The House Appropriations Committee adopted Fiscal Year 2016 subcommittee discretionary allocations, also known as 302(b)s, by voice vote following two markups Wednesday. The 302(b)s are the levels of federal discretionary spending per measure and the adoption will allow the committees to move forward with their work in crafting the 12 annual appropriations measures.
In addition, the House Appropriations Committee marked up the FY16 Energy-Water and FY16 Military Construction-VA spending bills today, along with voting to approve the FY16 spending allocations for all 12 regular bills. The Energy-Water committee report contains language pushing back against the Obama administration’s proposed Clean Water Rule, as well as language addressing the proposed nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain, Nev. The MilCon-VA bill, meanwhile, has language that a step toward providing a basis for a politically unpopular round of military base closures and realignments.
The Senate will follow suit, but the levels passed by the two respective legislative bodies might not be similar. This discrepancy will add to the FY16 appropriations challenges.