The White House has backed down from its controversial proposal to virtually eliminate funding for the federal drug control office amid a nationwide opioid epidemic.
The administration was originally eyeing a 95 percent cut to the Office of National Drug Control Policy, POLITICO first reported earlier this month. The cut would have essentially halved the staff at the office overseeing the nation's response to the opioid epidemic while slashing two major grant programs.
But after facing pressure from Republican and Democratic lawmakers — especially those in states ravaged by the opioid epidemic — the White House is proposing $369 million for the office in 2018, amounting to a 5 percent cut.
The White House proposal would give the office's drug-free communities program $92 million, down from $95 million this year. The high-intensity drug trafficking program will get $246.5 million, down from $250 million.
However, the office would be in line for a staffing cut. The budget proposal calls for 66 full-time equivalents, down from 75 this year, a spokesperson confirmed to POLITICO.
Amid the initial outrage over the proposed 95 percent cut earlier this month, the White House stressed that it was still reviewing the budget and that no final decisions on funding had been made. Still, budget officials at the time suggested that the drug control office was duplicative of other efforts in the federal government.
Sens. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) were among those expressing outrage over the original proposal. In a bipartisan letter they led earlier this month, they urged the administration "to protect ONDCP and maintain the long-standing and effective programs that prevent and fight against the scourge of drug abuse.”
POLITICO first reported the Trump administration’s decision to reverse the funding cut on Tuesday morning before the release of the 2018 budget.
Ultimately, the administration scrapped a proposal that many critics believed would hamstring the fight against an epidemic killing 33,000 Americans in 2015. Many of the communities hardest hit by the epidemic overwhelmingly voted for Trump, who campaigned on ending the crisis.
"I’m happy to see [the Office of Management and Budget] reversed course and included funding for the office in its budget," Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) said in a statement. Capito was among the lawmakers pressuring Trump to fund the office, noting that West Virginia has the highest drug overdose rate in the nation.
"We still have a long way to go when it comes to the drug epidemic, and it is essential that we remain fully committed to fighting it. We need to be doing more — not less," she added.
The Trump administration says the budget shows its commitment to solving the opioids crisis, touting a proposed “total federal drug budget” of $27.75 billion for next year. That’s up from $27.48 billion, when accounting for all drug control-related activities across different departments, according to the document.
But public health advocates say that figure is misleading, given that many of those funds go toward law enforcement and not treatment of opioid addiction. For instance, the budget calls for $103 million in new funds for the Justice Department to ramp up prosecution of drug-related crimes.
The administration also assumes a cut of more than $1.4 trillion to Medicaid over the next decade — between Republicans’ health bill and further changes to cap the entitlement program — and includes $400 million in cuts to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. Those changes could shred the safety net and make it harder for people to access treatment for addiction.
Advocates also say that the White House shouldn’t get plaudits for keeping drug office funding.
"The administration was ultimately pressured into doing the right thing, but it remains disturbing that they ever considered walking away from responding to the opioid epidemic," said Keith Humphreys, a Stanford University professor who advised the previous two administrations on drug issues.