Funding the Government for FY2024, Part 3: The Senate to the Rescue?

In part 3, I examine the more respectable work of the Senate and conclude with potential next steps.

Sarah Baker

It’s time for my annual accounting of how the federal appropriations process is playing out. The short answer: One house of Congress is doing the work…while the other is falling flat on its face. This does not bode well for keeping the federal government’s lights on, but there still is hope that disaster can be averted.

Note that this blog has three parts. In part 1, I summarize the overarching state of play in the government funding space. In part 2, I take a look at the shoddy work of the House of Representatives. I round things out in this part 3 by examining the more respectable work of the Senate before concluding by discussing potential next steps.

We’re nearly done! In our last edition, I spent a few thousand words hammering the House of Representatives for its juvenile parody of the appropriations process. I now turn to the more serious work conducted by the Senate over the past few months before concluding briefly by looking ahead. You’ll be happy to hear that this final part of my appropriations trilogy is less grim than the first two. Now, let’s close this out.

Learn More: Federal Appropriations

As an alumnus of the House, it pains me to say this, but the Senate did admirable work putting forward the best possible appropriations products in light of the difficult conditions imposed upon it by the debt limit law. Rather than following the House’s lead and engaging in senseless theatrics, the Senate did the difficult, serious work of forging consensus, engaging in compromise, and carving from hard stone all 12 of the general appropriations bills mandated by law, reporting them from their Appropriations Committee with near unanimity. You read that right! Even in this hyper-partisan, politics-before-governance era, the Senate appropriators—led, it must be said, for the first time by two women, Senators Patty Murray (D-WA) and Susan Collins (R-ME)—moved all of their bills out of committee, and did so with resounding bipartisan support. This is an incredibly impressive accomplishment.

With that acknowledged, it must also be said that these bills are, on the main, pretty unexciting from an environmental perspective. But—and I risk having my environmentalist’s credentials revoked for saying this—that’s…actually okay. Not every bill can be a major climate win, like last year’s Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), or provide a much-needed cash infusion to a subset of important environmental priorities, like 2021’s Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. Some measures are just an important part of a broader legislative whole and, although environmental priorities and objectives should be a part of such initiatives and not undercut therein, they must follow a center course in the name of good governance. Indeed, the annual appropriations bills often follow such a course, as bipartisan buy-in is usually required to keep the federal government functioning. Protecting the environment is difficult, if not impossible, in the face of utter governmental dysfunction. In light of this, compromise—without setting back environmental achievements landed in prior legislation—can be acceptable, and can even be considered a win.

It may not stir enthusiasm, but given the dire context for FY2024 laid out above, it should be acknowledged that the Senate did admirable work in: (1) marking up to the full amount allowed by the debt limit law; (2) moving bills with actual bipartisan buy-in; and (3) avoiding—for the most part—the insertion of new policy riders of the like that plague the House’s appropriations legislation. And even as they operated under significant constraint, the Senate still managed to put forward some incremental environmental victories, some of which I call out below. There also were some setbacks, of course, and they will be identified. In the end, however, I have to say: Well done, Senate.

With that out of the way, here’s my breakdown of the Senate’s bills:

Overall funding for the Senate’s bill on appropriations for the U.S. Department of the Interior, environment, and related agencies came in (after some nifty accounting sleight of hand by the appropriators) at just about $400 million below FY2023 levels—but remember, this is a mere drop in the bucket in comparison to the House’s maniacal $5.7 billion reduction. Further, the Senate’s promise of no new environmental policy riders was kept (though legacy riders remained in place). Again, in a vacuum, this is nothing to paint the town red over, but, given the unfortunate guardrails put in place by the debt limit law and the appropriators’ mandate to draft a bill that would satisfy both parties, this can be considered a success.

On the negative side of the ledger:

Notwithstanding the above reservations, it is once more worth noting that coming up with a compromise text in this space—one that was reported unanimously out of committee—is a real accomplishment. It is vital that the Senate appropriators: (1) take the above feedback with respect to the bill’s environmental priorities into account; while (2) holding firm against the dreck that has been put forward by the House. It will be challenging, but the Senate’s hard work at bipartisan compromise must win the day against the House’s unapologetic legislative cynicism.

Now let’s take a look at a few of the Senate’s other hard-won bills.

In addition to providing a total of just above $58 billion in total funding, the Senate’s bill on appropriations for energy and water development and related agencies contains a number of provisions of interest.

On the positive side:

One standout on the negative end: language (in section 307) that contradicts the Nuclear Waste Policy Act and enables the creation of a pilot program that would license, construct, and operate federal, consolidated interim storage facilities for spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste—before a broader system is even in place to obtain the consent of host states, units of local government, and affected Indigenous People. It is NRDC’s stance that this language should be struck from any final government funding package.

The Senate’s annual appropriations bill covering the agricultural sector provides just under $26 billion in funding for FY2024, with the following notable positive provisions in our space:

It is also worth noting that the Senate bill featured a handful of real setbacks, including:

The encouraging provisions above should be defended in bicameral negotiations with the House, while the disappointments should be remedied by whatever means the appropriators have at their disposal.

With respect to the Senate’s other efforts:

The above covers a lot of ground, to be sure, and it reads like a mixed bag. NRDC will, of course, always pipe up when improvements to legislative initiatives are required, and the Senate’s FY2024 appropriations bills are no exception. Still, it bears repeating: The Senate appropriators were dealt a difficult hand, and they carried out their mandate to responsibly fund the federal government capably, admirably, and within the limits necessarily imposed by the rigors of bipartisanship. Though the critiques we set out above are important ones, and point out significant areas in need of correction, they should not obscure our respect for the Senate Appropriations Committee’s work product. Its bills, though far from being resounding environmental victories—and, in a few areas, in need of amendment—are infinitely better than the legislative parodies put forward by the House. As the fiscal year winds to a close, and talks to fund the government begin in earnest, the Senate’s consensus products should be the foundation of those negotiations…and the House’s sorry bills should be wholly cast aside.

If you have read this far, you are either a true devotee of the appropriations process—or you are my mom. Regardless, thank you! Hopefully, this provided a helpful (and thorough) picture of where the process of funding the federal government stands. Much work remains to be done to keep the government’s lights on in FY2024, and the specter of a disastrous yearlong continuing resolution (CR) looms. In fact, if the House majority continues its refusal to engage in the type of bipartisan compromise that has marked the Senate’s process, I fear that ultimately, a long-term CR will be where things end up (potentially in the wake of an extended government shutdown). If so, ensuring that such a CR includes carve-outs from the looming sequester for key priorities—including those in the environmental realm—will be of utmost importance.

To close with my optimist’s cap on, however: There remains a road to success in the appropriations world, so long as the appropriators (and the administration): (1) use the bipartisan Senate bills as the jumping-off point for any funding negotiations; (2) refuse to bow to the House’s unrelenting cynicism in the form of its many new, environmentally calamitous policy riders; and (3) make generally known the perils of a long-term CR, which locks in obsolete funding assumptions, leaves new programs unfunded, and, this year, triggers the 1 percent sequestration outlined above. With madness reigning in the House of Representatives, this may seem like an impossible task. But truly bipartisan funding bills like those put forward by the Senate would pass the House if the House’s leadership were to develop the good sense and courage to put them on the floor. In the meantime, pressure must be applied to ensure that it does just that. Good governance and our environment both depend upon it.