Spring Roundup of Federal Activities in Washington, D.C.
Another few months have passed and after several continuing resolutions, Congress has successfully passed its FY22 omnibus package in time for spring. Below are the highlights from the last few months and a preview of what is to come for Congress and the Biden administration as it relates to Duke and the higher education community:
Budget and Appropriations
On March 11th, President Biden signed the $1.5 trillion FY22 omnibus package into law. The bill provides a 6.7% increase for domestic discretionary spending and a 5.6% increase for defense spending over FY21 levels. Notably, the bill established ARPA-H (Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health), a new agency housed within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) that will focus on accelerating the pace of scientific breakthroughs for disease.
Soon after passing the FY22 legislation, the Biden administration released its FY23 budget request on March 28th. The request calls for $5 billion to the newly established ARPA-H, a 20% increase for the National Science Foundation (NSF) above FY22 levels and a proposed $2,175 increase to the maximum Pell Grant maximum award to put the program on a path to double the award size by 2029.
As a reminder, the budget request is mostly a wish list for the White House and Congress is now working to develop appropriations bills that align with its own priorities. For a quick overview of the congressional appropriations process, please see this graphic linked here.
Research and Innovation
Congress continued its work to develop major competitiveness legislation during the early months of 2022. In February, the House of Representatives passed the America COMPETES Act on a party-line vote of 222-210. After previously noting a preference for passing stand-alone authorization measures, House leadership decided to draft a companion measure to the Senate-passed US Innovation and Competition Act. This began a series of procedural efforts to start the formal conference negotiations, culminating with the naming of conferees earlier this month. You can review the lists of House Democrats, House Republicans, Senate Democrats and Senate Republicans conferees here.
Higher ed associations laid out priorities for conference negotiations in a letter to Congressional leadership and produced a side-by-side comparison of the pending bills from each chamber.
As Congress continues to debate the contours of the sweeping competitiveness legislation and the future direction of the National Science Foundation, the National Science Foundation formally launched its new Technology, Innovation and Partnership (TIP) Directorate in March. NSF describes TIP as a critical first step to accelerate the development of new technologies and products that improve daily life, grow the economy, create new jobs and strengthen U.S. competitiveness.
In early February Eric Lander resigned from his role leading the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). Lander stepped down amid reports of bullying and mistreatment of subordinates. Currently OSTP’s interim leadership consists of Dr. Alondra Nelson performing the duties of director of OSTP and Dr. Francis Collins performing the duties of Science Advisor to the President and Co-Chair of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.
Foreign Influence and Research Security
Issues and concerns related to foreign influence and research security continue to be a focus for both Congress and the Biden administration. On one end of Pennsylvania Avenue, conference negotiators for the aforementioned competitiveness legislation will work through different research security and foreign influence provisions contained in the House and Senate bills. A side-by-side of these provisions can be found here but some of the most concerning provisions include an expansion of a Committee on Foreign Investment in the US (CFIUS) review of certain gifts and contracts between foreign individuals and universities, faculty disclosure of foreign gifts and contracts and overly broad definitions of foreign talent programs.
Within the Biden administration, the Department of Justice announced changes to its “China Initiative” in late February. The new “Strategy for Countering Nation-State Threats” will replace the China Initiative and take a more broad and comprehensive approach to address efforts by other nations which seek to undermine our core democratic, economic, and scientific institutions.
Higher Education and Student Aid
Noted in the chart above, the FY22 omnibus package included a $6,895 maximum Pell grant award and the Biden administration has requested an increase in FY23 to $8,670.
The release of the Department of Education’s Title IX regulations are expected to come out in May. The forthcoming regulations are expected to rewrite the Trump administration’s rules on sexual misconduct and codify federal anti-discrimination protections for transgender students.
The department also announced it would extend the pause on student loan repayment again through August 31, 2022. The pause, which was initially put in to place during the COVID-19 pandemic, will provide additional time for borrowers to plan for the resumption of payments.
Immigration
USCIS (US Citizenship and Immigration Services) recently announced a three-part effort to increase efficiency and reduce burdens to the overall legal immigration system. USCIS will set new agency-wide backlog reduction goals, expand premium processing to additional form types, and work to improve timely access to employment authorization documents.
In response to the ongoing crisis in Ukraine, the Biden administration announced it will accept up to 100,000 Ukrainian refugees and other displaced individuals. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) also announced it will grant Ukrainians Temporary Protected Status (TPS).
Biden Administration and Federal Government
On April 7th, Ketanji Brown Jackson was officially confirmed by the Senate, making her nomination to the Supreme Court a reality. Jackson is set to become the first Black woman to serve on the highest court in the nation.
Robert Califf, former Food and Drug Administration (FDA) commissioner, Duke alum and former professor of cardiology at the Duke University School of Medicine, was approved by the Senate to once again lead the FDA. Raskin, the Colin W. Brown Distinguished Professor of the Practice of Law at the Duke Law, decided to rescind her nomination to serve as vice chair for supervision of the Board of Governors of the Fed amid dissension around her positions on climate change regulations.
Updates from the Office of Government Relations and Duke in DC
The Duke in DC office hosted a welcome dinner this semester for Duke and NCCU Army cadets. The dinner featured a conversation between Duke alumni Wyndee Parker ‘91, national security advisor to Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Pat Thompson ‘11, national security advisor to Senator Roger Wicker (R-MS), moderated by Amy Kramer ’18, special assistant and policy analyst in the U.S. Army.
In 2022, Duke in DC also launched a new video series, “Duke Research and the Federal Funding that Makes it Possible.” The series highlights projects throughout Duke University that are progressing science, innovation and discovery, and underlines the positive impacts they are creating for the state of North Carolina. The first two videos of the series are DOE (Department of Energy) and the Triangle Universities Nuclear Laboratory (TUNL) and NIH (National Institutes of Health) and Duke’s Superfund Research Center.
There has been strong representation from Duke faculty on the hill this semester. William (Sandy) Darity, Manju Puri and Shane Stansbury each provided expert testimony to Congress.
Darity spoke to the House Financial Services Committee Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee about the role of financial institutions in the horrors of slavery and the need for atonement. Puri spoke to the House Small Business Subcommittee on Oversight, Investigations and Regulations on the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP). Stansbury spoke to the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs on the role of digital assets in illicit finance.