Washington Update

FY25 Appropriations Update 

The House continues its consideration of FY25 appropriations this week, while the Senate begins their consideration.  

House Action  
The Appropriations Committee is active this week, with the full committee passing the Commerce-Justice-Science, Interior, and Energy bills on Tuesday and marking up the Labor-Health and Human Services-Education and Agriculture bills this morning. The House marked up their bills at the FY25 topline levels found in the Fiscal Responsibility Act but without the additional bipartisan funding agreed to by then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy and President Biden. In summary, the House FY25 total defense spending would be 1 percent above actual FY24 levels, while the total non-defense discretionary spending would be 8 percent below actual FY24 levels. Under very challenging budget dynamics, APLU continues to make its strong case for prioritizing investments in higher education and research. 

Below are brief summaries of funding details in each bill under consideration this week. Additional details on APLU priority accounts are available on our appropriations chart, which is continuously updated to reflect the most recent activity. 

• Commerce-Justice-Science: APLU priority accounts are largely flat funded over FY24 levels, with the National Science Foundation (2 percent) and the NASA Aeronautics Research Directorate (3 percent) and Space Technology program (7 percent) receiving modest increases.  

• Energy: The Department of Energy Office of Science is increased by 2 percent to $8.39 billion, while the Advanced Research Projects Agency – Energy (ARPA-E) was cut by 2 percent to $450 million.  

• Interior: The House Interior bill cuts the Environmental Protection Agency Office of Science and Technology by 31 percent to $522.5 million. Funding for the Joint Fire Science Program is doubled to $12 million and the United States Geological Survey (USGS) Water Resources Research Act is increased by $1 million to $16.5 million. USGS Cooperative Research Units are flat funded at $28.2 million, and the National Endowment for the Humanities was cut by 1.5 percent to $203.9 million.  

• Agriculture: The Agriculture bill flat funds most APLU priority accounts. The Smith-Lever capacity grants and Agriculture and Food Research Initiative are cut by 1 percent, while programs benefiting 1994 land-grant institutions receive an additional $1 million each over FY24 levels. 

• Labor-HHS-Education: The funding challenges in the LHHS-ED bill are exacerbated by disproportionate cuts to the subcommittee’s overall allocation, (an 11 percent cut as compared to FY24 levels). The bill includes cuts of 50 percent to Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grants (SEOG) and Federal Work Study (FWS). The bill would again flat-fund the maximum Pell Grant at $7,395. The bill flat funds the National Institutes of Health while including the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s plan to reorganize the NIH. The bill further cuts the Institute of Education Sciences 7 percent and zeroes out the Graduate Assistance in Areas of National Need (GAANN) and Child Care Access Means Parents in Schools (CCAMPIS) programs.  
  • In advance of the Labor-Health and Human Services-Education markup, the Student Aid Alliance, of which APLU is on the steering committee, sent a letter expressing concerns with the deep cuts to Federal Work-Study and the Federal Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant program.  
     

Senate Action   
The Senate Appropriations Committee is set to convene on Thursday, July 11 to approve subcommittee allocations and to markup the Legislative Branch, Agriculture, and Military-Construction-VA appropriations bills. Text of the measures are not yet publicly available.  

Chair Patty Murray (D-WA) and Ranking Member Susan Collins (R-ME) have not yet reached a bipartisan agreement on subcommittee allocations, which are expected to pass the committee on a party-line vote. Despite this, the bills, drafted by the majority, are expected to have some bipartisan support in committee. 

The committee leaders were able to reach an agreement to include $34.5 billion in emergency spending in the committee’s bills this year, with $21 billion going towards defense and $13.5 billion towards non-defense discretionary. Thus, the Senate will be working with a higher overall budget than the House. 

