Zaraki KenpachiThe US federal government’s spending plan for the fiscal year ending September 2024 would increase spending on infrastructure, education and provisions for the poor and middle class.
However, it needs approval from Congress and has been condemned by Republicans.
he amendment restricts coverage for recipients of Medicare, Medicaid, federal employees, servicewomen and Washington DC residents, but could still be added to the bill as it moves through Congress.
Women’s and civil rights groups say the amendment disproportionately impacts low-income women.
“Exciting to see the admin’s historic step. For too long, the Hyde amendment has put the gov’t in control of personal health care decisions for people with low incomes,” women’s health provider Planned Parenthood tweeted.
However, Republican House minority leader Kevin McCarthy said it “breaks decades of settled precedent by calling for direct taxpayer-funded abortion”.
Senator Lindsey Graham said the Democrat president’s budget was “insanely expensive”, while Ron Johnson called it “immoral”.
Mr Biden‘s budget is roughly 50% higher than pre-pandemic government spending and estimates growth this year at 5.2%.
It would eclipse record levels of debt relative to GDP that have stood since the Second World War.
The proposal includes at least a $3trn (£2.1trn) tax increase on corporations, capital gains and the top income tax bracket – and promises over $800bn (£563.4bn) for the fight against climate change, including investments in clean energy.
© Getty Lindsey Graham was one of the Republicans to lash out at the budget
It would also provide $200bn (£140.8bn) for free pre-school places for all three and four-year-olds, and $109bn (£76.7bn) for two years of free community college for all Americans.
Video: Biden To Reportedly Propose $6 Trillion Budget (Cover Video)
Gormley said the statue should stay, the FT reported. But he added: “If we need to readdress our relationship to him, I would just simply turn him to face the wall rather than facing outwards.”
Turning Rhodes to face the wall would be “an acknowledgment of collective shame” that would also “reassert the fact that Oriel College and many institutions have property from Rhodes’ riches”, the FT quoted Gormley as saying.
Rhodes was instrumental in the establishment of the British colony of Rhodesia, covering what is now Zambia and Zimbabwe, and set up the diamond company De Beers. His last will endowed Oxford University to set up the Rhodes scholarship, the oldest graduate scholarship in the world, which was initially restricted to men from territories of the British empire, Germany and the United States.
Critics say Rhodes’s racism and his role in British imperial expansion and the establishment of apartheid in Africa mean he should be condemned. A campaign to remove statues of Rhodes began in Africa in 2015, and led swiftly to one being removed from the University of Cape Town. Students at Oxford began their campaign at around the same time.
Oriel had previously warned of the possibility that it would lose about £100m in gifts should the statue be taken down, but insisted financial concerns were not the motive for keeping it. Last month, following the recommendation that Rhodes be removed, the college said it would not “begin the legal process” of moving the statue at this stage owing to “regulatory and financial challenges” presented by its removal.
Nearly 70 tributes to slave traders, colonialists and racists across the UK have been removed since last summer’s Black Lives Matter protests, according to a Guardian analysis. The number includes an estimated 39 names – including streets, buildings and schools – and 30 statues, plaques and other memorials which have been or are undergoing changes or removal.
The Biden budget includes a $1.5trn (£1.1trn) request for operating expenditures for the Pentagon and other government departments.
It also includes two plans Mr Biden previously publicised – a $2.3trn (£1.6trn) jobs plan and a $1.8trn (£1.3trn) families plan.
The proposals have been praised by women’s and civil rights groups for omitting a ban on funding for most abortions.
It makes no mention of the Hyde Amendment, first passed in 1976 and included in federal spending bills since.
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The amendment restricts coverage for recipients of Medicare, Medicaid, federal employees, servicewomen and Washington DC residents, but could still be added to the bill as it moves through Congress.
Women’s and civil rights groups say the amendment disproportionately impacts low-income women.
“Exciting to see the admin’s historic step. For too long, the Hyde amendment has put the gov’t in control of personal health care decisions for people with low incomes,” women’s health provider Planned Parenthood tweeted.
However, Republican House minority leader Kevin McCarthy said it “breaks decades of settled precedent by calling for direct taxpayer-funded abortion”.
The budget follows Mr Biden’s $1.9trn (£1.4trn)passed by the Senate in March.
That bill includes $400bn (£289bn) in one-time payments of $1,400 (£1,000) to most Americans, $300 (£217) a week in extended jobless benefits for the 9.5 million people made unemployed, and $350bn (£253bn) in aid to state and local governments that have taken a huge hit in their budgets.
Jaime Hay
