And Congress agreed to funnel millions of dollars into its own staff and maintenance of the Capitol complex. The US Capitol Police will receive $602.5 million, an increase of $87 million, to help expand their ranks after the Jan. 6 riots, while congressional offices will see their budgets increase by 21 percent, the biggest increase since 1996. to try to stop the riots. leaking institutional knowledge and preventing staff from seeking higher pay on Capitol Hill.
Since this package is one of the few bills to be passed in legislative session, lawmakers have jumped at the opportunity to add a number of additional priorities. Specifically, the bill includes the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act, a law aimed at preventing domestic violence, stalking and sexual assault that expired in 2019. Mr. Biden helped draft the law as a Senator in 1994, and a bipartisan group of Senators recently unveiled a deal on an expanded version.
The law also includes $1 billion in funding for Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system, which was held up in the Senate over objections from Kentucky Republican Senator Rand Paul. And it will close a loophole so that flavored e-cigarette makers can no longer bypass the Food and Drug Administration’s ability to regulate tobacco-derived products.
To get the package through the Senate, lawmakers had to face a string of objections from conservative Republicans, who complained they had little time to study the legislation and insisted that emergency aid to Ukraine be a priority.
“It’s hard to express your anger and frustration,” Florida Republican Senator Rick Scott said when Democrats blocked his bid to accept emergency aid to Ukraine without $1.5 trillion to fund the government. “What the hell are we doing here?”
Like other budget hawks, Mr. Scott has also ridiculed the return of earmarked contributions, which allow lawmakers from both parties to funnel money to projects in their states or districts. But lawmakers have rejected an amendment proposed by Indiana Republican Sen. Mike Brown that would have removed these projects, now rebranded with stricter guardrails, from the package.
“That’s what it’s all about – politics,” said Sen. John Tester, Democrat from Montana, defending the package. He warned that Mr. Scott was risking closure by trying to change the spending figure.