As the Trump administration slashes funding for many federal agencies, new polling finds that large shares of Americans favor increasing funding for dozens of government services; very few support cuts. The survey asked about spending in 40 areas, and in none of these areas did a majority of Americans support a reduction in spending.
More than 70% of Americans think federal funding should be increased, either a lot or a little, for each of a half dozen areas: elderly care, veterans services, cybersecurity, health care services, disaster relief, and mental health care services. Majorities also want more funding directed to homelessness services, food assistance, infrastructure, disability assistance, border security, early childhood education, and K-12 education, along with several others.
Foreign aid is the only instance in which a share approaching a majority (49%) supports a reduction in federal funding. Around one-third (35%) want to reduce funding for artificial intelligence.
Democrats are more likely than Republicans to support funding increases in 33 of the 40 areas included on the survey. Far more Democrats than Republicans support increasing federal spending on environmental protection, vaccine development and distribution, public transportation, renewable energy development, higher education, early childhood education, arts and cultural programs, and pandemic preparedness.
Republicans are much more likely than Democrats to favor increasing funding for immigration enforcement and border security. And they are somewhat more likely than Democrats to support more funding for law enforcement, national defense, prisons, and election security.
While Republicans are less likely than Democrats to support increasing federal funding for most services, few Republicans advocate for funding cuts. The one exception is foreign aid, which 73% of Republicans — as well as 22% of Democrats — would like to see the government spend less on. For no other kind of federal spending do a majority of Republicans desire reductions. Other than foreign aid, the federal spending that Republicans are most likely to want to reduce is for public broadcasting (44%).
There is no area in which a majority of Democrats support a spending cut . The areas where Democrats are most likely to support reductions are immigration enforcement, artificial intelligence, space exploration, and prisons, foreign aid, and national defense: Between 20% and 30% of Democrats support cuts to funding each of these areas.
While Americans generally support increasing federal spending, many also believe that the federal government is wasteful. 46% of Americans say it uses its resources very wastefully, far more than say the same about their state government (29%), their local government (25%), large businesses (25%), non-profits (12%), or small businesses (3%). Only 8% of people who are currently employed say their own workplace uses resources very wastefully.
Republicans are more likely than Democrats to believe that the federal government spends resources very or somewhat wastefully, and they are also more likely to say this about their state and local governments, as well as non-profits. Similarly sized majorities of Democrats and Republicans think large businesses use their resources wastefully; 19% of Democrats and 19% of Republicans say the same about small businesses.
— Carl Bialik contributed to this article
See the results for this YouGov poll
Methodology: The poll was conducted online among 2,259 U.S. adult citizens on two separate surveys from February 24 - 26, 2025 and February 25 - 27, 2025. A random sample (stratified by gender, age, race, education, geographic region, and voter registration) was selected from the 2019 American Community Survey. The sample was weighted according to gender, age, race, education, 2024 presidential vote, 2020 election turnout and presidential vote, baseline party identification, and current voter registration status. 2024 presidential vote, at time of weighting, was estimated to be 48% Harris and 50% Trump. Demographic weighting targets come from the 2019 American Community Survey. Baseline party identification is the respondent’s most recent answer given around November 8, 2024, and is weighted to the estimated distribution at that time (31% Democratic, 32% Republican). The margin of error for the overall sample is approximately 3%.
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