Health Care Newsletter

Trump requests nearly $16 billion in cuts at HHS

by Joseph Choi - 04/03/26 6:54 PM ET

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by Joseph Choi - 04/03/26 6:54 PM ET

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Health Care

The Big Story

Trump requests nearly $16 billion in cuts at HHS

In its 2027 fiscal request, the White House is calling for roughly $16 billion in cuts to funding for the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), including $5 billion from the National Institutes of Health.

The White House’s budget request would reduce HHS’s budget by 12.5 percent if enacted.

Among the largest proposed cuts are $5 billion from NIH and another $5 billion in “consolidations and eliminations” of programs across various sub-agencies.

“NIH broke the trust of the American people with wasteful spending, misleading information, risky research, and the promotion of dangerous ideologies that undermine public health,” the president’s budget request stated.

It proposes eliminating entire institutes such as the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities; the Fogarty International Center; and the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health.

Congress is unlikely to sign off on deep cuts to NIH funding. Appropriators in the House and Senate approved a $415 million increase to the agency’s budget in January.

The budget also seeks to consolidate costs through the creation of the Administration for a Healthy America (AHA), an office that the White House announced last year but has yet to be formalized. Congress did not include funding for the AHA in the last HHS budget.

Part of establishing the AHA would involve eliminating programs that the White House said promote “radicalized DEI ideologies.”

It specifically cited examples like funding for youth LGBTQ services provided through Planned Parenthood and eczema awareness campaign for Black Indigenous People of Color.

Welcome to The Hill’s Health Care newsletter, I’m Joseph Choi — every week we follow the latest moves on how Washington impacts your health.

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