Legislative Update: POTUS budget released Feb.9th; House Speaker still intent on regular order; Mandatory funding 

Members of Congress will turn their attention to fiscal year (FY) 2017 when President Barack Obama sends his proposed budget to Capitol Hill on February 9. The administration's request is expected to include more details about initiatives for federal agencies next year, including an effort to rapidly accelerate cancer research. Following the submission of the Obama budget, lawmakers will begin working on their respective budget resolutions, which will outline overall spending priorities for FY 2017. Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) confirmed the House will consider a budget resolution in early March that adheres to the $30 billion increase in discretionary spending Congress approved last October. Senate Budget Committee Chairman Mike Enzi (R-WY) announced that his panel will also produce a budget blueprint after previously saying he was not sure whether they would be able to do so.

Appropriators are also moving forward with plans to start consideration of the 12 individual spending bills in late March.

House Speaker Ryan and Senate Majority Leader McConnell are intent on passing appropriations bills through regular order, even with the added challenge of a presidential election year. Only three times since 1954 have appropriations bills moved through regular order (and in the last two presidential election cycles we've ended up with year-long CRs).

House Appropriations Committee Chairman Rogers today told Congressional Quarterly that his goal is to have the first of the appropriations bills on the House floor by April. So as Republicans continue their quest to get spending bills to the floor early, committees will be working under a compressed hearing schedule compared to past year.

Even if all of the bills don't make it through regular order, there are several subcommittee chairmen who are optimistic about their bills getting far along in the process, according to CQ.

On the budget front, CQ reports that Majority Leader McCarthy said during a colloquy this week that the House is aiming to get the budget resolution on the floor in the first or second week of March. As previously reported, the Budget Committee target for marking up the budget resolution is February 25th, but it is proving difficult to write a budget that balances in 10 years because of rising deficits, and the markup could slip to the first week in March”

House Appropriations Committee (HAC) Chairman Rogers this week stepped up to back up Speaker Ryan in urging his conservative colleagues to avoid the temptation to reduce through the budget resolution the discretionary spending caps enacted in the Bipartisan Budget Act, as it would ultimately weaken the GOP's leverage in adding policy riders to spending bills.

Mandatory Funding: Key appropriators seem leery of allocating mandatory funding to support cancer research and the fight against opioid abuse as proposed by the president. Labor-HHS Chairman Tom Cole and HAC Chairman Hal Rogers both told CQ that they oppose proposals to shift the burden of fighting cancer and drug abuse from discretionary spending that is controlled by the Appropriations Committee to mandatory spending. While appropriators seem hesitant, it seems at least one key authorizer is coming around. According to Inside Health Policy, HELP Chairman Lamar Alexander is warming up to the idea of allowing mandatory funding for NIH. On the other side of the aisle, Ranking Democrat Patty Murray reportedly won't support the package without mandatory funding for the FDA and NIH.

Cures counterpart in the Senate: Senator Lamar Alexander (R-TN) announced that rather than passing a single piece of legislation similar to the 21st Century Cures Act adopted by the House in 2015, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee will consider several smaller health-related bills over the next few months. In February, the committee will vote on measures concerning electronic medical records, rare diseases, medical devices, neurological research, and a proposal from Senator Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) to improve career prospects for young researchers. On March 9th, the panel is expected to debate a bill to "ensure that the NIH (National Institutes of Health) has the tools it needs to research treatments that are individualized for patients." This legislation has not been introduced yet. It is not clear what issues the HELP Committee will tackle at a meeting scheduled for April 6th.

Last updated: February 9, 2016