Congressional News
Talks Continue as Congress Attempts to Raise Budget Caps
As previously reported, fiscal year (FY) 2020 discretionary spending is subject to austere caps that were put in place in 2011 as part of a larger effort to significantly reduce the size of the federal budget over 10 years. The Budget Control Act of 2011, or BCA, put in place caps on discretionary spending for both nondefense and defense spending for the period of 2013 through 2021. COSSA joined a letter with over 800 organizational signatures urging Congress to raise these spending caps. Congressional leaders are now considering several solutions to raise the discretionary spending caps and are currently taking…
Congress Holds Hearings on FY 2020 NIH Budget
On April 2, the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies (LHHS) hosted leadership from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to testify on the agencyâs fiscal year (FY) 2020 budget request on April 2. Present were NIH Director Francis Collins, National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) Director Diana Bianchi, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) Director Anthony Fauci, National Heart Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI) Director Gary Gibbons, National Cancer Institute (NCI) Deputy Director Doug Lowy, and National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) Director Nora Volkow. Members from…
Release of Presidentâs Budget Puts Pressure on Congress to Raise Caps; COSSA Urges Advocates to Take Action
The release of the Presidentâs budget request signals the official kick-off of the annual appropriations process in Congress. However, before Congress can fully dive into the FY 2020 bills, lawmakers must address a larger threat facing federal funding for next year. As COSSA has been reporting, discretionary spending that is appropriated every year by Congress has been subject to austere caps that were put in place in 2011 as part of a larger effort to significantly reduce the size of the federal budget over 10 years. The Budget Control Act of 2011, or BCA, put in place caps on discretionary…
Congressional Appropriators Get to Work; NSF Director Testifies
Following the release of the Administrationâs fiscal year (FY) 2020 budget request, Congressional leaders have gotten to work on spending bills for the coming fiscal year. As COSSA has previously reported, Congress must first address the limits to discretionary spending (âraise the capsâ) before they can complete the FY 2020 appropriations process. Congress has until the end of September to finalize all government spending. COSSA has signed onto a letter as part of the Coalition for National Science Funding (CNSF) to encourage Congress to raise the caps on discretionary spending. While Congress has yet to reach a broader budget deal…
Trump Administration to Release FY 2020 Budget Request Next Week
The Trump Administration is planning to release its fiscal year (FY) 2020 Budget Request in batches over the next couple of weeks. Due to the 35-day partial government shutdown and delayed ending to the FY 2019 appropriations process (see previous coverage), the Presidentâs budget, which is supposed to be delivered to Congress in early February, is not expected until mid-March. Reports indicate that preliminary details will be released the week of March 11 with full details available the week of March 18. The research community is expecting another tough year for federal science agencies and programs, especially as the President…
Compromise on FY 2019 Funding Reached, Averting Second Shutdown; Read COSSAâs Analysis of the Omnibus
After the longest partial-government shutdown in U.S. history, Congress came to a compromise on February 14 on funding the entire federal government for the remainder of fiscal year (FY) 2019, which began on October 1, 2018. The omnibus spending package contains 7 individual appropriations bills, including the Agriculture; Commerce, Justice, Science; Interior and Environment; Homeland Security; Financial Services and General Government; State and Foreign Operations; and Transportation and Housing and Urban Development appropriations bills. On February 15, President Trump signed the bill into law, closing a painful chapter and officially kicking off work on FY 2020 funding. The final package…
COSSA Endorses Census Idea Act
On February 8, COSSA endorsed the Census Improving Data and Enhanced Accuracy (IDEA) Act (S. 358) as introduced by Senator Brian Schatz (D-HI). The bill would prohibit the Department of Commerce from making any major change to the operational design of the decennial census that has not been âresearched, studied, and testedâ for at least three years. The Census Bureau routinely spends the years leading up to a decennial census carefully researching all proposed changes to its design and wording to ensure that they do not affect the quality of the responses received. This bill would formalize that longstanding practice…
Pingree Reintroduces Bill to Block USDA Research Moves
Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-ME) has reintroduced a bill from the last Congress that would prevent the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) from moving the authority of any of the agencies within the USDA mission area of Research, Education, and Economics (REE) to elsewhere within the Department of Agriculture and from moving the headquarters of agencies within the REE mission area from outside of the National Capitol Region. The bill, the Agriculture Research Integrity Act (ARIA) (H.R. 1221) would prevent the Administrationâs controversial plans to move the Economic Research Service (ERS) to the Office of the Chief Economist and to physically…
Government Reopens; Final Funding for FY 2019 Still Unclear
Following the longest partial-government shutdown in U.S. history and the passage of a short-term stopgap measure to reopen the government, the fate of fiscal year (FY) 2019 appropriations is still unclear. On January 25, Congress passed a continuing resolution (CR) to reopen all federal agencies until February 15, allowing more time to negotiate a compromise on border securityâthe policy issue at the center of the government funding debate. While the timing for finalizing FY 2019 spending remains uncertain, negotiations on all spending levels (except for Homeland Security) have been finalized. The end product for agencies awaiting their final appropriation is…
Foundations for Evidence-Based Policymaking Act Becomes Law
On January 14, President Trump signed the Foundations for Evidence-Based Policymaking Act of 2018 into law. Championed by former House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), the legislation represents a bipartisan recognition of the importance of science and data in helping to design and improve policies (see COSSAâs previous coverage for more details on the legislation). After the bill was signed, COSSA released a statement applauding the legislation. We will continue to report on details of the billâs implementation as they become available. Back to this issueâs table of contents.
