Legislative Affairs

Last week, the House passed a two-year budget deal that would also suspend the federal debt ceiling for two years, and is on its way to the Senate this week. Although the House passed its federal appropriations bills already (without having budget numbers for reference), Senate appropriators have chosen to hold off until they received the final top-line spending figures to fund federal programs and agencies.

If the deal passes as is, The Hill notes that top-line spending figures for defense would be $738 billion for FY2020 and $740 billion for FY2021. Meanwhile, top-line non-defense program spending would be $632 billion and $634.5 billion in FY2020 and FY2021 (including OCO and census funding), respectively. Fiscal hawks are pushing back on the budget deal because "it adds an estimated $1.7 trillion to the deficit over the next decade compared to the billions in spending cuts that would have kicked in without a budget deal," also known as sequestration. Assuming the Senate passes the measure, officials will have until September 30 (the end of the fiscal year) to pass 12 appropriations bills to fund federal agencies and programs and avoid a federal shutdown. Congress may pass a short-term continuing resolution (CR) to fund agencies on auto-pilot until spending levels can be agreed upon.

The Committee for Education Funding (CEF) says the non-defense discretionary (NDD) funding levels of the budget deal are lower than what the House approved in its appropriations bills earlier in the year. This means that some non-defense programs will get less funding than what the House has already approved, and it remains unclear which (if any) education programs will receive less funding than what the House proposed. Nonetheless, the budget deal provides a significant ($24.5 billion, 4.1%) NDD increase over FY2019 funding and will allow the appropriations process to move forward. Please stay tuned for more funding updates as we learn more information.   

Last week, the House passed a two-year budget deal that would also suspend the federal debt ceiling for two years, and is on its way to the Senate this week. Although the House passed its federal appropriations bills already (without having budget numbers for reference), Senate appropriators have chosen to hold off until they received the final top-line spending figures to fund federal programs and agencies.

If the deal passes as is, The Hill notes that top-line spending figures for defense would be $738 billion for FY2020 and $740 billion for FY2021. Meanwhile, top-line non-defense program spending would be $632 billion and $634.5 billion in FY2020 and FY2021 (including OCO and census funding), respectively. Fiscal hawks are pushing back on the budget deal because "it adds an estimated $1.7 trillion to the deficit over the next decade compared to the billions in spending cuts that would have kicked in without a budget deal," also known as sequestration. Assuming the Senate passes the measure, officials will have until September 30 (the end of the fiscal year) to pass 12 appropriations bills to fund federal agencies and programs and avoid a federal shutdown. Congress may pass a short-term continuing resolution (CR) to fund agencies on auto-pilot until spending levels can be agreed upon.

The Committee for Education Funding (CEF) says the non-defense discretionary (NDD) funding levels of the budget deal are lower than what the House approved in its appropriations bills earlier in the year. This means that some non-defense programs will get less funding than what the House has already approved, and it remains unclear which (if any) education programs will receive less funding than what the House proposed. Nonetheless, the budget deal provides a significant ($24.5 billion, 4.1%) NDD increase over FY2019 funding and will allow the appropriations process to move forward. Please stay tuned for more funding updates as we learn more information.   

Last week, the House passed a two-year budget deal that would also suspend the federal debt ceiling for two years, and is on its way to the Senate this week. Although the House passed its federal appropriations bills already (without having budget numbers for reference), Senate appropriators have chosen to hold off until they received the final top-line spending figures to fund federal programs and agencies.

If the deal passes as is, The Hill notes that top-line spending figures for defense would be $738 billion for FY2020 and $740 billion for FY2021. Meanwhile, top-line non-defense program spending would be $632 billion and $634.5 billion in FY2020 and FY2021 (including OCO and census funding), respectively. Fiscal hawks are pushing back on the budget deal because "it adds an estimated $1.7 trillion to the deficit over the next decade compared to the billions in spending cuts that would have kicked in without a budget deal," also known as sequestration. Assuming the Senate passes the measure, officials will have until September 30 (the end of the fiscal year) to pass 12 appropriations bills to fund federal agencies and programs and avoid a federal shutdown. Congress may pass a short-term continuing resolution (CR) to fund agencies on auto-pilot until spending levels can be agreed upon.

The Committee for Education Funding (CEF) says the non-defense discretionary (NDD) funding levels of the budget deal are lower than what the House approved in its appropriations bills earlier in the year. This means that some non-defense programs will get less funding than what the House has already approved, and it remains unclear which (if any) education programs will receive less funding than what the House proposed. Nonetheless, the budget deal provides a significant ($24.5 billion, 4.1%) NDD increase over FY2019 funding and will allow the appropriations process to move forward. Please stay tuned for more funding updates as we learn more information.