Spending deal cuts $3.4 billion from State and foreign operations

Funding for the State Department and foreign operations will drop $3.4 billion from 2017 to 2018 if the current spending bill passes. That drop is despite an overall increase in nondefense spending levels.

The State Department will see a $1.8 billion cut to its operations budget in 2018, according to summary documents provided with the 2018 budget. The cuts are “largely due to reduced costs of United Nations international peacekeeping missions,” in addition to the expiry of a one-time anti-Islamic State in Iraq and Syria campaign.

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The 2018 omnibus spending bill, released late on Wednesday night, would also cut bilateral economic assistance by $900 million as compared to 2017, and multilateral assistance by $253 million.

The Trump administration has argued that the U.S. should reduce aid to countries that do not vote with it at the United Nations.

The bill did not include funding for “controversial or unnecessary programs” such as the Green Climate Fund, international debt relief and UNESCO, according to summary documents.

The Trump administration announced plans to withdraw from UNESCO in October over what it called “anti-Israel bias.”