Advocacy Email - March 10, 2004
Subject: International Affairs Budget (3/10/2004)
To: International Education Advocates
UPDATE:
Legislative Update: President & Congress Begin Work on Budget
President Bush calls for strong International Affairs Budget
- Congress may target account in budget negotiations
In early February, President Bush submitted his 2005 budget to Congress.
Within his budget, the President requested an additional 7% from last year's
levels to be spent on the International Affairs programs. Even with the
increase, the International Affairs Budget remains at only 1.6% of the
entire U.S. budget and is still less than 50% of what we were spending in
1985, as a percentage of GDP.
The U.S. Global Leadership Campaign praised the President for requesting
$31.5 billion for the International Affairs Budget that includes such
important programs as humanitarian support, HIV/AIDS funding, education
exchanges, embassy security, and economic export promotion programs. The
majority of the increase was directed to funding two new Presidential
initiatives: the Millennium Challenge Account and money to combat Global
HIV/AIDS. With a few exceptions, all other programs in this account remained
unchanged from 2004. The U.S. Global Leadership Campaign is concerned that
these new initiatives are not funded at the expense of existing programs.
See a
complete list of programs funded by the International Affairs Budget.
The action now turns to Congress. The House and Senate began their
deliberations of the President's budget last week. Already, the Senate
Budget Chair has called for a $1.1 billion cut to the President's request
for International Affairs spending. In an election year with growing
deficits, there is enormous pressure for potential cuts to all the
discretionary accounts, especially the international programs.
Both the Senate and the House are trying to complete the work on their
budgets before the Easter Congressional break. This is the first step in a
long process of securing adequate funding for critical programs that not
only help those throughout the world create better, more stable lives, but
are also critical to our national security, economic interests, and
humanitarian and democratic values.
ACTION:
Requested by March 31, 2004
Members of Congress need to hear from you immediately. We already know
that the Senate has proposed a cut to the International Affairs Budget and
we are anticipating the House to do the same. Given the size of this
account, any cut will have a minimal impact on our overall federal budget
spending, but as you know any cut to the International Affairs Budget will
have a significant impact on these important programs.
Please take a moment and
send a message to your Senators and Representative and urge them to
oppose any cuts to the International Affairs Budget. Every voice will make a
difference.
Get Involved
To build strong grassroots advocacy for internationalizing education K-12
(K-20 even!), please invite your friends and colleagues to sign on to the
advocacy@internationaledwa.org listserv. To subscribe to the listserv,
they can complete the
Get Involved Form:
http://internationaledwa.org/forms/get_involved.htm.
____________________________________
Washington State Coalition for International Education
http://internationaledwa.org
For questions or to unsubscribe,
contact:
action@internationaledwa.org