WASHINGTON – In the wake of Trump administration efforts to reorganize the U.S. State Department and egregiously cut funding for critical U.S. national security programs, U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), a member of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations and U.S. Senate Appropriations Committees, introduced an amendment to the 2018 budget proposal to prohibit the administration from significantly reorganizing the State Department without Congressional authorization.

“President Trump and Secretary Tillerson have purposely neutered American diplomacy. Nothing about this administration gives me faith that their unilateral reorganization of the State Department would be productive,” said Murphy. “A botched reorganization – designed to reduce our reach overseas – would have immediate harm on our national security, and it would reverberate for decades. Congress needs to stake out our ground here. We authorize these programs under law and fund them through appropriations, and we should demand any wholesale departmental reorganization only happen with our approval." 

Full text of Murphy’s amendment is available here.

Earlier this year, Murphy blasted the Trump administration’s proposal to cut State Department funding. He also criticized President Trump’s proposal to gut assistance for developing countries and to fold the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) into the Department of State. Murphy is author of “Rethinking the Battlefield,” a comprehensive proposal containing specific recommendations to dramatically increase the United States’ non-military footprint abroad by nearly doubling the U.S. foreign affairs budget – including the State Department and USAID – with an emphasis on funding for international development, additional foreign service officers, anti-corruption efforts, countering propaganda, crisis response, and humanitarian relief.

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