CQ News
Senate spending panel advances Labor-HHS-Education bill
By Sandhya Raman, Mark Schoeff Jr. and Jacob Fulton, CQ
The Senate Appropriations Committee on Thursday approved its fiscal 2026 spending bill, as amended, that would provide about $197 billion in discretionary funding for the departments of Labor, Education, and Health and Human Services, while bucking the administration’s proposals to reduce agency staffing and programming.
The vote was 26-3. Sens. Bill Hagerty, R-Tenn., Christopher S. Murphy, D-Conn., and Tim Kaine, D-Va., voted against the bill.
Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins said the committee will handle the remaining markups in September and that she is hopeful that the Senate can pass its first package of appropriations bills on the floor before leaving for August recess.
“The appropriations process is the key way that Congress carries out its constitutional responsibility for the power of the purse,” said Collins, R-Maine, praising proposed increases to biomedical research and continued funding for programs like the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program.
The bill includes language that would require the three departments to support the staffing levels necessary to carry out their statutory responsibilities, which include the programs funded through the appropriations process, in a timely manner.
“The investments we make in these bills today are really only half the equation, because the fact of the matter is, we have an administration right now that is intent on ignoring Congress,” Senate Appropriations ranking member Patty Murray, D-Wash., said.
The bill would not fund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, after President Donald Trump’s recissions law (PL 119-28) clawed back $1.1 billion of its funding for fiscal 2025.
Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations ranking member Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., offered and withdrew an amendment that would have funded CPB for fiscal 2026.
“I really hope that Republicans will join us to restore this funding down the line, and I want you to know I'm going to keep pushing to do that,” Murray said.
The committee adopted two amendments, including a manager’s amendment and an amendment from Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith that would require the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to notify Congress if it plans to remove a hospital’s designation as a critical access hospital.
House appropriators had aimed to consider their Labor-HHS-Education bill last week but punted consideration until after the August recess.
Congress likely will need to pass a temporary spending measure if both chambers cannot agree on a spending compromise by the end of September.
Health programs
The Senate bill would provide the Health and Human Services Department with $116.6 billion in discretionary spending, an increase of $446 million over the enacted level and about $22 billion over the White House budget request.
It would provide $48.7 billion for the National Institutes of Health, according to a Senate Republican summary.
The $400 million proposed increase is tapped for cancer, Alzheimer's and ALS research. The measure has language included since 2018 that would prevent NIH from capping indirect costs on research grants.
Ongoing litigation has prevented the Trump administration from capping these costs at 15 percent.
The bill would also include $1.5 billion for the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health, or ARPA-H. It would provide about $9 billion in discretionary funds for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, including about $1.4 billion in transfers from the Prevention and Public Health Fund.
The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration would see $7.4 billion under the bill, including about $134 million in transfers. The funding includes $535 million for the 988 suicide and crisis lifeline and would restore funding to the LGBTQ specialized services that the Trump administration ended this year.
It would also provide $3.6 billion for the Health Resources and Services Administration including $3.1 billion for research, development and procurement activities.
But it would not fund Trump's Administration for a Healthy America, a new agency that would consolidate programming across SAMHSA, HRSA, the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, and Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry as part of its HHS reorganization.
“Congress can deal with reorganizations. We've done it before,” Baldwin told reporters ahead of the markup, pointing to a 2007 law (PL 109-482) that restructured the NIH. But the administration hasn’t “provided the transparency necessary for us to be able to provide an appropriation bill that tracks whatever's in their heads.”
The bill also includes:
- $345 million for the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.
- $286 million for Title X family planning, flat to current funding.
- $4 billion for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program.
- $3.6 billion Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response.
- $8.8 billion for the Child Care and Development Block Grant.
- $12.4 billion for Head Start.
Education
The Department of Education would receive $79 billion in discretionary funding, which includes boosts to K-12 funding.
The bill includes language that would prevent the dismantling of the Education Department, after Trump in March signed an executive order aimed at closing the department to the extent permitted by law.
The legislation includes $18.5 billion for Title I-A grants, a $50 million increase over the fiscal 2025 enacted amount, and $15.2 billion for IDEA Special Education State grant programs, also a $50 million increase over fiscal 2025 levels.
Murray said Education Secretary Linda McMahon intends to move the programs out of her department.
