Galen Carey, the Washington director for the National Association of Evangelicals, called the proposal “very counterproductive.” “We fully support the need to reduce the budget deficit,” Carey said, “but it doesn’t make any sense why this keeps coming up.”

For the fourth year in a row, President Obama is proposing lower tax deductions for the wealthy on donations to churches and other nonprofit organizations. And for the fourth year in a row, nonprofit groups say the change would lead to a dramatic drop in charitable giving.

The reduction, included in Obama’s 2013 budget proposal, rankled the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America.

“We were hoping this would not come up again this year. We asked that they not renew it, but unfortunately the request was not taken,” said Nathan Diament, the group’s Washington director. “It’s a real concern.”

Under the Obama proposal, the tax break for charitable donations would fall from 35 percent to 28 percent for the top 2 percent of taxpayers, those earning more than $250,000.

In real terms, that would mean a wealthy taxpayer who donates $10,000 to a charity would be able to only claim a $2,800 deduction on his taxes, rather than the current $3,500.

When it analyzed a similar proposal in Obama’s 2012 budget, the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University said it would boost federal revenue by billions of dollars and have a “modest negative effect” on charitable giving.

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