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Accountability and Oversight, Appropriations, Congressional Workplace Fairness and Inclusion, Ethics and Influence, Modernization, First Branch Forecast, Blog posts

First Branch Forecast for 6/26/23 – Teeing Up a Busy July

By DanielSchuman June 26, 2023 15 min read

TOP LINE This week Congress starts its two-week Independence Day holiday. We’re hoping to take next week off from writing our little newsletter, but we’ll be back. Among the highlights from this past week: Senate Appropriators adopted 302(b) allocations that are very different from the House’s untenable numbers, but with many Republican defections the National […]

Tags: Congressional Research Service, Access to Congressionally Mandated Reports Act, Congressional Unionization, Diversity and Inclusion, House Ethics Committee, US Capitol Police, Congressional Data Task Force, PRESS Act, Legislative Branch, Legislation, Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs

Appropriations, Congressional Workplace Fairness and Inclusion, Ethics and Influence, Modernization, First Branch Forecast, Blog posts

First Branch Forecast for May 30, 2023: The debt limit agreeement

By DanielSchuman May 30, 2023 22 min read

TOP LINE Appropriations bills’ markups, scheduled to begin last week, have taken a hiatus awaiting the outcome of the topic du jour. It’s not clear that House Republicans would have been able to pass those bills individually. This week: the deal that Pres. Biden and Speaker McCarthy have reached to raise the debt limit scrambled the […]

Tags: Legislative Branch, factions, debt limit, Diversity and Inclusion, Congressional Research Service

Appropriations, Congressional Security, First Branch Forecast, Blog posts

First Branch Forecast for April 3, 2023: No Foolin’

By DanielSchuman April 3, 2023 8 min read

TOP LINE Friends, in the last issue we promised that we’re taking a break until April 17th, which we are, we swear. But because there’s been a lot of news this past week, we’re going to point you in the right direction for a few items and leave it at that. As you know, Congress […]

Tags: US Capitol Police, debt limit, Legislative Branch

Congressional Security, Congressional Workplace Fairness and Inclusion, Modernization, First Branch Forecast, Blog posts

First Branch Forecast for March 6, 2023: Members Request Staff Funding

By DanielSchuman March 6, 2023 13 min read

TOP LINE Money decisions figured prominently in a shortened work week for the House. Committee leaders followed suit with Senate counterparts in requesting more funds for their staff in the coming fiscal year, while appropriators established tighter controls over the earmarks process. CHA, meanwhile, has grabbed the spotlight early in this Congress. This week … The […]

Tags: Appropriations, Staff Pay, Modernization, Diversity and Inclusion, US Capitol Police, January 6, MRA, Earmarks, Legislative Branch

Accountability and Oversight, Appropriations, Appropriation Tracking, Blog posts

Appointments of Legislative Branch Office and Agency Heads

By DanielSchuman January 10, 2023 10 min read

Written by Taylor J. Swift There are over 30 support offices and agencies within the Legislative branch, including the Government Accountability Office, the Architect of the Capitol, the Library of Congress, the United States Capitol Police, and more. How are agency heads chosen and how are they removed? The answer is not always clear. At […]

Tags: Appointments, Legislative Branch

Appropriations, Congressional Security, Congressional Workplace Fairness and Inclusion, Modernization, First Branch Forecast, Uncategorized, Blog posts

First Branch Forecast for August 1, 2022: Reconciliation

By DanielSchuman August 1, 2022 19 min read

TOP LINE This week. The House floor is closed until Sept.13 (with committee work starting on Sept. 6); the Senate is in for its last scheduled week until Sept. 6. The Senate will stick around until it passes the “Inflation Reduction Act,” AKA mini-reconciliation, timing depending on Democratic Members not testing positive for COVID; and the House is expected to return […]

Tags: Staff Pay, Diversity and Inclusion, factions, Legislative Branch, BillMap

Appropriations, Congressional Workplace Fairness and Inclusion, Modernization, Appropriation Tracking, First Branch Forecast, Blog posts

First Branch Forecast for June 27, 2022: Apropos everything

By DanielSchuman June 27, 2022 16 min read

TOP LINE What to expect from Congress this week? The House is holding a committee work week before joining the Senate, which is already out on recess. They will return the week of July 11th. We are writing this newsletter before 5pm on Friday, so you’ll have to check the House committee calendar for upcoming hearings, but we know […]

Tags: Staff Pay, Congressional Unionization, Congressional Data Task Force, Legislative Branch

Appropriations, Congressional Security, Congressional Workplace Fairness and Inclusion, Appropriation Tracking, First Branch Forecast, Blog posts

First Branch Forecast for June 21, 2022

By DanielSchuman June 21, 2022 21 min read

TOP LINE This week. The House is in today and so is the Senate. After this week, both chambers will take a break from floor legislative activities until July 11th — according to the House floor calendar and Senate floor calendar — although the House will hold a committee work week next week. Afterward, the House has scheduled only 3 weeks of […]

Tags: Appropriations, Staff Pay, US Capitol Police, January 6, Congressional Data Task Force, Legislative Branch, Political Violence, House Digital Service

Appropriations, Appropriation Tracking, Blog posts, Reports & Analysis

Leg Branch Line Items FY 21-23

By DanielSchuman June 18, 2022 1 min read

As Congress considering appropriations levels for the Legislative branch for FY2023, we thought it would be useful to compare line items inside the Legislative Branch bill. Below contains the actual funding levels for FY21 and FY 22, the requests published in the president budget, the appropriations levels supported by the subcommittee and full committee as […]

Tags: Appropriations, Legislative Branch

Appropriations, Appropriation Tracking, Blog posts, Reports & Analysis

FY 2023 Leg Branch Approps Requests

By DanielSchuman April 2, 2022 1 min read

We were curious about how the requests for the Legislative Branch for FY 2023 compared to prior years. So we took each line item for the requests published in the president’s budget for FY 2023 and compared it against the line items for FY 2022 and FY 2021. The following spreadsheet, which is also available […]

Tags: Legislative Branch

Appropriations, Announcements and Statements, Appropriation Tracking, Blog posts, Reports & Analysis

Key Funding Items Included in the FY 2022 Legislative Branch Bill

By DanielSchuman March 12, 2022 6 min read

The FY 2022 appropriations omnibus was passed by both houses of Congress this past week and President Biden is expected to shortly sign the measure into law. The FY 2022 Legislative Branch Appropriations Bill was rolled into the package, and it is packed with good government reforms and significant investments in Congress’s capacity to legislate, […]

Tags: Appropriations, Staff Pay, US Capitol Police, MRA, Legislative Branch

Tag: Legislative Branch

First Branch Forecast for 6/26/23 – Teeing Up a Busy July

First Branch Forecast for May 30, 2023: The debt limit agreeement

First Branch Forecast for April 3, 2023: No Foolin’

First Branch Forecast for March 6, 2023: Members Request Staff Funding

Appointments of Legislative Branch Office and Agency Heads

First Branch Forecast for August 1, 2022: Reconciliation

First Branch Forecast for June 27, 2022: Apropos everything

First Branch Forecast for June 21, 2022

Leg Branch Line Items FY 21-23

FY 2023 Leg Branch Approps Requests

Key Funding Items Included in the FY 2022 Legislative Branch Bill

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