Press Releases

Today, the House passed H.R. 244, the Consolidated Appropriations Act to complete the government’s funding through the end of Fiscal Year 2017. The bill provides a $21 billion increase in funding for defense and breaks from the Obama-era position that any additional defense spending should be met with an equal amount of additional domestic spending. Per the president’s request, the bill contains a $1.5 billion increase in border security assistance, signaling the largest increase in border security funding in the past ten years.

The bill also increases funding for National Institutes of Health (NIH) by $2 billion, money which will go to research institutions like Little Rock's University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences and Arkansas Children's Hospital. The increase in funding will help these facilities continue to search for cures to the diseases that cost our health care system billions of dollars and take millions of lives each year. This priority spending for NIH was sourced from existing dollars previously appropriated elsewhere in the budget.

Following passage of the bill, Congressman French Hill (AR-02) stated:

“This five-month 2017 fiscal year funding bill achieves our president’s critical priorities of boosting our efforts to support national defense, secure our borders, and provide vital, and life-saving medical research, all while maintaining the spending caps under current law. I remain concerned with the negotiation process of this all-encompassing spending bill and the constant uncertainty that is caused by the inability to pass timely appropriations bills that fund the government and the priorities of Congress and the American people. While I believe the end result of this bill is a victory for the safety and security of the American people, I will continue to urge the president to fight for a superior approach whereby all twelve appropriations bills are enacted in regular order without having to endure a year-end spending bill or continuing resolution.”

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