Here’s what’s in the bipartisan spending bill to avoid a partial shutdown
Congress is expected later this week to pass and pass a package of six spending bills to fund half the government through the fall, after months of bitter negotiations in which Republicans pushed for spending cuts and conservative policies.
The $460 billion legislation would fund a slew of government agencies and programs, including the Environmental Protection Agency, the Justice Department and Veterans Affairs. An agreement must be reached to avoid a partial government shutdown at the end of the week.
Top lawmakers are still negotiating spending for the other half of the government for the rest of the year, including for the Pentagon, which Congress must vote on by March 22 to avoid a lapse in funding for those programs.
Here’s what you need to know about the 1,050-page bill on the agenda this week.
Republicans have failed to achieve major policy changes.
The funding levels are consistent with the debt limit and spending deal negotiated last year by President Biden and then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy, which left spending on domestic programs essentially flat — even as funding for veterans programs continues to grow — while increasing military spending Allowed. to increase something.
Ultimately, lawmakers jettisoned most of Republicans’ most sweeping and divisive demands, including blocking an increase in funding for nutrition assistance programs for low-income women and children and halting implementation of new rules to allow better access to abortion medications.
But Chairman Mike Johnson and his negotiators managed to secure a number of smaller demands, including cuts to the EPA and the FBI.
The bill would increase nutrition funding for low-income women and children.
Republicans are opposing a Democratic bid to increase funding for the nutrition program known as WIC, the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women Infants and Children, but Democrats have secured $7.03 billion for the program — more than 1 billion more than President Biden initially requested — saying the additional money was needed to meet rising needs.
Democrats also resisted an effort led by a top Republican on the House Appropriations Committee and Freedom Caucus member, Rep. Andy Harris of Maryland, to launch a pilot program in several states to limit what low-income recipients could buy with government assistance through the food nutrition program known as SNAP, which limits them to “nutrient-dense” foods.
Republicans won cuts to the EPA, the FBI and the ATF
Negotiators agreed to cut funding for the EPA by nearly 10 percent, although the actual cut is only about 4 percent because of a change in how the Superfund program, which is responsible for cleaning up contaminated land and responding to ecological emergencies such as oil spills is paid for.
The spending bill includes deep cuts to the Superfund program, but Mr. Biden has signed legislation, including the bipartisan infrastructure bill of 2021 and the landmark Health, Climate and Tax Act, that created new tax revenues to fund it.
The FBI, a frequent target of Republicans who say law enforcement has been weaponized against the right, would see a 6 percent cut in funding — most of which will go toward the agency’s budget for construction of a new building. Funding for FBI salaries would also decrease slightly.
Republicans also pushed for the inclusion of a measure that would prohibit the Justice Department from targeting or investigating “parents who are peacefully protesting at school board meetings and are not suspected of unlawful activity.” Conservatives were outraged when the department began tracking threats against school administrators, teachers and board members in 2021 amid heated and sometimes violent clashes on issues like mask requirements.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives — which Republicans criticize for over-regulating guns — would also see a 7 percent cut, while funding for the Drug Enforcement Administration would increase slightly.
Republicans won a provision making it easier for veterans deemed mentally incompetent to buy a gun.
Republicans used the spending legislation to target a Department of Veterans Affairs policy that aims to prevent suicides among veterans by switching to federal gun background checks when veterans are found to lack the mental capacity to handle their own finances to deal with. Under the language the GOP pushed for, the VA could not do this without a court order. Republicans argued that the current practice relies on an overly broad definition of incompetence and could infringe on veterans’ Second Amendment rights.
Republican Party moves to restrict access to abortion have not resulted in definitive reductions.
House Republicans had loaded their spending bills with provisions aimed at restricting access to abortion.
In one case last fall, more moderate Republican lawmakers helped scuttle a spending bill that prevented money from being spent to enforce a District of Columbia law that protects workers from discrimination when they seek employment. contraceptive or abortion services.
Republicans also sought to nullify a new Food and Drug Administration rule that allows mifepristone — the first pill used in a two-drug abortion regimen — to be distributed through the mail and in stores.
None of these measures made it into the first spending package.