News and updates

Congress returns to Washington this week after its annual Thanksgiving break.  It has a number of items to address on its collective plate in short order.

Before the current funding mechanism runs out at the end of next week, Congress must pass, and the president must sign, spending bills for FY2021.  Before Congress went home for Thanksgiving last week, an agreement was reached between the leading Democratic and Republican appropriators on how much each of the 12 individual spending bills would receive for the fiscal year.  Those details have not yet been made public.  The deal was centered around a move to push a large omnibus package of bills for FY2021 rather than individual bills.

Although the current belief is that the president would sign the final omnibus package, that is not guaranteed.  The last time President Trump signed such a bill, he warned that he would not sign another one in the future.  The White House has not yet provided any assurances that the president will sign such a measure.

While progress was made before the Thanksgiving recess with respect to FY2021 spending, there was little movement in terms of trying to pass another COVID relief package.  The House Democrats were insisting on a measure totaling more than $2 trillion, while the Senate Republicans were dug in on something much smaller, in the neighborhood of approximately $500 billion.  A number of provisions currently in place are scheduled to expire at the end of the year and it remains to be seen whether the various parties can come to an agreement on new legislation.

Meanwhile, House Democrats are scheduled to pick a new Appropriations Committee chair for the 117th Congress, with current chair Nita Lowey (NY) retiring at the end of this year.  Three women are competing to replace Lowey:  Rosa DeLauro (CT), who chairs the Labor-HHS-Education Subcommittee; March Kaptur (OH), who has the most seniority ofthe three; and Debbie Wasserman Schultz (FL), who is the biggest fundraiser of the three.