UPDATE: Fiscal Year 2020 Appropriations
The 2020 federal fiscal year began on October 1, 2019. The government is currently operating under temporary funding until November 21 as FY2020 appropriations have stalled due to disputes over the southern border wall.
What does this mean?
Congress has passed a Continuing Resolution (CR) to provide level funding to all federal departments, agencies, and programs through November 21. This means that programs will continue, temporarily, with the same level of funding as they had in FY2019. The CR mechanism is often used by Congress to buy itself a few extra weeks or months to finalize appropriations.
Senate Republicans and House Democrats are currently split over topline spending allocations, including how, and to what level, Congress should fund the President’s proposed expansion of the southern border wall. If Congress is unable to reach a compromise by November 21, it will likely pass yet another short-term CR to fund federal operations into mid- or late-December. Failure to achieve either a resolution of FY20 appropriations, or to pass another continuing resolution by November 21, would result in a government shutdown. A shutdown appears unlikely at this point in time but Youth Collaboratory will provide additional updates as we near the November 21 deadline.
Has there been any progress?
Despite the disagreement over a border wall funding, Congress is actually quite close to finalizing FY2020 appropriations. Earlier this year, Congress and the President struck a two-year bipartisan budget deal, the House has passed all 12 of its appropriations bills, and the Senate has moved 10 of its 12 bills out of committee. Of the appropriations bills that are ready, the Senate may package several of the less controversial bills together for votes on the Senate Floor later this week, inching ever closer to a final resolution. There is still time for negotiations to fall apart, but members of the Appropriations Committee are pushing hard to successfully complete FY2020 before the December holidays.
More details will emerge in the coming weeks as congressional negotiators continue to meet. Additionally, it is possible that impeachment proceedings could impact the timing of FY2020 appropriations; however, the impeachment inquiry is still too fluid to suggest any firm forecast.
Youth Collaboratory will continue to periodically update our network as the situation develops.
