"America First" Budget 2027 On Review in Congress

Why it Matters

The House Foreign Affairs Committee's State Department FY 2027 budget hearing arrives as the U.S. is navigating an unresolved war with Iran. A national Security Adviser, will defend a budget that proposes gutting the very institutions Congress has long used to project American power short of military force. What happens in that hearing room on Wednesday, June 3 could shape how the U.S. engages the world for years to come.

The Budget

The administration's FY 2027 foreign policy budget request, formally released April 3, 2026, is less a funding document than a statement of intent. The State Department's Congressional Budget Justification projects an on-board workforce of 17,236 employees even as the department absorbs functions from the now-dismantled U.S. Agency for International Development. Rubio announced earlier this year that 83% of USAID contracts had been cut following DOGE-led reviews, with remaining programs transferred to State and the Department of Agriculture. The FY 2027 request is the first full budget cycle in which Congress can formally examine whether that restructuring is working or whether it has simply hollowed out American soft power.

The proposed cuts go well beyond personnel. The administration's "America First Opportunity Fund," its designated replacement for traditional foreign assistance programs, is funded at just $575 million, a fraction of what legacy aid programs received. The Counter-Influence Programs Account, which received $1.08 billion in FY 2025, has been proposed for elimination. Contributions to international organizations would be slashed by more than 80%, from $1.37 billion to $263.8 million, as the administration has instructed agencies to cease participation in or funding of 31 UN entities and 66 other international organizations. The House Appropriations Committee's own FY 2027 State and Foreign Operations bill compounds the picture: it proposes funding Global Health Programs at $5.12 billion, a 45.6% cut from the $9.42 billion enacted for FY 2026.

Iran

No issue will dominate the State Department FY 2027 budget hearing more than Iran. On May 23, President Trump declared that a deal to reopen the Strait of Hormuz was "largely negotiated," while simultaneously demanding Iran dismantle the Natanz, Fordow, and Isfahan nuclear sites, which the U.S. bombed after joining Israel's military campaign against Iran. Six days later, Trump ended a meeting without announcing a "final determination" on the Iran proposal, posting on Truth Social that Iran "must agree" to never acquire a nuclear weapon and that the Strait "must be immediately open." He also announced: "No money will be exchanged until further notice."

By May 31, Axios reported that Trump had requested edits to a deal his own envoys had negotiated, a deal that, as drafted, includes a 60-day window to negotiate nuclear commitments from Iran in exchange for sanctions relief, with Iran's enriched uranium stockpile and future enrichment limits as the first items on the table. As of this hearing, no agreement has been finalized.

Rubio is at the center of all of it. As both Secretary of State and National Security Adviser, he is the administration's lead diplomat and its primary national security strategist simultaneously. Committee members will have every incentive to press him on the legal basis for the military strikes, the current state of negotiations, and whether the State Department has the resources and personnel to manage a diplomatic endgame if and when one materializes.

A Preview From the Senate

The House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing comes one day after Rubio testified before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations on the same budget request, with Iran and Cuba as the dominant flashpoints. Reuters reported that senators grilled Rubio "over foreign policy" in a session that ran long. The New York Times framed the Senate appearance as Rubio "arguing for budget amid Iran war and pressure on Cuba," a headline that doubles as a preview of Wednesday's agenda. Whatever Rubio said in the Senate, House members will have had 24 hours to review it, prepare follow-ups, and sharpen their lines of attack or defense.

UPI reported that Rubio is expected to defend a total request of more than $35 billion for FY 2027, a figure that, given the scale of proposed cuts to multilateral institutions and foreign assistance, reflects a fundamental reorientation of how the administration values traditional diplomatic tools.

The Staffing Paradox

One of the sharpest tensions Rubio will face involves the department's own workforce. The State Department finalized layoffs of nearly 250 Foreign Service Officers in May 2026, completing a process that began the previous summer. At the same time, the FY 2027 budget requests more than $21 million to hire approximately 400 new employees to absorb former USAID functions. The committee is likely to probe this apparent paradox: shedding experienced career diplomats while simultaneously requesting funds to backfill positions created by a restructuring that Congress never formally authorized.

The Committee

Chair Brian Mast (R-FL) and Ranking Member Gregory Meeks (D-NY) lead a committee that is broadly united in its desire to conduct rigorous oversight but sharply divided on the merits of the "America First" foreign policy framework the budget is designed to fund. Republican members are expected to use the hearing to validate the administration's reorientation away from multilateral institutions and traditional foreign assistance. Democrats will press on the humanitarian consequences of the USAID dismantlement, the legality of the Iran strikes, and whether deep cuts to diplomatic capacity leave the U.S. less able to manage the very crises (Iran, Cuba, and beyond) that now dominate the foreign policy agenda.

The America First foreign policy framework embedded in this budget request is a set of specific funding choices (to defund UN entities, eliminate counter-influence programs, slash global health spending, and replace decades of foreign assistance architecture with a $575 million fund) that will be defended or challenged line by line before the committee on Wednesday afternoon.