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Congressional Outlook
The House and Senate are in session this week. The House will consider seven bills under suspension of the rules, including the Senior Security Act of 2023 (H.R. 2593), which establishes a Senior Investor Taskforce within the Securities and Exchange Commission to examine challenges encountered by investors older than 65. The House will vote on four additional bills: the Gas Stove Protection and Freedom Act (H.R. 1615), which bars the Consumer Product Safety Commission from using federal funds to ban gas stoves as a hazardous product; the Save Our Gas Stoves Act (H.R. 1640), which prevents the Energy Department from finalizing its proposed rule expanding energy efficiency regulations on gas stoves; the Separation of Powers Restoration Act of 2023 (H.R. 288), which directs federal courts to conduct their own interpretation of laws when reviewing administrative actions without deferring to the federal agencies’ legal conclusions; and the Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny (REINS) Act of 2023 (H.R. 277), which requires that “major rules” — including those that cause a major increase in prices or have an annual effect on the economy that is equal to $100 million or more — are approved by Congress before they can take effect.
The Senate will vote on several executive and judicial nominations, including: David Crane to be Under Secretary for Infrastructure at the Department of Energy; Dale Ho to be a U.S. District Judge for the Southern District of New York; and Dilawar Syed to be Deputy Administrator of the Small Business Administration. During remarks on the Senate floor May 30, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) previewed legislation that the upper chamber may consider later in June: “During the work period, I look forward to working with colleagues on both sides to begin the process of advancing bipartisan legislation to: 1) outcompete the Chinese government, 2) prepare for a future defined by Artificial Intelligence, 3) to lower the costs of prescription drugs including insulin, 4) to strengthen rail safety regulations, and 5) to build on our work for the past two years to make the U.S. more competitive and more prosperous in the 21st century.”
Now that the Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023 (H.R. 3746) has been enacted into law, which suspends the federal debt limit through January 1, 2025 and sets topline discretionary spending caps for Fiscal Year (FY) 2024, House and Senate appropriators can move forward on holding markups for each of the 12 annual spending bills. Senate appropriators aim to start markups this month, according to Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Patty Murray (D-Wash.), while the House Appropriations Committee will likely hold FY24 spending bill markups during the weeks of June 12 and/or June 19. The Committees should release their lists of approved FY24 earmark (i.e., Community Project Funding & Congressionally Directed Spending) requests submitted by members of Congress in early Spring at the time each full committee markup is held.
For the remainder of the week, the Senate will hold several hearings, including an Environment and Public Works Committee hearing on “Ecosystem Restoration Projects of the US Army Corps of Engineers”; a Senate Agriculture Subcommittee hearing on “Horticulture Title: How the Farm Bill Works for Specialty Crop Producers”; a Budget Committee hearing on “Cultivating Stewardship: Examining the Changing Agricultural Landscape"; and an Energy and Natural Resources Committee hearing to “Examine the Federal Response to Escalating Wildfires and to Evaluate Reforms to Land Management and Wildland Firefighter Recruitment and Retention.” A House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee will hold a hearing on “Clean Power Plan 2.0: EPA’s Latest Attack on Electric Reliability.”
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