Hispanic-serving institutions would have their annual appropriation for 2009 cut from $93 million to $74 million in the Senate measure. However, after receiving $100 million from CCRA, those institutions would achieve a net gain under the Senate approach.
Despite this action at committee and subcommittee levels, it is unclear whether the full House and Senate can muster the will to approve final bills for education and other hotbutton programs. Many observers predict that progress will stall by September, leaving Congress to resort to short-term spending bills followed by a final negotiation after the presidential election.
Congress does not want to spend months on an education spending bill only to have President Bush veto the measure, as he did last year, Bartley says. Peoples of USSA agreed there may be no serious White House/Congress negotiations until after the November election, with a final outcome perhaps only after a new president takes office. “It doesn’t look like it will be completed this year,” she tells Diverse. Short-term spending bills for the start of 2009 are “pretty inevitable at this point.
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