Court Rules Portions of the U.S. Department of Education’s SAVE Student Loan Plan May Continue, for Now 

On July 1, a federal appeals court ruled that some portions of the Biden administration’s new income-driven repayment plan, Saving on a Valuable Repayment (SAVE), can continue as planned while litigation proceeds. This federal ruling halted an injunction by a Kansas judge who had previously blocked these provisions in late June. Specifically, the U.S. Department of Education (ED) may proceed with reducing borrowers’ monthly payments from 10 to 5 percent of discretionary income. Borrowers in the SAVE plan who make monthly payments on time will also accumulate zero interest.  

A separate injunction by a Missouri judge remains in place, blocking the Biden administration from providing loan forgiveness to any new SAVE plan borrowers while the litigation continues. Borrowers whose debt has already been forgiven under SAVE are unaffected. Borrowers may continue to enroll in SAVE provisions that previously went into effect. The Biden administration stated it would appeal the ruling. View ED Secretary Cardona’s statement on the ruling here. 

U.S. Department of Education Reminds Institutions of Clery Obligations in Response to Crimes Connected to Campus Protests 

In light of recent campus protests, the U.S. Department of Education (ED) released an electronic announcement (EA) reminding institutions of their obligation to report and effectively manage “protests, demonstrations, and other events, whether approved or unapproved by your institution” in compliance with the Clery Act. In addition to on-campus incidents, the agency took note of related media reports of arson, aggravated assaults, and other Clery crimes occurring adjacent to campuses that are connected to protests. 

The timely reminder comes as many institutions revisit campus safety policies ahead of the next academic year. While outlining institutions’ full Clery obligations, ED specifically prompts institutions to inform campus communities of changes in campus safety procedures impacting the disclosure of hate crimes, which may include “larceny-theft, simple assault, intimidation, and destruction/damage/vandalism of property where the incident manifests evidence that a person or group was targeted for their actual or perceived membership in one or more of eight bias categories: race, gender, gender identity, religion, sexual orientation, ethnicity, national origin, and disability.” 

Office of Science and Technology Policies Releases NSPM-33 “Research Security Programs” Guidance

On July 9, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) released guidelines to federal research agencies on research security programs at universities and federally-funded research institutions that receive over $50 million per year in federal R&D funding. National Security Presidential Memorandum-33 and certain provisions of the CHIPS and Science Act require covered institutions to certify to a federal funding agency that the institution has established and operates a research security program. 

The memo provides guidance to federal agencies on the four aspects of a certified research security program – cybersecurity, tracking foreign travel, research security training, and export controls. The memo indicates that institutions will self-certify with a “written or electronic attestation to a federal research agency that the covered institution has met relevant research security program requirements.” 

The memo indicates implementation of the guidance will take place over the next 6-18 months. 

APLU Endorses the FAFSA Deadline Act of 2024 

Senate HELP Committee Ranking Member Bill Cassidy (R-LA) and Representative Erin Houchin (R-IN) introduced the FAFSA Deadline Act of 2024, which would require the Department of Education to make the FAFSA available to students each year on October 1. The House Committee on Education and the Workforce considered the bill in committee markup Wednesday (votes had not concluded as of the time of publication). APLU sent a formal letter of endorsement for the bill. 

APLU Joins Letters on Cybersecurity Infrastructure Agency Reporting Requirements 

The Cybersecurity Infrastructure Agency (CISA), which is part of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, published a proposed rule that would add higher education and K-12 to its critical infrastructure list. Under the CISA proposed rule, any institution of higher education that receives Title IV funding would be considered a “covered entity” and subject to the cyber incident reporting requirements contained in CISA’s final rule. This would likely impose a significant administrative burden on institutions to report cyber incidents to CISA within 72 hours of any “substantial cyber incident.” 
 
APLU signed two higher education community letters in response to the proposed rule, one led by EDUCAUSE and the other led by ACE. The EDUCAUSE letter is comprised of 24 detailed pages describing some of the technical challenges posed by the rule. The ACE letter broadly focuses on the lack of prior engagement with the higher education sector and appropriate planning for the diverse sizes and capabilities of higher education institutions.