House and Senate Return to Work Today To Finish 113th Congress, Prepare for Next Year

The House and Senate return to work today to finish out the 113th Congress and get ready for the 114th, which begins in January.   The congressional landscape will change significantly then, with Republicans taking control of the Senate in addition to the House.  Generally, space activities have bi-partisan support in both chambers.  Where that has broken down in the past is over budgets and that could be a defining issue in the 114th Congress.

But first, over the next several weeks Congress needs to complete work on FY2015 appropriations.  There remains a question as to whether the appropriations will cover the rest of the fiscal year – through September 30, 2015 – or only a few months, but something must be done by December 11 to keep the government open.  On that day, the Continuing Resolution (CR) currently funding the government expires.

The prevailing wisdom is that Congress will pass an omnibus FY2015 appropriations bill combining all 12 regular appropriations bills and fund the government through the rest of FY2015.  Some Tea Party Republicans, however, want a short term bill to carry the government only through the first few weeks of the New Year when Republicans are in control of both chambers.

The House has passed seven of the 12 regular appropriations bills, and although the Senate has not passed any, the Senate Appropriations Committee completed work on eight. The two that fund most space activities are Defense (national security space programs) and Commerce-Justice-Science (NASA and NOAA).  A third, Transportation-HUD, funds activities at the FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation.

The House has passed and the Senate Appropriations Committee has approved all three of those bills increasing the likelihood that final action on them can be completed by year’s end if prevailing wisdom holds true.

Congress also has not yet completed action on new authorization bills for NASA or DOD. Like appropriations, the House has passed bills for both, but the Senate has not passed either.   Congress has an unblemished record for more than 50 years of passing annual DOD authorization bills, formally called a National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).  Pundits are predicting that one will pass this year, too, probably by using the House-passed bill as the basis for a behind-the-scenes compromise and sending it to the Senate floor for a vote, skipping the step of passing a Senate version first.

As for NASA, it is always possible that similar negotiations could also result in a bill clearing Congress this year, but the NASA bill is not considered as crucial as the NDAA. With little time on the legislative calendar, the imminent change in party control, and the departure of key Senate Democratic staffer Ann Zulkosky, getting the NASA bill done could be problematical.

The Senate also is expected to try and approve at least some of President Obama’s nominations, particularly those for judicial positions.  Whether Dava Newman’s nomination to be NASA Deputy Administrator can get through in such a short time will depend on many factors, such as whether she has a Senate champion willing to push for it or if any opposition has developed.   Expectations were that it would not be considered until next year and that is probably a good bet.

What will happen in the 114th Congress is anyone’s guess.  There’s a presidential election coming up in 2016 and each party will use the next two years to convince the electorate to choose a President from their side of the aisle (President Obama cannot run for another term, so there will be no incumbent).  Not to mention that all of the House and one-third of the Senate will once again be up for election.  How all of that plays out in congressional politics is to be determined.  There is much talk at the moment of the two parties working together because the electorate is weary of Washington gridlock, but such talk is typical right after an election.   Rarely does it actually lead to compromise.  With some Republicans vowing to repeal the Affordable Care Act (“Obamacare”) and fight the President on issues from immigration to the Keystone Pipeline, it is difficult to be optimistic.

All the committee and subcommittee chairmanships will change in the Senate, since the Republicans are taking control.  Even though Republicans retained control in the House, 11 committee chairmanships are up for grabs because of term limits or retirements.  There is a lot of speculation about who will be in charge of what, which is important, but in terms of the fate of government-funded space programs, a more important factor is whether deficit cutting returns as the dominant issue in Congress.

Republicans and Democrats have been fighting for the past six years over how to reduce the deficit.  The Republicans want only funding cuts, while Democrats want a combination of funding cuts and tax increases.   The result of the deadlock over this issue was sequestration – across-the-board funding cuts for federal agencies that are part of the “discretionary spending” portion of the budget that Congress directly allocates (as opposed to mandatory spending for programs like Medicare and Social Security).

Both parties oppose sequestration, but could not reach a compromise on any other solution.   In December 2013, a temporary truce was negotiated by the chairs of the House and Senate Budget Committees, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) and Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), where sequestration limits were lifted, but only for FY2014 and FY2015.  Consequently, budget fights were not as intense for FY2015 and NASA, for example, would get a significant boost if it gets what is allocated in its House-passed and Senate Appropriations Committee-approved appropriations bill.

That could be a short-term win, though. Unless Congress changes the law, sequestration is back for FY2016 and beyond. Republicans do not like sequestration any more than Democrats, and now that they will control both chambers, they could try to repeal sequestration and replace it with cuts to mandatory spending.  They can only go so far, though, without alienating their own voters or prompting a presidential veto.  Discretionary programs like NASA and NOAA could once again be in the budget bulls eye and while DOD as a whole may fare better, it is far from clear if that would extend to its space programs.

A lot of what happens in the 114th Congress may depend on whether “establishment” Republicans, including Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH) and incoming Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), can work with their Tea Party colleagues or if there will be intra-party fights.  Also, in the Senate, the Democrats could adopt the tactics McConnell has used so effectively as Minority Leader in preventing action on most legislation.   The Senate will have 53 Republicans, 44 Democrats, and 2 Independents who caucus with the Democrats, essentially a 53 – 46 split (one race, Louisiana, is still undetermined). That is basically the inverse of the situation today.  Just as Senate Republicans stymied action under Democratic control, so could Democrats do the same now that they will be in the minority.