The week of March 1, Congress approved a two-week measure to fund the government that included about $4 billion in additional cuts from the President’s request. Negotiations involving the White House, the Senate and the House began on a measure to fund the government for the rest of the fiscal year.
In the meantime, on March 4, the Senate Appropriations Committee released a new version of the Continuing Resolution that would cut $51 billion from the President’s request compared to a $100 billion cut from the House.
The draft Senate Continuing Resolution funds the Pentagon base budget at $513.6 billion and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan at $157.8 billion for a total of $671.3 billion. That total is $17.3 billion less than the President’s request and $2.1 billion less than the House approved.
The Senate Appropriations Committee has proposed to restore about $300 million for the nuclear non-proliferation program, still a reduction of about $360 million from the Administration’s request. According to the Senate committee, this compares to a $648 million in the House bill. The Senate bill restores most or all of the $300 million that the House cut from nuclear complex modernization.
For State-Foreign Operations, which constitutes most of the International Affairs Budget, the Senate measure provides $50.15 billion, $500 million below current Continuing Resolution levels but $4.2 billion (7.6%) below the Fiscal Year 2010 levels. The House-passed version of the bill includes a 19% cut to the International Affairs Budget (for State-Foreign Operations the cut is 16%).(Source: US Global Leadership Coalition)
