The House State-Foreign Operations (SFOPS) Appropriations subcommittee today released their FY16 spending bill along with the accompanying report, in advance of the full committee mark-up tomorrow.
The Senate Appropriations Committee yesterday approved its spending allocations for the twelve FY16 appropriations bills, allocating $49.0 billion for State-Foreign Operations, which funds the Department of State and State Department exchanges. This spending allocation maintains total funding nearly at the current funding level for international affairs, the United States Global Leadership Coalition (USGLC) explains.
The House and Senate passed a budget resolution conference agreement last week that recommends $47.1 billion for international affairs in FY16. This is the first time in several years that both chambers of Congress agreed to a budget resolution guiding the appropriations bills for the upcoming fiscal year.
For the third time in recent years, the Alliance partnered with Representative Hank Johnson’s office to send a sign-on letter to the leadership of the House Appropriations Committee. The letter this year is bipartisan and signed by 105 members of Congress, requesting the highest funding level possible for State Department exchanges in FY 2016. This represents a strong commitment to international exchange programs and continues to build on the Alliance’s advocacy efforts.
Funding cuts to the Congress-Bundestag Youth Exchange (CBYX), a bilateral exchange program supported jointly by the U.S. and Germany, are facing bipartisan criticism from members of Congress, as well as from the German government. In addition to opposition from CBYX program alumni, the cuts have “spawned an unusual coalition in Washington that is working hard to reverse the partial defunding of the program,” Deutsche Welle reports.
Secretary of State John Kerry, throughout the past two days, testified before several congressional committees with regard to the President’s FY16 State Department budget request.