President Donald Trump said it’s “not possible” for the U.S. government to fund child care costs, Medicare, and Medicaid, claiming that it should be the states’ responsibility instead to “take care” of those programs as the federal government focuses on “military protection.”
During a private Easter luncheon, President Trump said he told Russell Vought, the director of the U.S. Office of Management and Budget (OMB), not to allocate funds towards daycare because “the United States can’t take care of daycare.”
“That has to be up to a state. We can’t take care of the daycare. We’re a big country. We have 50 states. We have all these other people. We’re fighting wars. We can’t take care of daycare. You got to let a state take care of daycare, and they should pay for it too,” President Trump remarked.
The president argued that states would have to raise their taxes to cover child care costs, adding that the federal government, "could lower our taxes a little bit to them to make up" for it. He went on to claim that "it's not possible for us to take care of daycare, Medicaid, Medicare, all these individual things.”
“They can do it on a state basis. You can't do it on a federal. We have to take care of one thing: military protection. We have to guard the country."
The private lunch was not open to the press, but President Trump’s comments surfaced after a video posted on the White House’s YouTube page included his statements. The video has since been deleted.
“The federal government currently provides states with funds to subsidize child care for low-income families through programs like Child Care and Development Block Grants and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families,” according to NBC News.
Pushback from Democratic Congressmembers
"Trump says we can pay for war in Iran but can't afford childcare. Mr. President, the billions you wasted in Iran could pay for $10 day childcare for every American family with childcare workers paid $25 an hour," Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) wrote in a post on X, responding to the president's comments.
"For the cost of 3 weeks of this war, we could provide vision, hearing, and dental coverage to every senior on Medicare for a year. It is possible. Trump just doesn't care to do it," Sen. Andy Kim (D-N.J.) also wrote on X.
Rampant fraud and abuse should mean the federal government needs to get out of the welfare programs, not add to them.