It is a time-honored tradition in politics to reward your friends and punish your enemies. This reality has been born out in recent years when federal spending on numerous grant programs has been curtailed and reduced, particularly in states that didn’t support President Barack Obama’s two elections.

A Reuters examination of federal budget cuts found funding reductions were highest in “red” states like Texas and Mississippi, where—between fiscal years 2009 and 2014— grant funding dropped to $15 billion, a 40% reduction. Programs that lost funding ranged from preschool to anti-drug initiatives.

In purple states like North Carolina and Ohio, where Obama’s support was more evenly split with the Republican opposition, the funding cuts were smaller—a 27% drop to $19.8 billion. Meanwhile, Obama-friendly blue states like California only saw a 22.5% drop to $27.6 billion.

“In the context of the Obama administration, swing states and blue states are doing better than red states,” John Hudak, an expert on federal spending at the Brookings Institution who helped Reuters on the analysis, told the news service.

“I would suggest these numbers would tell us there is politicization going on,” he added.

-Noel Brinkerhoff, Danny Biederman

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Spending- Why 'Red' States Shoulder the Deepest Cuts under Obama (by Andy Sullivan, Reuters)