LegiStorm

Summary:

The congressional appropriations process, which provides discretionary spending for federal government agencies, assumes the annual enactment of 12 regular appropriations bills prior to the beginning of the fiscal year (October 1). One or more continuing resolutions (CRs) may be enacted if all regular appropriations bills are not completed by that time. This report provides information on the budget enforcement framework for the consideration of FY2015 appropriations measures, the status of the FY2015 regular appropriations bills as of the beginning of the fiscal year, and the enactment of FY2015 continuing appropriations. Budget enforcement for discretionary spending under the congressional budget process has two primary sources. The first is the discretionary spending limits that are derived from the Budget Control Act of 2011 (P.L. 112-25). The FY2015 levels for those limits are about $521.3 billion for defense spending and $492.4 billion for nondefense spending. The second source is the limits associated with the budget resolution on both total discretionary spending and spending under the jurisdiction of each of the appropriations subcommittees. However, Congress has not adopted a FY2015 budget resolution and has instead used an alternative mechanism for budget enforcement that was enacted as part of the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2013 (P.L. 113-67). On the basis of this mechanism, the House and Senate Appropriations Committees received the total allocation for spending under their jurisdictions, and each reported 302(b) suballocations to its subcommittees prior to floor consideration of the FY2015 regular appropriations bills. In the course of the FY2015 appropriations process that occurred during the 113th Congress, the House Appropriations Committee reported all but one of the 12 regular appropriations bills for FY2015. The House separately considered eight regular appropriations bills on the floor and passed seven of them. The Senate Appropriations Committee reported eight of the 12 regular appropriations bills. Although the Senate began floor consideration of one of these bills, it did not complete it. The Senate did not separately consider any other regular FY2015 appropriations bills prior to the beginning of the fiscal year. Because none of the FY2015 regular appropriations bills were to be enacted by the beginning of the fiscal year, a CR (H.J.Res. 124; P.L. 113-164) was enacted on September 19, 2014. This CR generally extended funding at last year's levels, with a small across-the-board reduction and certain enumerated exceptions, through December 11, 2014. Two additional CRs extended temporary funding for all 12 regular appropriations bills through December 13 and December 17 (P.L. 113-202 and P.L. 113-203, respectively). The regular appropriations process for 11 of the 12 regular appropriations bills was concluded on December 16, 2014, when the Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act, 2015 (P.L. 113-235), Divisions A-K) was enacted. A fourth CR was enacted as Division L of P.L. 113-235 to extend temporary funding for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) only through February 27, 2015. On February 27, a fifth CR (H.R. 33; P.L. 114-3) was enacted to extend temporary funding for DHS through March 6, 2015, after another CR (H.J.Res. 35) was defeated on the House floor. On March 4, 2015, the FY2015 Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act was signed into law (H.R. 240). This report will be updated during the FY2015 appropriations process as developments warrant. For information on the current status of FY2015 appropriations measures, see the CRS Appropriations Status Table: FY2015, at http://www.crs.gov/Pages/AppropriationsStatusTable.aspx.