Hill Heat

Subcommittee hearing on the Fiscal Year 2025 Budget Request for the U.S. Agency for International Development. The budget request is $58.8 billion for all USAID and Department of State operations.

• Samantha Power, Administrator, United States Agency for International Development

The State Department’s FY 2025 Request of $99 million for cross-cutting climate change programs includes an additional $18 million over FY 2023 Actual to meet the vision and mandates laid out by the Administration and Congress, as well as sustain a leadership role for climate solutions on the global stage. (By way of comparison, the programs for competition with China total $4 billion.)

Full committee hearing.

• Lonnie G. Bunch III, Secretary, Smithsonian Institution

Locked in a Hotbox: The Impact of Climate Change on the Incarcerated will be a critical examination of how climate change impacts people who are incarcerated. Many jails and prisons are inadequately equipped to handle extreme weather, exposing people who are confined within them to unique health vulnerabilities.

This event will highlight how the effects of climate-related events on prisons impact not only people confined in them but also people who work in them. It will describe challenges like inadequate cooling systems in the face of rising temperatures and the risks posed by natural disasters to these facilities. Addressing jail/prison infrastructure law and policy in the era of climate change, speakers will consider what policy changes at the intersection of environmental justice and prison reform would help mitigate risks and increase awareness.

• Co-Moderator: Stephen P. Wood, MS, ACNP-BC – Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics at Harvard Law School; Northeastern University
• Co-Moderator: Jeremiah Goulka, LL.B., JD – Founder and Director, Climate and Public Safety (CAPS) and the SHIELD Training Initiative, Northeastern University
• Lt. Col. Cathy Fontenot, MS – Chief of Corrections, East Baton Rouge (LA) Parish Sheriff’s Office
• Laurie Levenson, JD – Professor of Law, David W. Burcham Chair in Ethical Advocacy, and Founding Director of the Fidler Institute on Criminal Justice, LMU Loyola Law School
• Joel Thompson, JD – Managing Attorney, Harvard Prison Legal Assistance Project

RSVP

Full committee hearing to examine the President’s proposed budget request for fiscal year 2025 for the Department of Defense and Future Years Defense Program. The budget request is $849.8 billion.

• Lloyd J. Austin III, Secretary of Defense
• Michael J. McCord, Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller)
• General Charles Q. Brown, Jr., USAF, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

On Monday, April 8, 2024, at 3:30 p.m. (CT) at 1800 Lakeshore Drive, Port Arthur, TX 77640, the Subcommittee on Energy, Climate, and Grid Security will hold a field hearing entitled “Biden’s LNG Export Ban: How Rush-to-Green Politics Hurts Local Communities and U.S. Energy Security.” The hearing will examine the Biden administration’s recently announced ban on issuing permits to export liquified natural gas (LNG), and the negative implications of this decision on local economies, jobs, and educational opportunities.

Hearing memo

• Thurman Bill Bartie, Mayor, Port Arthur, Texas
• Dr. Betty J. Reynard, President, Lamar State College Port Arthur
• Larry Kelley, Executive Port Director and CEO, Port of Port Arthur
• James Beard, Jr., Founder and CEO, Port Arthur Community Action Network

Subcommittee hearing on the FY2025 budget request and economic outlook.

• Janet Yellen, Secretary, Department of the Treasury
• Shalanda Young, Director, Office of Management and Budget
• Jared Bernstein, Chairman, Council of Economic Advisers

Subcommittee on Oversight & Accountability hearing.

• Richard R. Verma, Deputy Secretary of State for Management and Resources, U.S. Department of State
• Naz Durakoğlu, Assistant Secretary Bureau of Legislative Affairs, U.S. Department of State

Subcommittee hearing.

• Kin W. Moy, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary, Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, U.S. State Department
• Matt Murray, U.S. Senior Official for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), U.S. State Department
• Pamela Phan, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Asia, International Trade Administration, U.S. Department of Commerce

On Thursday, March 21, 2024, immediately following the conclusion of the Full Committee Business Meeting, the Full Committee will hold a legislative hearing titled “Legislative Hearing on: Toxic Exposure Fund Improvement Act of 2024”.

Hearing repository

Subcommittee hearing on the FY2025 Department of Agriculture budget request.

• Budget in brief

• Thomas Vilsack, Secretary, U.S. Department of Agriculture

Under the current law, the 2025 request for discretionary budget authority to fund programs and operating expenses is $31.6 billion, slightly more than 6.84 percent increase, or $2.16 billion, above the 2024 annualized Continuing Resolution (CR) levels. Outlays for mandatory programs are $189.6 billion, 82.1 percent of total outlays. The remaining $41.4 billion, or 17.9 percent, of outlays are for discretionary programs such as: the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), food safety, rural development loans and grants, research and education, soil and water conservation technical assistance, animal and plant health, management of national forests, wildland firefighting, other Forest Service activities, and domestic and international marketing assistance.

The 2025 Budget supports a continued investment of approximately $11.6 billion to combat the climate crisis through all aspects of the food and agricultural systems by focusing on climate science, clean energy innovation, mitigation via climate-smart land management practices, and adaptation and resilience. The Budget includes approximately $5.1 billion to restore our national forests and mitigate wildfire risk, an operational increase of approximately $400 million from 2023 enacted. This includes $207 million for hazardous fuels reduction, equal to the 2023 enacted level. The Budget requests $1 billion in lending authority for Rural Energy for America Program (REAP) to support the transition to clean energy, and $6.5 billion in authority for rural electric loans to support additional clean energy, energy storage, and transmission projects that would create good-paying jobs. The Budget also requests $53 million in zero-interest loans for the Rural Energy Savings Program, which would help rural Americans implement durable cost- effective energy efficiency measures in their homes, which lowers energy costs and contributes to the President’s clean energy goals. The Budget also seeks $1 million in funding to continue work started by the Growing Climate Solutions Act. As directed in the Act, USDA will establish a voluntary program to help reduce entry barriers into voluntary environmental credit markets for farmers, ranchers, and private forest landowners.