Committees Begin to Announce Leadership, Membership as FY 2019 Funding Remains Uncertain
While some parts of the federal government, including the National Science Foundation (NSF), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the Department of the Interior, and the Census Bureau, remain closed as part of the partial government shutdown, Congress is at work organizing committees, selecting leaders, and preparing for the work of the 116th Congress. Many Congressional leadership positions important to the social and behavioral sciences have been announced over the past few weeks. The House and Senate Appropriations Committees have both announced their subcommittee leadership, and while leadership on Senate subcommittees important to the social and behavioral sciences will remain…
Chairwoman Johnson Introduces Gun Violence Research Act
On January 11, Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX), Chair of the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, introduced the National Gun Violence Research Act. If enacted, the law would create a national gun violence research program overseen by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and carried out by the National Science Foundation, National Institute of Standards and Technology, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the Department of Justice. In a statement released after the bill was introduced, Rep. Johnson said that more research is needed on the impact of policies on gun violence and…
Government Shutdown Continues into Third Week, Leaving Uncertainty for FY 2019
The partial government shutdown has stretched into its third week, leaving many government agencies, including the National Science Foundation (NSF), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the Department of the Interior, and the Census Bureau, shuttered. Unlike government shutdowns of the recent past, this shutdown is not related to disputed funding levels, but rather policy disagreements and political maneuvering. This means that we already have an idea of what the final funding numbers will be once the policy impasse has cleared, as Congress has already negotiated most of its appropriations bills. Once funding is finalized, COSSA will release an analysis…
Evidence-Based Policymaking Bill Awaiting Presidentâs Signature
After languishing in the Senate for over a year, the Foundations for Evidence-Based Policymaking Act (H.R. 4174) was passed by both chambers in the last days of 2018 and is currently awaiting the Presidentâs signature. The President has until January 14 to sign the bill into law. The legislation, which is intended to be a âdown-paymentâ enacting some of the less complicated (and less controversial) recommendations of the report from the Commission on Evidence-Based Policymaking (see COSSAâs coverage and statement), contains some minor changes from the version passed by the House in November 2017 but generally conforms to the recommendations of the Commission. It contains…
Droegemeier and Dillingham Confirmed in Final Hours of 115th Congress
In the final hours of the 115th Congress on January 2, the Senate confirmed nearly 80 presidential nominations, including Kelvin Droegemeier to lead the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and Steven Dillingham to lead the U.S. Census Bureau. Dr. Droegemeier holds a Ph.D. in atmospheric science, has served on the faculty of the University of Oklahoma, as the universityâs vice president for research, and as Vice Chair of the National Science Board. Dr. Dillingham holds a Ph.D. in political science and has served as the Director for the Office of Strategic Information, Research, and Planning for the…
Science Committee Leadership Finalized; First Bills Introduced
On January 4, Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX) was elected the chair of the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee, after announcing her intention to seek the gavel following the 2018 midterm elections. Representative Frank Lucas (R-OK) was named Ranking Member of the Committee in December. Representatives Johnson and Lucas announced on the first day of the 116th Congress that they had jointly introduced two bills, one to combat sexual harassment in science, and one to integrate energy and water research at the Department of Energy. The two bills, H.R. 36, the Combatting Sexual Harassment in Science Act of 2019…
Congress Passes Stop-Gap Spending Bill, Averting Partial Government Shutdown
On December 7, President Trump signed a two-week continuing resolution (CR) to keep the government open until December 21. As earlier reported, Congress accomplished more appropriations work on time than in recent years, including passing the notoriously controversial Labor, Health and Human Services, Education appropriations bill, but the fiscal year (FY) 2019 funding for many agencies is still uncertain. Notably, the Commerce, Justice, Science (CJS) Appropriations bill, which is responsible for funding the National Science Foundation and the Census Bureau, among other programs, is still pending; neither the House or Senate have taken up the bill outside of committee. House…
House Republicans Announce Committee Leadership for the 116th Congress
House Republicans have begun to announce committee leadership appointments for the 116th Congress, following the loss of their majority in Novemberâs election. As a result of a historic number of Republican retirements, including nearly half of all committee chairs, and a loss of 40 House seats in the midterm election, there will be many new faces among Republican committee leadership in the new Congress. Notably for social science, Rep. Frank Lucas (R-OK) will serve as the ranking Republican on the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology and Kay Granger (R-TX) will be the ranking Republican on the House Appropriations…
Rep. Johnson Seeks Science Chairmanship, Announces Priorities for the New Congress
On November 6, Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-TX) announced her interest in seeking the chairmanship of the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology. Johnson has served as the Ranking Minority Member of the Science Committee since 2010, and, should she be elected chairâwhich is expectedâshe will become the first woman and the first person of color to lead the committee. In her announcement she included three priorities for the committee in the coming year, including: ensuring the United States remains the global leader in innovation, addressing the challenge of climate change, and restoring the âcredibility of the Science Committee…
Democrats Take Control of the House in Midterm Elections; Congress Returns for Lame Duck Session
Congress returns to Washington this week for the first time since early October. Lawmakers are returning to what many expected to be the outcome of the midterm elections, with Democrats taking control of the House of Representatives and Republicans maintaining control of the Senate. The Senate margin currently stands at 51 Republicans and 46 Democrats, with a run-off election scheduled in Mississippi, a recount of votes in Florida, and a race in Arizona still too close to call. The contests in Florida and Arizona are considered toss-ups while the Mississippi race is expected to stay in Republican hands. As many…