FY20:

Senate Appropriations Committee staff believe it will be difficult to raise the spending caps to the same level as those in FY19. According to our sources, the federal government is expected to reach the debt limit on March 2, and this will be a driving force for determining if budget caps will be raised or return to the levels under the 2010 Budget Control Act (BCA). If the caps return to those under the BCA, nondefense programs will face a $55 billion cut, but our understanding is that both the House and Senate are working to prevent that from happening.

The President’s Budget, which has no force of law but provides a starting point for the appropriations process, is expected to be released the week of March 11.

Title X:

Last Friday afternoon, the Trump Administration released the final draft of the Title X rule “Compliance with Statutory Program Integrity Requirements.” This rule places additional requirements on providers making it more difficult for them to share medically-accurate information and services with their patients and ultimately compromising the patient-provider relationship. You can read more about this rule and NCSD’s position here. The rule will not be final until it is published in the Federal Register. NCSD will continue to follow developments in this closely as we know it could have implications STD testing and treatment.