U.S. Government Affairs

The House Appropriations Committee is scheduled to markup the FY26 DHS appropriations bill on Tuesday, June 24, at 10:00 ET.  You can stream it here.

A summary of the bill is available here.

Bill text is available here.

I've attached the committee report.

On Friday afternoon, the Senate Appropriations Committee released their version of the DHS Appropriations bill for FY26.  The House Appropriations Committee completed work on their version of the bill back during the summer, so there is a possibility the House and Senate will be able to come to an agreement before the January 30 deadline, though I have my doubts about that.

The bill contains some really good news.  The Senate followed the lead of the House by restoring many of the grant reductions from the FY24 appropriations cycle and that carried over by CR into FY25.  EMPG is returned to FY23 level of $355 million, and the bill directs a three-year period of performance for all preparedness grants.  In addition, the proposed cost-share initiative proposed in the President's request is not included for the homeland security grants.

In regards to the DRF, funding for FY26 is calculated to be $26.5 billion, an increase of $3.9 billion over FY25 enacted levels.  The Committee recommends $26.37 billion.

I am still going through the bill and will provide additional information after Christmas, but for anyone who wants to wade in, here are the links to the bill itself and the committee report:

Senate DHS Appropriations Language

Senate Report

IAEM, NEMA, and BCEM will send a letter to House and Senate Appropriations before Christmas so that they are aware of our priorities as the two bills go to conference.  I will share that letter with the GAC as soon as it is delivered to Capitol Hill.

The House Appropriations Committee is scheduled to markup the FY26 DHS appropriations bill on Tuesday, June 24, at 10:00 ET.  You can stream it here.

A summary of the bill is available here.

Bill text is available here.

I've attached the committee report.

See the attached letter that IAEM, NEMA, and BCEM sent to the House and Senate Appropriations Committees regarding the DHS Appropriations bill:

On Friday afternoon, the Senate Appropriations Committee released their version of the DHS Appropriations bill for FY26.  The House Appropriations Committee completed work on their version of the bill back during the summer, so there is a possibility the House and Senate will be able to come to an agreement before the January 30 deadline, though I have my doubts about that.

The bill contains some really good news.  The Senate followed the lead of the House by restoring many of the grant reductions from the FY24 appropriations cycle and that carried over by CR into FY25.  EMPG is returned to FY23 level of $355 million, and the bill directs a three-year period of performance for all preparedness grants.  In addition, the proposed cost-share initiative proposed in the President's request is not included for the homeland security grants.

In regards to the DRF, funding for FY26 is calculated to be $26.5 billion, an increase of $3.9 billion over FY25 enacted levels.  The Committee recommends $26.37 billion.

I am still going through the bill and will provide additional information after Christmas, but for anyone who wants to wade in, here are the links to the bill itself and the committee report:

Senate DHS Appropriations Language

Senate Report

IAEM, NEMA, and BCEM will send a letter to House and Senate Appropriations before Christmas so that they are aware of our priorities as the two bills go to conference.  I will share that letter with the GAC as soon as it is delivered to Capitol Hill.

The House Appropriations Committee is scheduled to markup the FY26 DHS appropriations bill on Tuesday, June 24, at 10:00 ET.  You can stream it here.

A summary of the bill is available here.

Bill text is available here.

I've attached the committee report.