FY 22 APPROPRIATIONS NEWS
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Senate GOP Blocks Bill to Raise Debt Limit, Avert Shutdown
Senate Republicans blocked a bill that would suspend the debt ceiling into December 2022 and keep the government operating past Sept. 30, forcing Democrats to find a new strategy to address two fast-approaching deadlines with acute economic consequences. The 48-50 largely party-line vote fell well short of the 60 needed to advance the House-passed legislation to the floor. Schumer switched his vote to “no” at the last moment, which allows him to call up the bill for another vote later. But he gave no indication of any further strategy to prevent a government shutdown early Friday and a default on government obligations sometime in October. Republicans refused to back the debt ceiling suspension because they say they don’t approve of Democrats’ plans to spend trillions as part of President Joe Biden’s far-reaching economic plan, even though a major portion of the current debt accumulated under Republican control of Congress and the White House. That’s a departure from the usual bipartisan votes on the debt ceiling. ( Bloomberg - Sept. 27, 2021)
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What the Debt Ceiling Debate Means for Higher Ed
At the same time that Congress is trying to keep the federal government from shutting down at the end of this week, it’s also facing a deadline to keep the United States from defaulting on its loans —a never-before-seen outcome that would impact higher education, and the economy over all, in disastrous but still mostly unknown ways. It’s almost impossible to know what would happen if the U.S. defaults on its loans because it would be such a disaster, said Sandy Baum, a nonresident senior fellow for the Center on Education and Data Policy at the Urban Institute. At least one outcome seems obvious if Congress doesn’t act: it’s difficult to disburse financial aid if the federal bank account doesn’t have any money in it, said Justin Draeger, president and CEO of the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators. The debate surrounding the debt ceiling and federal spending raises larger questions about the national debt at a time when many Democrats are looking to make monumental investments in higher education. ( Inside Higher Ed - Sept. 28, 2021)
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BUDGET RECONCILIATION NEWS
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States Will Need to Pony Up for Biden’s Free College Plan
America’s College Promise —the Democratic-backed plan to provide tuition for all community college students —could allow more than nine million students to pursue an associate degree for free. States, on the other hand, will have to open their wallets. As it stands now, the promise program would be a five-year federal-state partnership. Over the course of the partnership, federal investment would steadily decline, starting at 100 percent in year one and dropping by 5 percent each consecutive year, leaving states to fund the rest. Participating states would receive a per-student dollar amount based on the national median tuition, according to the proposed legislation. After accounting for inflation, the State Higher Education Executive Officers Association estimated that the per-student subsidy in the first year of the program would be $5,162, not weighted for enrollment. The SHEEO analysis found that states will, on average, need to increase investment in higher education by 12 percent, or an average of $387 per full-time student, in order to opt in to the program. ( Inside Higher Ed - Sept. 28, 2021)
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Codifying and Fortifying DACA
The Biden administration is publishing a new proposed rule today aimed at codifying into regulation the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program established by former president Obama. The proposed rule issued by the Department of Homeland Security would not expand eligibility for DACA, which to date has provided protection from deportation as well as work authorization to more than 800,000 people who were brought to the U.S. without documentation as children, including many current and former college students. Immigration law experts noted that the newly published 205-page proposed rule on DACA does not include major changes to the DACA program and keeps eligibility criteria the same. However, the proposed rule does decouple work authorization from protection against deportation. DACA applicants would still be eligible to receive work authorization, but they would have the option of to seek protection from deportation without also applying for work authorization. ( Inside Higher Ed - Sept. 28, 2021)
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Biden Picks Scientist Dumped by Trump’s EPA to Lead the Agency’s Research Office
One year ago, environmental engineer Chris Frey was an outcast and a rebel at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), issuing scathing critiques of its treatment of science under former President Donald Trump. Now, the former North Carolina State University scientist has been named to head the agency’s research branch. President Joe Biden’s nomination of Frey to run the Office of Research and Development (ORD), announced on 22 September, signals a marked shift toward environmental science at a time when the agency is tackling a host of policies and regulatory decisions that lean heavily on research. Under the Trump administration, ORD—which oversees everything from hands-on research to compiling tomes summarizing science about regulated pollutants—was overseen in part by appointees with backgrounds focused more on policy than environmental science. Frey, by contrast, studies human exposure to air pollution and was a longtime member of EPA advisory committees that vetted the science behind regulatory proposals. ( Science Magazine - Sept. 27, 2021)
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