Followup from yesterday’s policy call: Sarah Abernathy/CEF and others are reporting today that the appropriations subcommittees are hoping to complete all their work by Friday, and then elevate outstanding issues to the full appropriations committee leadership this weekend — that’s Sen. Shelby (R-AL.), Rep. Lowey (D-NY), Sen. Leahy (D-VT) and Rep. Granger (R-TX). We talked yesterday about how they might or might not package the bills into packages… I love this quote from Sen. Shelby in today’s Politico “Morning Defense,”: "We've talked about all kind of scenarios — an omnibus, kind of a middle-sized bus, a minibus, different things. But gosh, we're a long way from that," said Senate Appropriations Chairman Richard Shelby. "We've got to agree on who's going to ride in the bus first, or what's going to ride in the bus.” Taken out of context, this reads like utter gibberish, doesn’t it? Maybe even if you do know the context… Anyway, Sarah says Democrats are saying they do not want to pass any bills until all 12 bills are completed, and she thinks that it may not be possible to get all of the bills completed by time the CR expires on December 20. She’s not the only one. More Sen. Shelby, in Roll Call: If we don’t work something out toward the end of this week or the next 10 days after that … I think it’s inevitable we’re going to get a CR,” Shelby said, referring to a continuing resolution. “We’re probably going to get on past maybe January and go from there.” and “For us to reach an agreement, we're going to have to give some things and the Democrats are going to have to give some things. And I thought this would happen Sunday. Today is Tuesday, and it looks like we're going further apart,” he said, adding that “it's not looking good right now.” Again, nothing has been made public yet about the funding totals for each bill or the likely program levels within each bill. Big question, I think, is whether Congress can pass these bills before the House sends impeachment articles to the Senate. Once the Senate gets impeachment articles, they become the highest priority under the rules. Sen McConnell has already blocked out all of January in the Senate schedule in anticipation that this is what will be taking up all of the Senate’s time that month. So this is why even if they are close by the 20th, I can see why a CR lasting into February or March might be necessary. I am stubbornly refusing to believe that a year-long CR is in the offing, but you still see that idea show up in the press, at least. So, bottom line, it’s quite possible that federal funding levels for adult ed for FY2020 might not be finalized until March or later. Jeff Jeff Carter Cell: (202) 374-4387 | @jeffcrtr Senior Policy Advisor National Coalition for Literacy www.national-coalition-literacy.org <http://www.national-coalition-literacy.org/> jcarter@literacypolicy.org <mailto:jcarter@literacypolicy.org> Immediate Past President, Committee for Education Funding Executive Director Physicians for Social Responsibility 1111 14th St, NW, Suite 700 Washington, DC 20005 www.psr.org <http://www.psr.org/> | jcarter@psr.org <mailto:jcarter@psr.org>