Legislation
December 14, 2014
Senate Passes FY15 Appropriations
In a very rare weekend session, the Senate voted 56-40 late Saturday evening to pass the FY15 $1.1 trillion spending package that funds most of the government through next September. As previously discussed in this blog, the package includes 11 appropriations bills that fund most of the government through Sept. 30 and a continuing resolution (CR) funding…
December 12, 2014
‘Cromnibus’ Advances to the Senate
The House yesterday approved the FY2015 ‘cromnibus’ bill funding all areas of federal government through September 30, 2015 except for Homeland Security, which is subject to a continuing resolution (CR) through February 2, 2015. The House vote as close – 219 to 206 – and delayed several hours as GOP leaders worked their members to…
December 10, 2014
FY15 Appropriations Released
Last night, House and Senate Appropriators unveiled a $1.1 trillion spending package that is a combination of all but one of the Fiscal Year 2015 (FY15) appropriations bills rolled into an omnibus for the remainder for FY15, plus a continuing resolution (CR) funding the Department of Homeland Security through February 2015. The FY15 appropriations package, dubbed…
September 17, 2014
HELP Committee Passes ESRA
This morning, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee marked up a bill to reauthorize the Education Sciences Reform Act or ESRA. The Senate Committee passed voice vote a bipartisan substitute amendment that closely tracks the House-passed version of this bill, H.R. 4366, the Strengthening Education through Research Act. The House passed the bill in March of…
September 10, 2014
FY 2015 Continuing Resolution Released
Last night, the House of Representatives released their version of the FY2015 Continuing Resolution to fund federal government through December 11, 2014. The CR would fund the government at its current rate of $1.012 trillion annually with only a few changes in spending. Those changes include the Administration’s $88 million request to fight the Ebola…
August 1, 2014
Senators Introduce America COMPETES
Senators Jay Rockefeller, (D-UW and Chair of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation), Dick Durbin (D-IL), Bill Nelson (D-FL), Mark Pryor (D-AR), Chris Coons (D-DE), and Ed Markey (D-MA) have introduced the America COMPETES Reauthorization Act of 2014. The Senators’ bill would authorize stable and sustained increases in federal research and development (R&D) funding for…
July 31, 2014
Senate Passes VA and Transportation Bill
The Senate has passed two key pieces of legislation clearing them for the President’s signature. The Senate has passed legislation overhauling the scandalized Department of Veterans Affairs, by a vote of 91-3. The House considered the measure earlier in the week. The measure contains provisions expanding Graduate Medical Education at VA Hospitals as well as…
House Melts Down
In what was supposed to be the last series of votes before the August Recess, the House has pulled a vote for legislation that would fund the border crisis. Both an emergency funding measure and a measure to limit the Deferred Action on Child Arrivals (DACA) program, for which consideration was dependent on the funding measure…
July 30, 2014
House Passes VA Conference Report
The conference report to accompany H.R. 3230 (reported earlier on the Federal Affairs Blog) was adopted by the House – 420 Yeas, 5 Nays. The Senate is expected to pass it later this week.
House Considers VA Conference Report
Both the House and Senate intend to bring to the floor this week a conference agreement to reform the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) and increase transparency and services in the Department of Veterans Administration (VA). The House will be the first to consider, what has been a delicate and sometimes contentious agreement to create, the conference…
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