans – will oppose.

Trump called his plan a bold next step for a nation experiencing "an economic miracle." House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called his cuts "cruel and shortsighted ... a roadmap to a sicker, weaker America."

Presidential budgets tend to be seen as aspirational blueprints, rarely becoming enacted policy, and Trump's proposal for the new fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1, sets up a showdown with Congress over priorities, especially as he reignites his push for money to build the U.S-Mexico border wall.

The deficit is projected to hit $1.1 trillion in the 2020 fiscal year, the highest in a decade. The administration is counting on robust growth, including from the Republican tax cuts – which Trump wants to make permanent – to push down the red ink.

Some economists, though, say the bump from the tax cuts is waning, and they project slower economic expansion in coming years. The national debt is $22 trillion.

Even with his own projections, Trump's budget would not come into balance for a decade and a half, rather than the traditional hope of balancing in 10.