Trump to Ask Cabinet Secretaries to Cut Spending by Five Percent

President Trump said today that the administration would be asking cabinet-level secretaries to cut their budgets. “We’re going to be asking for a 5 percent cut from every secretary, if not more,” President Trump told reporters in the White House. “Get rid of the fat, get rid of the waste,” Trump said separately at a cabinet meeting. “I’m sure everybody at this table can do it. It’ll have a huge impact. That’s a very, very important request that I’m making,” he told cabinet members.  But Trump added the request would not apply to the Department of Defense, and stated that the Pentagon budget “will probably be $700 billion,” compared to the department’s current FY 2019 budget of $716 billion.