Lawmakers buck calls to defund low-income heating program

Ariel Cohen, CQ-Roll Call on Apr 24, 2026

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WASHINGTON — Lawmakers are signaling they’ll reject a Trump administration request to eliminate funding for a program that provides heating and cooling assistance to low-income Americans, one of the few on-topic issues repeatedly raised during hearings on the Health and Human Services Department budget.

The administration’s fiscal 2027 budget request for the HHS proposed zeroing out the $4 billion funding for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program received in the current fiscal year. The White House argues the program is unnecessary because many states have policies preventing utility disconnection for low-income households, characterizing the program “a pass-through benefiting utility companies” with a history of integrity concerns — something that lawmakers and advocates dispute.

During HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s budget hearings over the past week, lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, and in both chambers, chastised the administration for again proposing cuts.

“It’s particularly painful for working people and low-income people who don’t have access, as they did before, to healthcare, access this winter to heating assistance. And I don’t think that’s the same problem they’re seeing down in Mar-a-Lago,” Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., said Tuesday at the Senate Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations Subcommittee.

This is the sixth Trump budget that has sought to eliminate funding for LIHEAP. Congress has rejected these requests, including the current Republican majority, which funded the program at $4.13 billion, a $20 million increase, for fiscal 2026.

An estimated 5.9 million households nationwide receive heating and cooling assistance based on income, family size and availability, according to HHS. As energy costs increase across the country — home heating oil prices have risen more than 40% in some areas this year — lawmakers say a growing number of their constituents need the help.

Kennedy repeatedly told lawmakers he supports the mission of the program, adding that one of his brothers “is the biggest supplier to home heating and oil to poor people in New England,” referring to Joseph P. Kennedy II, who founded the nonprofit Citizens Energy Corp. that provides the commodity to low-income and elderly families.

But Kennedy said Trump is facing a $39 trillion national debt.

“He’s got to cut somewhere,” he said. “Everywhere they cut is painful.”

The administration has found other ways to weaken the program despite Congress appropriating the funds, lawmakers say.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, noted during a Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee budget hearing on Wednesday that HHS eliminated all staff assigned to administer LIHEAP in April 2025. The responsibility now rests on a single staffer. She asked Kennedy to ensure adequate staffing going forward.

“It’s not just kind of nice to have, but for so many it was very imperative,” Murkowski said, noting that residents of her state often must cope with many periods where temperatures fall below zero.

Kennedy told the committee that he would spend any money Congress appropriates for the program, “and we will spend so we have adequate staffing.”

The Trump administration also slow-walked the release of program funding to states this year — something that angered congressional members of both parties.

HHS typically advances funds for LIHEAP at 90 percent of the previous year’s funding allocation, even if lawmakers have not yet agreed on the coming year’s appropriations. This is to ensure that the program has funds to cover heating costs once the winter begins, explained Mark Wolfe, executive director at the National Energy Assistance Directors Association.

HHS distributes the grants to states, territories and tribes, who pass along program funds to households based on their own criteria.

While that happened, lawmakers accused HHS of not distributing the remaining 10%, or about $400 million, to states until April 20, even though appropriations were finalized in February.

The release of funds came a few days after House and Senate members urged Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought to release the remaining $400 million.

Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins, a Maine Republican and one of the biggest proponents of the program in Congress, on Wednesday thanked Kennedy for releasing the remaining 10%, calling it “very important to many of our states.”