President Trump says he has reversed his administration’s request to slash federal funding for Special Olympics grants.
He claimed that he just learned about about the cuts today and immediately withdrew the proposal to Congress to cut $17.6 million from the organization for athletes with disabilities.
‘The Special Olympics will be funded. I just told my people. I wanna fund the Special Olympics, and I just authorized a funding of the Special Olympics,’ he told reporters on Thursday as he left the White House. ‘I have overridden my people. We’re funding the Special Olympics.’
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos said earlier in the day that she wasn’t ‘involved’ in the controversial decision to recommend Special Olympics funding cuts, passing the buck. She suggested the White House budget office was behind the assault on the popular program.
After Trump claimed his ‘people’ were responsible and he found out ‘this morning,’ she claimed once again that she wasn’t culpable.
‘I am pleased and grateful the president and I see eye-to-eye on this issue,’ she said. ‘This is funding I have fought for behind-the-scenes over the last several years.’
President Trump says he has reversed his administration’s request to slash federal funding for the Special Olympics
He claimed that he just learned about about the cuts today and immediately withdrew the proposal to Congress to cut $17.6 million from the organization for athletes with disabilities
Democrats had condemned the cuts as ‘shameful’ and a ‘bad decision’ and Republicans in Congress backed away from the administrtion’s proposal
DeVos suggested that President Trump and the White House are calling the shots when it comes to the administration’s budget requests during testimony on Thursday to Congress.
She claimed at a Senate hearing, under questioning from Democrat Dick Durbin, ‘I didn’t personally get involved.’
‘Let’s not use disabled children in a twisted way for your political narrative,’ she also said. ‘That is just disgusting and it’s shameful and I think we should move on from that.’
He said the recommended slash is ‘shameful’ and ‘someone has to accept responsibility for a bad decision.’
‘Whoever came up with that idea at OMB gets a Special Olympics gold medal for insensitivity,’ he told her.
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos came under fire Wednesday and Thursday after unveiling a budget proposal that eliminated $17.6 million in federal grants for Special Olympics
‘Whoever came up with that idea at OMB gets a Special Olympics gold medal for insensitivity,’ Sen. Dick Durbin told DeVos
DeVos came under intense fire on Wednesday from the family that created Special Olympics and its most vocal backer in the U.S. Senate after she argued that the federal government should cancel $17.6 million in planned grants to the organization.
DeVos, among the biggest lightning rods in Donald Trump’s Cabinet, was accused of trying to cut 10 per cent from her budget to keep in line with the president’s penny-pinching goals.
She said her budget request includes $13.2 billion to help states ‘ensure students with disabilities have the resources and supports they need,’ and insisted that the 50-year-old Special Olympics should be funded by private donors like most other non-governmental charities.
The Special Olympics 2017 annual report showed $144 million of income, including $113 million from individual, corporate and foundation donors.
As she came under attack on Thursday in the U.S. Senate, the education secretary said she wasn’t the one who recommended the cuts, seemingly throwing the White House under the proverbial bus.
Sen. Roy Blunt, the chairman of the subcommittee she was testifying before, made it clear that he would not support cuts, pushing back on the executive branch request.
So did House Minority Leader Kevin, McCarthy, who said Thursday to reporters, ‘No. I fully support Special Olympics.’
Maria Shriver, the wife of former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and sister of Special Olympics chairman Timothy Shriver, unloaded on DeVos in a series of tweets on Wednesday that fueled a bitter controversy over how much is enough.
The Shrivers’ mother, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, founded Special Olympics in 1968. It’s the world’s largest sports competition for children and adults with disabilities.
‘This is outrageous in every way. Let’s let our voices be heard. No cutting @SpecialOlympics,’ Mrs. Shriver tweeted.
Maria Shriver, whose mother founded the group and whose brother is its chairman, unloaded on DeVos
Special Olympics, founded in 1968, is the world’s largest sports competition for children and adults with disabilities
The Special Olympics 2017 annual report showed $144 million of income, including $113 million from individual, corporate and foundation donors and more than $15 million from the U.S. federal government
Zeroing out the $17.6 million in Special Olympics grants would save taxpayers roughty the same amount of money the government spends on five of President Donald Trump’s repeated trips to his Mar-a-Lago resort club in Palm Beach, Florida.
The Government Accountability Office reported in February that just those trips cost roughly $3.4 million each – approximately $1 million per day.
