House Republicans Unveil Guidance on 2024 Congressionally Directed Spending

March 2, 2023

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House

House Appropriations Chairwoman Kay Granger (R-TX) released fiscal year 2024 member request guidance. House Republicans announced as part of the guidance that congressionally directed spending, also known as earmarks, will be capped at 0.5 percent of the total discretionary spending, a lower threshold than the one percent limit set in 2021. Each House member is limited to 15 requests for the fiscal year and are required to submit a written statement outlining the federal nexus of their project requests.

House Republicans will focus funding requests on projects relating to economic development, infrastructure, water, and public safety while prohibiting the use of earmarks in the Labor-Health-Education, Financial Services, and Defense appropriation bills. The ban on earmarks for the State-Foreign Operations and Legislative branch subcommittees from previous years remains.

An overview of the released guidance can be found below:

The guidance instructed members to submit programmatic, language, and projects requests to relevant Committee using an electronic portal which opens on Friday, March 10, 2023, at 09:00 a.m. Please note, deadlines for submitting requests to individual member offices are before the deadlines imposed for committees and very by personal office.

Members can submit programmatic, language, and project requests as follows:

  • Programmatic requests: Members may request specific funding levels for agencies and programs funded in the twelve appropriations bills.
  • Language requests: Members may request bill language or report language directing or encouraging specific actions by federal agencies.
  • Community Project Funding requests: Members may request funding for specific projects in their communities, so long as the projects have a federal nexus and meet other requirements established by federal law, House Rules, and the Committee to ensure only high-quality projects are requested and funded.
    • Guidance for Community Project Funding is available here.
    • The Community Project Funding accounts list is available here.
    • A template for the Member Financial Disclosure Certification and Federal Nexus Statement is available here.

The released guidance also provided the following dear colleagues, guidance, and deadlines for each House subcommittee:

Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration and Related Agencies

Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies

Defense

  • Dear Colleague 
  • Submission Deadline: Wednesday, March 29, 2023, at 6:00 p.m. EST

Energy and Water Development and Related Agencies

Financial Services and General Government

Homeland Security

Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies

Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies

Legislative Branch

  • Dear Colleague
  • Submission Deadline: Friday, March 24, 2023, at 6:00 p.m. EST

Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies

State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs

  • Dear Colleague
  • Submission Deadline: Friday, March 24, 2023, at 6:00 p.m. EST

Transportation, and Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies

Senate Appropriations Deadlines Set

Senate

For the fiscal year 2024 appropriations cycle, the U.S. Senate Committee on Appropriations will again accept requests from Senators on their funding priorities.

In addition to accepting programmatic and language requests, the Committee will again, on a bipartisan basis, accept requests for Congressionally Directed Spending (CDS) items. Congressionally Directed Spending items can promote economic development, education, health care initiatives, and other worthy investments in communities across the country. More detailed CDS guidance can be found here.

All Senate committees are accepting CDS requests except Defense; Legislative Branch; State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs.

Fiscal Year 24 Senate Appropriations Subcommittee Deadlines

Note – Personal office deadlines are often weeks before a committee deadline

Energy and Water Development – March 30th – 5:00pm
Legislative Branch – March 30th – COB
Agriculture – March 31st – 5:00pm
Financial Services and General Government – March 31st – 5:00pm
Interior, Environment and Related Agencies – April 4th – 5:00pm
Commerce, Justice, Science – April 5th – 5:00pm
Transportation, Housing and Urban Development – April 6th – 5:00pm
Military Construction, Veterans Affairs – April 7th – 5:00pm
Homeland Security – April 11th – 5:00pm
State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs – April 12th – 5:00pm
Labor, Health and Human Services, Education– April 13th – 5:00pm
Defense – April 14th – 5:00pm