“So I am very glad our LHHS bill takes new steps to ensure she cannot do that, and Title I and IDEA programs students depend on do not get dismantled or moved out of ED,” Murray said.
For higher education, the bill would maintain the maximum Pell Grant award at $7,395 for the 2025-2026 school year — a departure from the Trump administration’s request to cut the maximum to $5,710.
Total discretionary funding for the Pell program would remain level at just under $22.5 billion, but the additional $10.5 billion allocated toward the program’s discretionary costs under the budget reconciliation law means the program would not face a funding shortfall, according to the committee report.
Funding for federal work-study programs would remain level at $1.23 billion, running counter to the Trump administration's request to cut that funding to $250 million. The administration also proposed that employers be required to pay 75 percent of a student's hourly wages while the federal contribution would drop to 25 percent — a proposal the committee didn't get behind.
The federal government currently pays up to 75 percent of a student's work-study wages for on-campus jobs and up to 50 percent for off-campus jobs with private for-profit organizations. The bill requires institutions to provide at least 25 percent of student earnings.
The Institute of Education Sciences, the department's statistics, research and evaluation arm, was also spared the axe under the Senate's proposal.
The administration requested $261.3 million in funding for the institute — a drop of nearly $532 million from fiscal 2024 – and proposed a major overhaul of the institute in the process. The Senate bill would keep funding level at $793.1 billion.
Another sticking point for some senators, the federal TRIO programs, which aim to help disadvantaged students pursue higher education, would also remain at level at $1.9 billion under the bill. The Trump administration had proposed zeroing out TRIO.
The GEAR UP program, which the administration also wanted to eliminate, would receive level funding as well, to the tune of $338 million.
The bill also includes:
- $140 million for the Office of Civil Rights, rejecting the Trump administration's proposed $49 million cut.
- $2.18 billion for career, technical and adult education.
- $440 million for the Charter School Program, which is $60 million short of the Trump administration's budget request.
However, the bill would allow the department to transfer as much as $60 million from a nonrecurring expenses fund to the program.
Labor
The Labor Department would receive $13.7 billion in discretionary funding, according to a summary from committee Democrats.
“The bill rejects the harmful cuts proposed by the Trump administration, including the administration’s proposal to block grant our nation’s workforce training programs,” the summary states.
The legislation would provide $4 billion for the Employment and Training Administration, up slightly from $3.9 billion in fiscal 2025, according to the committee report.
The Training and Employment Services account provides funding for activities under the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (PL 113-128). The bill includes $2.9 billion in such worforce formula grants, according to the Democratic summary.
Other funding levels include, according to the bill report:
- $285 million for apprenticeship grants.
- $1.8 billion for Job Corps, which is the same level as the 2025 appropriation.
- $4.1 billion for state unemployment insurance.
- $260 million for the Wage and Hour Division, which is level with 2025.
- $191.1 million for the Employee Benefits Security Administration, level with 2025.
- $632.3 million for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, level with 2025.
- $704 million for the Bureau of Labor Statistics, level with 2025.
- $122.7 million for the Office of Workers Compensation, level with 2025.
The Senate bill would preserve Labor programs the administration’s budget would eliminate, such as Job Corps. The administration argued Job Corps did not produce results that justified its existence.
A free, residential career training initiative for young adults, Job Corps is a priority for Collins and Murray, both of whom praised the Senate measure for maintaining the program.
“It rejects backward proposals from Trump that would hurt our students and workers — like eliminating preschool grants, or slashing PELL, gutting public school funding, or ending Job Corps and AmeriCorps,” Murray said. “It rejects efforts to gut agencies that protect the rights of patients, students, and workers.”
The bill also funds the BLS as a Labor agency. The administration’s budget request would move BLS to the Commerce Department.
Labor, Health and Education Subcommittee Chair Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., said the bill “allocates limited taxpayer resources to keep bipartisan priorities at a lower level than fiscal year 2025.”
She said the legislation funds apprenticeship programs to support the administration’s goal of creating one million active apprenticeships.
“The bill also makes critical investments in our workforce to improve outcomes for workers looking to upskill or advance their careers,” Capito said.
She added that the bill “maintains important funding to support workers' rights and ensure the safety of our workplaces.”
The page for the fiscal 2026 Senate Labor-HHS-Education spending bill is available here.
Lia DeGroot contributed to this report.