The Senate’s work on fiscal 2026 spending bills got off to a rocky start Thursday, and the bill that funds federal climate research and weather forecasting was at the center of the debacle.
A dispute over an amendment concerning the location of the FBI’s future headquarters forced the Appropriations Committee into an indefinite recess and froze all action on the Commerce-Justice-Science bill until next week at the earliest.
While Senate appropriators were ultimately able to advance their Agriculture and Legislative Branch funding proposals with broad bipartisan support, the Senate’s effort to fund NOAA, the National Weather Service, the National Science Foundation, NASA and other programs remains at a standstill.
“This is very unfortunate,” Appropriations Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine) said Thursday after realizing the CJS bill did not yet have the votes to advance. “I think it’s sad that one issue is sinking a bill that was completely bipartisan and strongly supported on both sides of the aisle.”
