These lawmakers want off the federal funding merry-go-round

In just two weeks, Congress is supposed to write the proverbial checks for next year’s government expenses. But the money’s not there yet—and that’s hardly a surprise.

In 12 of the past 14 years, Congress has been unable to approve a single one of its 12 appropriations bills to fund the government before their deadline on the last day of September. Since the current budget process was established in 1974, lawmakers have only ever passed the spending legislation on time once. Even then, six of the 12 bills were rolled into an omnibus package. Most years, leadership has given up on trying to pass individual bills at all and relied on alternative measures.

With Congress poised to do more of the same, Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, told WORLD something needs to change.

“That’s why I support a two-year budget, a two-year appropriations cycle,” Roy told me. “We would be able to get that done in a single Congress [and] hold that Congress accountable. I think the years are past of us being able to get appropriations done in a single calendar year.”

He’s not alone.

Roy doesn’t sit on the House Appropriations Committee, but many of its members agree with him. They see a two-year plan as an opportunity for Congress to increase its effectiveness in an area where it has historically failed. But the idea isn’t a gimme, either. Some committee members are concerned such a change would lessen the flexibility and oversight of Congress’ power of the purse.

Of 25 Republican Appropriations Committee members interviewed by WORLD, 10 said they would be open to the idea, five said they had concerns or preferred the current system, eight strongly opposed it, and two said they hadn’t given it any consideration.

For some lawmakers like Rep. Mike Garcia, R-Calif., the upside is obvious.

“I would support longer [spending bills], and maybe as an appropriator that might be blasphemous,” Garcia said. “But it’s more predictability, less variance year over year, less subject to the whim of the executive branch.”

Garcia sits on the Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense. If nothing else, he thinks switching to a two-year plan would force the United States to be a little more forward-thinking.

“China is certainly looking at a 20-year paradigm when it comes to their spending. The fact that we’re looking at it through a fiscal year paradigm makes it so these budget discussions become political rather than functioning,” Garcia said.

Rep. Michael Cloud, R-Texas, who sits on the appropriations subcommittee for financial services and general government, believes a two-year funding cycle would also better enable Congress to track the effectiveness of what it spends.

“I would lean towards, ‘That’s a great idea.’ I know a number of members would like to see that happen. We’ve done a better comb-through than we have probably have in several years,” Cloud said, noting the committees’ efforts in 2024. “But even then, it’s a pretty massive bureaucracy. Are we getting a [return on investment] for the taxpayers? There’s just so much more work to be done every single cycle.”

This year, the Appropriations Committee advanced all 12 of its bills by mid-July—ahead of schedule compared to most years. But so far, the House has passed only five. None have cleared the Senate.

As frustrating as it may be to see their work stall year after year, some appropriators believe the idea of two-year appropriations might break more than it fixes. The committee’s current chairman, Rep. Tom Cole, R-Okla., agrees with that concern.

“I don’t favor that [model],” Cole said. “A lot of people like it. There’s certainly some support to it. Now I could certainly understand two-year budgets, but I would still want to keep appropriations on an annual basis. I think we [would] give up too much power and too much authority.”

Cole noted that such a structure would make it harder for Congress to address changing circumstances year over year such as the war in Ukraine or a pandemic.

Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart, R-Fla., agrees with Cole. He dismissed the idea almost immediately.

“It does not give us the flexibility to deal with a very dangerous world,” Diaz-Balart said. “I respectfully think that’s a really, really bad idea.”

Linda Blimes is a professor of public policy at the Harvard John F. Kennedy School of Government and studies budgetary policy and public administration. She, too, had concerns about Congress’ ability to quickly compensate for overspending.

“The difficulty with two-year budgets is that [the Office of Management and Budget] may view the two-year budget as a ceiling, whereas a government agency views it as a floor. And Congress may have to enact supplementals if the estimates were wrong,” Blimes said.

The situation happens regularly enough with one-year spending bills, she noted.

“For example, recently the [Department of Veterans Affairs] has projected a $15 billion shortfall, due to increases in veterans’ benefits due. Congress will have to step in and fund this gap,” Blimes said.

Flexibility is one problem. Oversight is another.

David Ditch, senior policy analyst at the Heritage Foundation, believes annual appropriations provide an opportunity to hold administrations accountable for spending.

“Year to year, if Congress doesn’t like a particular policy the administration is putting forward, they can put language in the appropriations bills to say, ‘No, you can’t use tax dollars to such and such purpose,’” Ditch said. “If you do a two-year bill and then the presidential administration does something underhanded or nefarious, Congress in many cases is going to have to wait till the next cycle to go after it.”

That being said, Ditch said he does not necessarily oppose the idea. He also noted that it’s not completely new.

“About eight years ago, I was a staffer on the Senate Budget Committee under then-Chairman Mike Enzi of Wyoming,” Ditch said, referencing the former Republican senator who died in 2021. “Biennial budgeting was something that was getting a lot of discussion as a potential reform.”

But the idea never really went anywhere.

Notably, the longer lawmakers have been in Congress, the more likely they are to oppose the concept of two-year appropriations. Of the Appropriations Committee members interviewed by WORLD, no one elected before 2011 believed the change would improve the spending approval process. Of the eight appropriators who readily shut the idea down, six were elected prior to 2003.

Even if Congress did switch to two-year appropriations, some lawmakers are skeptical whether the change would improve political friction.

Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., has served on the Appropriations Committee since she came to Congress in 1991 and is the ranking member on the committee. She said Republicans have a poor track record of following through on negotiated spending deals. She pointed to Republican efforts this year to cut spending in violation of a 2023 topline agreement made by former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy.

“We had a two-year deal on the Fiscal Responsibility Act: 1 percent [spending] increase for defense and 1 percent for non-defense,” DeLauro said. “They don’t hold to the bargain. Look, they reneged. They renege on every deal they come up with.”

Cole, the appropriations chairman, said Congress doesn’t have an appropriations problem; it has a problem passing bills. More often than not, political considerations—not numbers and spreadsheets—disrupt the process.

“It’s not like the committee can’t do its work,” Cole pointed out. “Our problem is on the floor.”

Cole added that, while it’s not his preference, he would respect the switch to a two-year spending plan if the Republican conference decided to go that way.

While the two-year approach may not be a perfect answer, some lawmakers like Rep. Michael Guest, R-Miss., would take the shot at change. Guest believes he’s seen enough to know Congress needs to do something differently.

“I mean, clearly our appropriations process is broken,” Guest said. “I’d be willing to look at any option. There’s got to be a better way to do it than we’ve been able to over the past couple years.”