House Republicans rejected Donald Trump’s steep budgets cuts for the Environmental Protection Agency as members of the president’s party instead offered a trim in spending for the environmental regulator.
The White House had proposed a record 31 percent cut to the agency’s roughly $8 billion budget, telling lawmakers it wanted to cut 3,200 jobs and shrink or eliminate a wide swath of programs, including those aimed cutting lead poisoning and improving the health of the Great Lakes. Instead, congressional appropriators released a bill Tuesday that would slice the agency’s budget by 6.5 percent to $7.5 billion.