US President Donald Trump's administration has proposed cutting funding to the State Department and the US Agency for International Development by more than a third in a move that drew immediate push-back from senators on both sides of the aisle.
The White House Office of Management and Budget has proposed cuts of 37 per cent at two agencies that provide US foreign aid, according to two people familiar with the matter who asked not to be identified because the figure hasn't been publicly disclosed. The State Department requested more than US$50 billion in its 2017 budget.
The cuts are part of Trump's plan to cut spending from the government's discretionary budget to fund increases in defence spending, according to Administration officials.
Some conservatives have objected to the way the State Department's programmes grew under President Barack Obama, with numerous special envoys and offices overseeing projects such as climate change and biodiversity.
"If it's anywhere in the ballpark of what I've seen about the State Department, that's definitely dead on arrival," Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, said of Trump's State Department cuts. "That guts soft power and puts our diplomats at risk."