Overview
- The House approved the FY2026 minibus on January 22, sending a package with Labor-HHS funding and health policy changes to the Senate ahead of the January 30 deadline.
- Senate Democrats oppose advancing legislation that includes current DHS funding, and negotiators are discussing stripping DHS to move the rest of the bills, a step that would still require House approval of an identical version.
- With the House out of session, timing complications raise the risk of a partial shutdown if the chambers cannot align on identical text this week.
- Appropriators’ summaries show about $116 billion in discretionary funding for HHS, including roughly $48.7 billion for NIH, alongside extensions of Medicare telehealth and hospital-at-home authorities.
- The package advances PBM transparency reforms, initial site-neutral payment steps and incentives for alternative payment models, but it does not restore the expired enhanced ACA premium subsidies; related oversight continues with House fraud inquiries and some Senate hearings postponed.