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President Donald Trump proposed drastically slashing U.S. spending on aid to Mexico, including programs aimed at stopping and helping prevent violence stemming from the country’s war against drug traffickers.

Trump’s 2018 budget proposal, which would trim $3.6 trillion from government spending over the next 10 years if approved by Congress, lays out steep cuts in most federal agencies, especially the State Department.

The plan sets aside $87.6 million in aid for Mexico for 2018, roughly 45 percent of what was spent in 2016. It comes after Mexico has been helping stem the flow of migrants fleeing poverty and gangs in Central America, with the homes of reaching the United States.

The budget proposes cutting by 40 percent funding for a State Department program aimed at supporting Mexican police training and federal judicial reform. 

The cuts appear to contradict U.S. Secretary of State’s recent suggestion that the war on the drug trade is a shared problem between the United States and Mexico, said Alejandro Hope, a security analyst in Mexico City.

"I'm actually surprised that there will be some appropriations for it," Hope said. “I would have guessed that that would have been one way of 'making Mexico pay for the wall.'”

The budget asks Congress to set aside $1.6 billion on the construction of a wall between the two countries. It does not provide specifics on how funding would come from the Mexican government, as Trump had promised during his presidential campaign.

Mexico is doing much of the difficult work in the drug war, says University of San Diego professor David Shirk.

"They're the ones who are seeing the high casualty rates when it comes to going after organized crime use and trying to interrupt the flow of drugs to the United States," Shirk said.