As the outrage spread at the speed of the Internet, Mrs. Shriver tweeted at DeVos, first lady Melania Trump and second lady Karen Pence: ‘You have been at our @SpecialOlympics games. Don’t try to balance our nation’s budget on the back of those with special needs. Not your best.’
By mid-afternoon she broadened her outrage to flag Democrats in the race to challenge President Trump.
‘I’d love to hear from those running for president regarding @BetsyDeVosED @SpecialOlympics budget cuts,’ Mrs. Shriver wrote. ‘This is a values question: Who are we as a nation? What & whom do we value? What does inclusion mean to us? What are the rights of those with specials needs?’
Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, one of the Democratic 2020 hopefuls, swung hard.
‘[P]roposed cuts to @SpecialOlympics by Betsy DeVos are an affront to our values,’ Klobuchar wrote on Twitter. ‘Kids with disabilities can’t write checks & thus got on the chopping block. But their power comes from the people. I will fight these cuts.’
Mrs. Shriver vented on Twitter, challenging Melania Trump, Karen Pence and all of the 2020 Democratic presidential hopefuls to join in her outrage
More than 7,000 athletes from 170 countries competed in 24 summer sports at this year’s Special Olympics in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, along with 2,500 coaches and 20,000 volunteers
Darina Khrihova of Slovakia competed in the Special Olympics’s 25 Meter breaststroke at the Zayed Sports City Stadium in Abu Dhabi on March 18
Betsy Devos’s outrage at her critics following announcement of Special Olympics funding cut
Secretary DeVos Corrects the Record on Trump Administration Support for Students with Disabilities
Following is a statement from U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy Devos:
‘It is unacceptable, shameful and counterproductive that the media and some members of Congress have spun up falsehoods and fully misrepresented the facts.
‘Make no mistake: we are focused every day on raising expectations and improving outcomes for infants and toddlers, children and youth with disabilities, and are committed to confronting and addressing anything that stands in the way of their success.
‘The President’s budget reflects that commitment. It supports our nation’s 7 million students with disabilities through a $13.2 billion request for IDEA funding, the same funding level appropriated by Congress. All of that money goes directly to states to ensure students with disabilities have the resources and supports they need. The budget also requests an additional $225.6 million for competitively awarded grants to support teacher preparation, research and technical assistance to support students with disabilities.
‘The Special Olympics is not a federal program. It’s a private organization. I love its work, and I have personally supported its mission. Because of its important work, it is able to raise more than $100 million every year. There are dozens of worthy nonprofits that support students and adults with disabilities that don’t get a dime of federal grant money. But given our current budget realities, the federal government cannot fund every worthy program, particularly ones that enjoy robust support from private donations.’
Blunt vowed to block the de-funding request in the Senate’s final budget.
‘I’m a longtime supporter of Special Olympics and proud that Missouri is home to the largest Special Olympics training facility inthe world,’ Blunt said in a statement. ‘I was just at the World Games and saw, as I have many times before, what a huge impact the organization has on athletes, their families, and their communities.’
‘Our Department of Education appropriations bill will not cut funding for the program.’
Timothy Shriver told MSNBC on Wednesday that without the federal government’s money his organization would have to discontinue ‘what we are doing in schools to end social isolation’ for intellectually disabled students.
‘We just disagree’ with DeVos, he said.
Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar was among the Democratic presidential hopefuls to pile on DeVos this week
Special Olympics chairman Timothy Shriver tols MSNBC on Wednesday that he disagrees with Devos’s proposed funding cuts
Missouri Republican Sen. Roy Blunt, pictured with Timothy Shriver in 2010, said he would block the Special Olympics funding cut when the federal budget gets to the U.S. Senate
According to Connecticut Democratic Rep. Rosa DeLauro, who chaired the subcommittee hearing on Wednesday, the three education budgets written by President Trump’s administration have proposed the largest cuts to education funding since the department’s creation in 1979.
The late Eunice Kennedy Shriver, pictured in 2000, founded Special Olympics in 1968
DeLauro called the budget a ‘cruel and reckless,’ proposal that ‘will hurt the middle class and low-income families that most need our help.’
‘How can you support this budget? I mean that genuinely,’ she said.
‘As secretary of the Department of Education, how can you support, even boast, about taking 10 per cent … away from our teachers and students?’
The latest Education Department budget proposal includes a $2 billion reduction for Pell Grants, along with billions more for about 30 other programs.
It already had a slim chance of being approved by Democrats who control the House of Representatives.