CARH’S BROADCAST EMAIL – Legislative Update

October 20, 2017

Yesterday evening, the Senate, by a 51-49 vote, passed a Fiscal Year (FY) 2018 budget. A last minute amendment by Senate Budget Committee Chairman Mike Enzi (R-WY) adopting technical and procedural language from the House budget, may make the bill acceptable enough to House Republicans to avoid a conference committee between the House and Senate and allow the House to simply pass the Senate resolution.

Senator Enzi’s amendment ensured that the only reconciliation instruction applicable to the House is for the House Ways and Means Committee to overhaul the tax code. It also includes instructions that will allow the plan to avoid a Democratic filibuster.

The Senate adopted budget is an amendment to the House adopted budget. The House could take up and adopt the bill as early as next week, setting the stage in the reconciliation process where the Ways and Means Committee will mark up a tax overhaul with the goal of passing it and sending it to the Senate.

The budget would allow the Senate GOP’s tax plan to add up to $1.5 trillion to the deficit over a decade and instructs the Senate Finance Committee to report a tax bill by November 13^th. The budget maintains spending at FY 2017 levels, but would then cut non-defense spending in subsequent years, leading to a $106 billion cut in 2027.

Final discretionary spending levels that will fund the government in FY 2018 will still have to be negotiated between Congressional Republicans, Democrats, and the White House before the December 8^th expiration of the current Continuing Resolution (CR). Some leading Senate Republicans believe the Senate budget passed last night will not impact final appropriations, but instead was a needed vehicle in preparation of tax reform.

CARH will continue to update our members as FY 2018 appropriations and tax reform legislation moves forward.

If you have any questions or comments, please contact CARH at 703-837-9001 or carh@carh.org.