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Category: Administration

Meanwhile, in Non-Budget Related News…

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In another demonstration of how unusual the current political times are, the House is expected to take up today H. J. Res. 46, a resolution disapproving President Trump’s decision to declare a national emergency to build a wall along the Southern border.  The measure is expected to pass easily in that chamber.  The remaining question in the House appears to be whether it will pass with enough votes to overturn a presidential veto.  Should the resolution reach the his desk, the President has vowed to veto it, which would mark his first veto in office.

If the resolution passes the House, the Senate would be required to take it up and it would only require a majority for passage.  With all Senate Democrats expected to support it, the question now is whether enough Republicans will join them to garner its passage.  So far, three Republicans have declared their support for the resolution:  Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Susan Collins of Maine, and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.  Only one more would be needed for passage, but that would not be enough to make it veto-proof.

Read more about the issue here and here.

Meanwhile, in other news, former Trump attorney Michael Cohen is scheduled to appear before three different Congressional committees this week, starting with the Senate Intelligence Committee today.  Tomorrow, he is expected to testify on the House side, before both the House Oversight Committee and the House Intelligence Committee.  Only his appearance before the Oversight Committee is expected to occur in a public setting.  Read more about the Cohen situation here and here.

And here comes the NEXT Spending Battle

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Although the FY2019 spending situation has finally been resolved, another potentially protracted spending fight is already underway.  Without an agreement to lift the statutory limits on how much the government can spend during FY2020, the federal government is looking at a very steep fiscal cliff and significant automatic cuts.

In 2011, House and Senate negotiators came up with, and the Obama Administration agreed to, a plan that was considered so potentially draconian that no one thought that parts of the plan would ever be allowed to come to fruition.  The overarching goal of the plan was to cut mandatory spending.  The intent was to force cuts in mandatory spending by imposing automatic cuts (or popularly called “sequesters”) to the discretionary part of the budget– both defense and non-defense– with statutory cuts placed on each part of the discretionary budget for 10 years.

The mandatory savings never materialized, and over the last eight years, sequesters have been avoided only as a result of two-year deals that raised the spending limits imposed on both defense and non-defense discretionary (“NDD”) programs.  The last deal that lifted the cap applied to FY2018 and FY2019.

All of this means that, for FY2020, without an agreement that lifts the statutory limit on discretionary programs, we are facing a mandatory cut of $126 billion below FY2019 levels.  As a result of the 2011 agreement, discretionary defense programs would be subject to a cut of $71 billion while the domestic agencies and programs funded through discretionary funds– such as NIH and NSF– would be forced to deal with a cut of $55 billion in FY2020.  An agreement must also be reached for FY2021 in order to prevent similar automatic cuts.

Advocacy groups have mobilized to draw Congressional attention to the serious problems surrounding maintaining current spending caps.  Congressional discussions have begun and the situation will take months to resolve.

 

Trump to Sign Spending Bill, Then Declare National Emergency

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Late this afternoon, the Senate cleared by a vote of 83 to 16 the spending package that would fund the entire government for the rest of the fiscal year (the text of the conference report is available here). The Senate moved to vote on the bill even as the Members were unclear as to whether the President would actually sign it.

To end the drama, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) appeared on the Senate floor to announce that President Trump would sign the bill, which does not contain the $5.7 billion requested by the President for a concrete wall.  While declaring that the bill would be signed by the President, McConnell also added that President Trump also plans to declare a national emergency, in an attempt to find additional ways to construct the wall.  A number of Republicans in both chambers of Congress have expressed reservations about such a move, as they are concerned that a future Democratic president might declare a national emergency for other issues, such as gun violence or climate change.  If and when a national emergency is declared, various lawsuits are expected to be filed, challenging that declaration.

The House is scheduled to take up the measure later this evening.

Read more about the developments here, here, and here.

We will provide details from the conference report shortly.

NSF and NASA Resumption of Operations

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The National Science Foundation issued the following notice concerning the reopening of the government:

A Resumption of Operations at NSF page has been developed that includes Important Notice No. 145, Resumption of Operations at the National Science Foundation, dated January 28, 2019, as well as supplemental guidance that addresses grant and cooperative agreement-related policy and systems issues.  This page will be of interest to your membership and we would appreciate your sharing this link as soon as possible. This page will continue to be updated as new information becomes available.

Policy-related questions regarding resumption of operations at NSF may be addressed to policy@nsf.gov.

 

NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine issued a message to the NASA workforce today.

CBO: Shutdown Cost $11B

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The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released a report today that the recent 35 day, 5 week government shutdown cost the U.S. economy $11 billion. Other take aways:

  • It permanently lost $3 billion in economic activity for the 4th quarter.
  • The shutdown delayed approximately $18 billion in federal discretionary spending for compensation and purchases of goods and services and suspended some federal services.
  • The level of real GDP in the first quarter of 2019 is expected to be reduced by 0.2 percent, or $8 billion less than it would have been if the government had been open.

Read the report here.