THE TOP LINE CODA — Covid, Defense, and Approps — are the “must pass” summer blockbuster legislation (we miss movies) that lurched forward in both chambers. Sort of. But how does it end? We’re betting there will be sequels. 11 of the 12 appropriations bills passed or are scheduled for a vote in the House. The Senate […]
(This is an update of a 2019 article on how Senate Committees are funded. It has been updated for the 116th Congress.) UPDATED TRENDS IN SENATE COMMITTEE FUNDING How do Senate committees get their funding and how has funding changed over the last 25 years? We crunched the numbers for you and here are the […]
(This is an update of a 2019 article on how House Committees are funded. It has been updated for the 116th Congress.) Committee funding in the House of Representatives is accomplished through a somewhat quirky process. Appropriators in the House Legislative Branch Appropriations Committee set a top dollar amount for the committees — they appropriate […]
THE TOP LINE The House Appropriations Committee finished its deliberations this past week, favorably reporting bills from its 12 subcommittees and marking the end of an era with Rep. Lowey’s forthcoming retirement as Chair. As we noted last week, this included much needed investments in the Legislative Branch, reclaiming Congress’ power of the purse, and increased transparency […]
THE TOP LINECongress may finally have begun investing in itself — House appropriators favorably reported a 5% increase in funding for the Legislative Branch. That’s half of the 10% increase sought by good government types (like us), and while Congress is still significantly below its funding level from a decade again, we are starting to dig out of […]
Welcome back. This week will be busy in the House, so let’s go! THE TOP LINE The House Appropriations subcommittees are holding mark-ups all week, plus a Thursday vote on the 302(b) allocations and full committee markups on Thursday and Friday. The full schedule is at the bottom of this email. • One notable change: for the […]
THE TOP LINE Musical chairs. The House of Representatives will have new committee chairs in the 117th Congress, but how will they be chosen? That’s a difficult enough question that we dig into it below. NDAA. House Armed Services will markup the NDAA on Wednesday; on Monday, the Senate will resume consideration of the motion to […]
THE TOP LINE Appropriations subcommittee markups are now two weeks away, but there’s no agreement or public statement on how much money will be available to the 12 appropriations subcommittees. Today we released a letter urging a $500 million increase (+10%) in funding available for the legislative branch appropriations subcommittee, co-drafted with the Lincoln Network and signed by […]
The 2021 appropriations process is ramping up with markups scheduled over next month and just a few months left before the end of the fiscal year. Appropriations bills can be a vehicle for institutional reform; we would like to elevate a few modernization ideas from a number of civil society organizations that lawmakers may wish […]
Congress is working on the federal government’s spending plan for Fiscal Year 2021. How will spending levels compare to the past? Here are the top line numbers for the last fifteen years. Here’s the upshot:
THE TOP LINE The House schedule has changed again: June 25 and 26 are for police reform legislation; the week of June 29 is for health care and infrastructure (!!!!); and the last two weeks of July are for Appropriations and NDAA. Apropos approps: Oddly, the Senate will start approps mark-ups first, and some subcommittee bills will go directly […]
THE TOP LINE Police reform takes center stage. Widespread outrage over the murder of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police, combined with dozens of videos of police attacking non-violent demonstrators, the use of unidentified internal security forces to police DC streets, and more than 140 police attacks on the press have elevated public pressure on Congress to address systemic police misconduct. […]