The House Appropriations Committee today approved the fiscal year 2023 Homeland Security bill on a 32 to 25 vote.
For fiscal year 2023, the bill provides total funding of $85.67 billion, including $60.3 billion within the subcommittee’s funding allocation, $19.95 billion for major disaster response and recovery, and $5.4 billion that is offset by fee collections. The total within the subcommittee allocation is $2.7 billion above fiscal year 2022. The legislation:
- Makes smart and effective investments in border security
- Secures our critical infrastructure with dramatically increased funding to prevent cyber-attacks and root out cyber intrusions
- Invests strongly in maritime security through funding for the Coast Guard
- Supports a new pay system for TSA to ensure its personnel are paid salaries equivalent to other federal workers carrying out comparable work
- Respects the dignity of immigrants with funding to improve migrant processing
“The Homeland Security funding bill includes many of the federal programs critical to keeping our country safe,” Appropriations Committee Chair Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-03) said. “With this bill, we are securing our borders by funding smart and effective investments in technology and operations. We are respecting the dignity of children and families by making border processing quicker and more efficient and improving conditions in short-term holding facilities. From dramatic investments in our nation’s cyber infrastructure to prevent increasingly pervasive cyber-attacks to ensuring our Coast Guard has the tools it needs to protect our country from Russian aggression in the Arctic, this bill is key to bolstering our national security.”
The following amendments to the bill were adopted by the full Committee:
Rep. Roybal-Allard – The manager’s amendment makes technical and noncontroversial changes to the bill and report. The amendment was adopted by voice vote.
Rep. Newhouse – This amendment requires Title 42 expulsions to continue for 180 days after the COVID-19 emergency is terminated. The amendment was adopted by voice vote.
Rep. Aguilar – The amendment makes funding available to United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) for processing Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) applications and work authorizations. The amendment was adopted by voice vote.
Rep. Espaillat – The amendment exempts the Special Immigrant Juvenile Status children from employment-based visa caps. The amendment was adopted by voice vote.
Rep. Lee (CA) – The amendment makes technical corrections to the STORM Act (Section 205 of the Stafford Act) to make United States territories eligible for assistance. The amendment was adopted by voice vote.
Reps. Meng, Pocan, Espaillat, Torres – The amendment allows unused employment- and family-based visas from FYs 1992-2022 to remain available in FY 2023. The amendment also protects against future loss of unused employment- or family-based visas and permits the issuance of diversity visas to immigrants who would have otherwise been permitted entry into the United States but for executive policies of the prior administration. The amendment was adopted by a vote of 32 to 25.
Reps. Pingree, Harris, Cuellar, Ruppersberger – The amendment provides the Secretary authority to make available additional H-2B visas and waives certain rulemaking requirements to expedite visa approvals. The amendment was adopted by voice vote.
Reps. Cuellar, Newhouse — The amendment authorizes the Secretary to issue H-2A visas for agricultural work without regard to whether the work is temporary or seasonal in nature.
A summary of the bill is here. The text of the draft bill is here. The bill report, before the adoption of amendments in full Committee, is here. In keeping with the Appropriations Committee’s commitment to transparency, information on Community Project Funding in the bill is here.
Subcommittees:
The Department of Homeland Security (117th Congress)
117th Congress
Original source can be found here.
