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Budget Negotiators Continue to Talk

Just when all seems lost, it appears that there may yet be hope that Budget negotiators could reach a deal to replace a portion of sequestration. Any potential deal would be small in comparison to the $17.1 trillion national debt, potentially with proposals to replace one year of sequestration cuts — worth $110 billion — or something smaller, with more targeted cuts.

While the outlines of the agreement are certainly far from solid, they could include some mandatory savings, along with revenue, but no new taxes. Potential revenue raisers being discussed include increased Transportation Security Administration fees and money generated from wireless spectrum sales. As an extra bargaining chip, Republicans would consider including an extension of extended unemployment benefits, which expire on December 28th.

This all seems like a small glimmer of hope that the next round of sequestration will be avoided, and maybe topline budget numbers for FY2014 and FY2015 would be agreed to. This would give some certainty – or mock regular order – at least through next years mid-term elections.

Budget Deadline Closing In

Both the House and Senate will be busy this week as they attempt to wrap up a number of issues before they take a two-week break for Thanksgiving. The Senate will try to finish work on the annual Defense Authorization bill that the House completed back in June. This could be one of the few substantial pieces of annual legislation that Congress acts on this year.

But the big news is what’s not happening. With the deadline less than a month away, budget conference committee negotiators say there has been almost no progress in their attempt to address the $91 billion chasm that continues to separate the House and Senate FY 2014 budget plans. The December 13th deadline is fast approaching, with a two-week break in there for Thanksgiving. While Congress set the arbitrary December 13thdeadline, there are no consequences for missing it. In fact, the next deadline that does have consequences is January 15th when the current continuing resolution (CR) runs out. The hope is that negotiators can reach an agreement on an outline that could provide an overall budget number for FY2014 and possibly FY2015 as well as some relief from sequestration before the next round of sequestration take effect in January.

America COMPETES Reauthorizations Revealed

The House Science Committee Chairman Lamar Smith and Ranking Member Eddie Bernice Johnson have released dueling draft bills to reauthorize America COMPETES. The House will begin to work through their differences on these pieces of legislation in the coming months.

Here is the House Democrat’s reauthorization discussion draft bill.

The Committee Republicans have decided to consider COMPETES reauthorization in two smaller bills.  The two bills are the EINSTEIN (Enabling Innovation for Science, Technology and Energy in America) Act which encompasses the Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science parts of COMPETES and the FIRST (Frontier in Innovative Research, Science, and Technology) Act which includes reauthorization for the NSF, NIST, OSTP, and STEM education components of COMPETES. Here is a summary of the discussion draft of the EINSTEIN Act. Here is a summary of the House Republicans discussion draft of the FIRST Act.  The full draft will be posted when available.

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