On September 18, 2025, Trust for America's Health (TFAH) published a detailed analysis revealing that the Trump administration's proposed FY2026 budget would slash CDC funding by 53 percent, from approximately $9.1 billion to $4.3 billion, and eliminate over 61 CDC programs along with 40 programs at the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
Programs slated for elimination included cancer prevention, diabetes and heart disease prevention, obesity prevention, global and domestic HIV/AIDS prevention, global immunization programs, and opioid and substance use prevention and recovery programs. The proposed budget would also cut the Public Health Emergency Preparedness program -- the nation's primary funding mechanism for state and local emergency response capacity -- by 52 percent.
The workforce impact was severe: staff would be cut from 13,363 positions (2024 levels) to approximately 7,571 -- a 43 percent reduction -- as most functions related to noninfectious diseases were abolished or transferred to a newly created "Administration for a Healthy America." The George Washington University Milken Institute School of Public Health documented that the cuts would devastate state and local economies, as approximately 80 percent of CDC's domestic budget supports state and local health departments. State health officials interviewed by TFAH reported facing budget reductions of at least 50 percent of their annual budgets.
The proposed cuts came on top of $12 billion in COVID-era grants already clawed back earlier in 2025 and the mass layoff of approximately 10,000 HHS workers at NIH, FDA, and CDC announced in April. Together, these actions represented a systematic effort to dismantle the nation's public health infrastructure under the direction of HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., whose long-standing hostility to public health institutions shaped the budget's priorities. While Congress ultimately rejected the most severe proposed cuts, the proposal itself functioned as a signal of institutional intent and created a chilling effect on CDC programming, recruitment, and morale.