Amendments to the FY15 Energy and Water Appropriations Act (H.R. 4923)
Amendments to the FY15 Energy and Water Appropriations Act (H.R. 4923)
Heritage Action will be key voting the following amendment[s] to H.R. 4923, the FY15 Energy and Water Appropriations Act.
Key Vote Alert: "YES" on Hudson Amendment
The House will vote on the Hudson Amendment to the FY15 Energy and Water Appropriations Act (H.R. 4923). Introduced by Rep. Richard Hudson (R-N.C.), the amendment would take spending back to FY 2008 levels with an across the board cut of 7.4831 percent. The cuts do not apply to defense accounts under the headings of "National Nuclear Security Administration," "Environmental and Other Defense Activities," or "Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board."
As Heritage has explained:
The Department of Energy's budget grew from $15 billion in FY 2000 to $25.7 billion in FY 2011-a staggering 71 percent increase in only one decade. Many government programs included in various Presidents' annual DOE budgets evolved from basic research and development to attempts at commercialization better left to the private sector. Other programs are politically correct pet projects of various Members of Congress that have little business being supported by taxpayers. The private sector is much better at allocating resources and developing energy technologies than government-directed initiatives. Such wasteful use of taxpayer money provides Congress an opportunity to significantly scale back or eliminate a number of government energy programs and return the Department of Energy to its traditional mission of promoting national and economic energy security and focus on areas that meet a critical national objective.
The Hudson Amendment helps return the Department of Energy closer to its traditional mission of promoting national and economic energy security, while reducing budget authority by roughly $1 billion and cutting hundreds of millions of dollars in FY2015 outlays.
Heritage Action supports the Hudson Amendment and will include it as a key vote on our legislative scorecard.
Related:
Amendments to the FY15 Energy and Water Appropriations Act (H.R. 4923)