As lawmakers continued negotiations Dec. 20 on a new continuing resolution (CR), Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Democrats would oppose attempts to include “anomalies” that are designed to get around defense spending limits.
While the new CR would generally freeze funding at the previous fiscal year’s level and prevent the start of new programs, Republicans might try to include anomalies, or exceptions, to ease such restrictions on the military.
“We will not accept that,” Schumer told reporters on Capitol Hill. “We have said all along there has to be parity. [If] defense goes up, spending for [non-defense programs] goes up. We’re sticking with that. We’re not letting them try to get around this one way or the other.”
Schumer’s comments were the latest volley in the congressional back-and-forth over efforts to keep the federal government open when the current CR runs out Dec. 22.
Last week, Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen (R-N.J.), chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, introduced legislation to fully fund defense for the rest of fiscal year 2018 and fund the rest of the government at FY 2017 levels through Jan. 19 (Defense Daily, Dec. 14). But Schumer said Senate Democrats would block that proposal due to its lack of parity.
In other congressional news, the House voted, 411-0, Dec. 20 to pass a bill (H.R. 1159) to encourage continued space cooperation between NASA and the Israel Space Agency (ISA).
“Since 1996, NASA and the ISA have successfully cooperated on many space programs supporting the Global Positioning System and research related to the sun, earth science and the environment,” says the legislation, introduced by Rep. Derek Kilmer (D-Wash.). “The mutual interest of the United States and Israel in space exploration affords both nations an opportunity to leverage their unique abilities to advance scientific discovery.”