John Slattery, Vice Dean for Research and Graduate Education at the University of Washington, speaks about how federal funding cuts (sequestration) will constrain potential advances in patient care and dampen students’ pursuit of research careers. Watch the video here.
Category: 2014 UW Federal Agenda
President’s Budget Now Due April 10th
The White House has just announced that President Obama will release his budget on April 10th, nearly two months later than the traditional February release date. The President had been expected to release his budget on April 8th, the same day that Congress returns from its two-week recess period. The White House has said that its two-month delay was in part due to the administration’s focus on sequestration and completing the FY 2013 continuing resolution.
Federal Update, March 2013
The month of March has been a busy one in Washington, D.C. On March 1st sequestration went into effect after Congress failed to come to agreement on long-term deficit reduction, and last week both the House and Senate approved their respective budget resolutions that address overall spending for federal government for FY 2014. And, finally, Congress took action on a continuing resolution to fund the federal government for the remaining six months of FY 2013, just a week before the current CR expires on March 27th. Congress is now enjoying a two-week recess period before returning to work on April 8th, the same day that President Obama is to release his FY 2014 budget request, two months later than usual because of all of the fiscal uncertainty in Congress.
This Federal Update will focus on these fiscal issues, and also take a look ahead at the congressional agenda for spring. Continue reading “Federal Update, March 2013”
Senate Approves Budget, Begins Two-Week Recess
Early this morning, the Senate passed its first budget in four years by a vote of 50 to 49 after a marathon session that began Friday morning and included 562 filed amendments. The Senate approved a budget resolution that relies heavily on $975 billion in new tax revenue to stabilize the growth of the national debt within the next ten years. The Senate budget contains and equal amount of spending cuts ($975 billion), and also turns off $1.2 trillion in automatic cuts scheduled over nine years (sequestration).
But while the Senate plan would bring the deficit down to only $566 billion by 2023, it does not balance like the budget plan approved by the House earlier this week. The House plan bring government taxes and spending into balance by 2023 with cuts to domestic programs below the sequestration levels and mandates significant changes to Medicare and the tax code. Negotiations between the two chambers to reconcile the different budget plans will likely be fruitless as the two plans are wildly different.
Congress now begins a two-week recess period, returning to work on Monday, April 8th. At that time, the Senate is expected to take up controversial gun legislation and executive nominations. The gun legislation will likely include background checks, gun-trafficking language, and school safety provisions. The House returns to work Tuesday, April 9th.
CR and Budget Update
Yesterday, the Senate passed HR 933, a continuing resolution to fund federal government for the remainder of FY 2013. That bill now moves back to the House for final approval, which should take place today before being sent to the President for signature. While the CR does not eliminate sequestration, it does provide some federal agencies with more flexibility as to how they implement their cuts. And some programs will receive extra funds that may reduce the immediate impacts of sequestration. The National Institutes of Health will get an extra $71 million from the Senate bill, only partly offsetting the $1.5 billion cut that must happen in NIH’s estimated $31 billion budget due to sequestration. The National Science Foundation will also get a boost of $221 million to $7.2 billion even as they must cut about $360 million from their budget.
With the final passage of the CR today, this is likely the end of any discussions to eliminate or replace the sequester for this year.
Both the House and Senate will spend most of today focusing on their respective FY 2014 budget resolutions as they try to get those measures approved before they begin their two-week recess period on Friday. The budget resolution provides instructions to the appropriations committees in both chambers as to how much each federal agency will have to spend for the upcoming fiscal year. Appropriators use these guidelines to craft spending bills for the upcoming fiscal year that direct how each agency must use their funds. The House and Senate budget plans will likely establish different overall spending priorities making it difficult for appropriators in both chambers to come to resolution on final bills by September 30th.