This Week in Congress

The Senate will work on H.R. 6157, legislation combining the Defense Appropriations bill with the Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education Appropriations bills. The bill spends $675 billion on “defense,” an increase of $20.4 billion from FY 2018 levels. $607.1 billion is “base” funding, while $67.9 billion is the off-budget slush fund “Overseas Contingency Operations” funding.

The bill spends $179.3 billion on Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, a $2.2 billion increase. The bills also spends an additional $711 million as authorized by the CURES Act for medical research.

Approximately $3.7 billion will be spent on programs related to the opioid epidemic, an increase of $135 million from last year.

It provides $3.4 billion, a $195 million increase, for mental health programs. Some of this money will go to “school safety” programs, meaning more money will be spent on labeling children as threats in need of professional help and put on drugs like Ritalin.

The bill increases spending on K-12 elementary education by $409 million.

The bill provides $12.1 billion for the Department of Labor, a $92 million decrease.

The bill provides $90.1 billion for the Department of Health and Human Services, a $2.3 billion increase.

The bill provides $98 million for global health security.

The bill does not provide any new funding for ObamaCare, but does require the ObamaCare exchange “risk corridors” program to be operated in a budget-neutral manner.

The bill also provides $71.4 billion for the Department of Education, a $55 million increase.

$93 million will be designated for school safety programs, a $5 million increase.

$64 million will be used for Science Technology Education and Mathematical (STEM) programs, an increase of $16 million. (The government should not be spending money to promote any particular field  or discipline.)

Senator Rand Paul will offer an amendment to prevent taxpayer dollars from going to abortion providers.