The FY2023 omnibus bill looks like the FY2021 version
Speaking Security Newsletter | Note n°188 | 22 December 2022
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Situation
The Senate should pass the FY2023 omnibus bill today. Between the 12 regular appropriations bills that comprise the omnibus, there’s $858 billion for military programs and $772.5 billion for non-military ones. The share of military spending compared to non-military spending—53 to 47 percent—is the same as it was in FY2021, the last annual spending bill Trump signed into law.
Mitch McConnell is right: considering the way it boosts Pentagon spending and makes an inflation-adjusted cut to non-military spending—outside of VA programs—the FY2023 omnibus is essentially a Republican bill. (Other reasons: it ends a prohibition on states kicking people off Medicaid that started as part of the COVID-19 public health emergency, includes tax breaks for wealthy retirees, and excludes a child tax credit expansion.)
^I’m only looking at regular discretionary appropriations, here, which means I exclude the FY2023 bills’ emergency/supplemental funding for disaster relief and Ukraine aid. It also means I exclude Division N of the FY2021 bill, which funded the second round of stimulus payments, and other supplemental provisions.
-Stephen (@stephensemler; stephen@securityreform.org)
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