President Donald Trump is seeking hundreds of millions of dollars in funding for two anti-drug grant programs that the White House Office of Management and Budget called “duplicative” and worthy of elimination.

After swift push-back from lawmakers and outside interest groups earlier this month, Trump sent Congress "the highest funding amounts ever requested" for the two programs, according to the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy.

If Congress agrees, funding for the Drug-Free Communities grant program, which seeks to prevent youth drug use, would be $91.9 million in fiscal 2018. Grants for law enforcement task forces called High Intensity Drug-Trafficking Areas would be $246.5 million.

Both figures are slightly lower than funding for fiscal 2017 – as Congress often increases funding, which may happen again this year with two Democratic senators last week introducing legislation to boost the allocation.

A document justifying elimination of the grant programs was uploaded to a computer network this month by the Office of Management and Budget. The document, acquired by U.S. News and other outlets, called the programs “duplicative” of other federal efforts.

The OMB document said funding cuts would "allow ONDCP to focus on identifying priorities and coordinating interagency efforts, particularly in policy development and implementation, in order to better address the top drug threats, including the opioid epidemic," suggesting total ONDCP funding be reduced about 95 percent, slashing staff more than a third alongside its two primary grant programs.

Supporters of ONDCP and its two largest programs fought back when the OMB's plans surfaced, saying the timing was particularly bad, given the surge in abuse of opioids and related deaths. Staff cuts also were largely avoided in Trump's budget request, with an anticipated reduction from 74 to 65 employees.

DFC grants are overseen by the Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America, which attempts evidence-based approaches to prevent youth drug use, moving past ONDCP’s historical “this is your brain on drugs” messaging to focus more on subtle educational, prescription take-back and school intervention campaigns.

The HIDTA tasks forces, meanwhile, have waded into controversial debates such as marijuana legalization, with the Rocky Mountain HIDTA issuing a disputed report claiming to have tracked an uptick in marijuana packages originating from Colorado. The U.S. Postal Inspection Service, which polices the mail system, said no such records existed.

Skeptics of the programs found the initial OMB proposal promising.

Elimination of HIDTAs historically was envisioned as part of a move to bolster a Justice Department division that handles generalized organized crime, not just drugs – something Bill Piper of the Drug Policy Alliance told U.S. News he would support.

“In particular, the HIDTA and DFA programs are a waste of money,” Piper said. HIDTAs “contribute to mass incarceration” and “use taxpayer dollars to oppose legalization," he says, and the drug-free community grants generally go to groups that “focus on stigmatizing drug users,” a characterization disputed by Sue Thau, a public policy consultant representing Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America.

It’s possible that internal politics had some role in plans to shrink the ONDCP, which has unique budgetary authority to craft the spending of other agencies, creating tension with OMB.

Though ONDCP has been removed from the chopping block, it’s unclear whether it will regain its historical prominence. Trump has not appointed a permanent director – popularly called a “drug czar” – and the office’s visibility has been overshadowed by the recent announcement of Republican Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey to lead an opioid abuse task force.