About

What This Site Is

Where the Cuts Fall is a public resource that makes the FY2027 federal budget proposal navigable and understandable. Every proposed cut, reduction, and cancellation has been extracted from the official budget document, structured, and explained in plain language with AI-generated summaries.

Understanding the Numbers

Discretionary vs. Mandatory Spending

The federal budget has two main categories:

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  Discretionary spending is funded annually through the congressional appropriations process. Most domestic programs — education, housing, EPA, science agencies — fall here. The FY2027 proposal cuts roughly $73B+ in non-defense discretionary spending.
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  Mandatory spending (Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid) runs on autopilot and is not covered by this site, as it requires separate legislation to change.
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  IIJA rescissions are a third category unique to this budget: the administration proposes cancelling unspent funds from the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (over $20B). These are technically "rescissions" of already-appropriated money and sit outside the normal annual process. This site includes them because they would eliminate funding communities were planning around.

Why Totals May Differ

The headline "$73B" figure refers specifically to non-defense discretionary cuts. When you add IIJA rescissions (DOE, DOT, NTIA), the total proposed reduction in programs and commitments exceeds $93B. Both figures are accurate; they measure different things. The department-level totals reflect the net change in the department's total budget (which may include mandatory components), so individual program cuts may not sum exactly to the department total.

Data Sources

• ▸Primary source: Budget of the U.S. Government, Fiscal Year 2027, Office of Management and Budget, April 2026. All dollar amounts and page references trace directly to this document.
• ▸Program context: Who-is-served data and historical program information drawn from agency websites, congressional testimony, and CRS reports.
• ▸AI summaries: Plain-language summaries generated using Claude (Anthropic) from structured program data. Summaries aim to be factual and balanced, noting both the administration's rationale and independent assessments. They are not editorial opinion.

AI Summary Methodology

Each program summary was generated using a structured prompt with the following inputs:

• Program name and parent department
• Proposed cut amount and type (elimination, reduction, etc.)
• Administration's stated justification from the budget document
• Population served (from agency data)

The prompt instructs the model to be factual, include numbers, and note both the administration's rationale and what independent analysts say. Summaries were generated at a general adult reading level. Impact ratings (critical / major / moderate / minor) are derived algorithmically from cut size and type, not editorially assigned.

Limitations

• ▸This is a point-in-time snapshot of the April 2026 proposal. Congressional action may change any figure.
• ▸Some cut amounts are approximate where the budget document uses language like "approximately" or provides only percentage changes.
• ▸The $73B headline figure excludes defense-side reforms and IIJA rescissions by convention; our program data includes both.
• ▸AI summaries may contain errors. When precision matters, refer to the primary budget document using the provided page references.
• ▸Department total-budget figures include mandatory spending components; individual cut totals may not reconcile to department totals.

Congressional Tracking

To follow what Congress actually does with these proposals, see:

• ▸Senate Appropriations Committee
• ▸House Appropriations Committee
• ▸Congressional Budget Office cost estimates