House passes final spending package, Alabama delegation split on DHS bill

WASHINGTON — The U.S House passed the final package of spending bills Thursday, with a close margin on the Department of Homeland Security bill, after most Democrats, including the two from Alabama, opposed it for lacking stronger restrictions on immigration enforcement.

Alabama’s Republican members of Congress voted for the DHS funding bill, as did seven other Democrats.

But all seven of the state’s House members supported the other three bills that would fund multiple agencies, including the departments of Defense, Labor, Health and Human Services, Education and Transportation through fiscal year 2026. The vote was 341-88.

The package now heads to the U.S. Senate, with just a week left before government funding runs out on Jan. 30. Senators are set to return to Washington Monday, but an impending winter storm could make travel difficult.

Rep. Robert Aderholt, R-Haleyville, who chairs the subcommittee that oversees the Labor-HHS-Education bill, told Alabama Daily News that the legislation funds the departments in a “conservative manner.”

The measure provides $116.8 billion for HHS, which is $33 billion more than President Donald Trump requested in his budget. It includes $48.7 billion for the National Institutes of Health, which also rejects the president’s 40% cut to the health research agency, Democrats highlighted. Noting that fact, Aderholt said Trump is still supportive of getting the bill across the finish line.

“(The National Institutes of Health) is one of those things…you want to make sure they’re doing their mission…on the cutting edge of health care, getting new cures for diseases, and that’s what they’re doing,” Aderholt told ADN. “And so that part of the bill has a lot of support.”

Aderholt’s bill also allocates about $79 billion for the Department of Education, keeping funding levels roughly flat. It also includes language, touted by Democrats, to continue programs under the direction of the department that Trump has sought to dismantle.

“As long as education is funded in this country…it doesn’t matter what department it comes out of,” the congressman told ADN.

House Republican appropriators celebrated the passage of all 12 annual appropriations bills on Thursday after the vote. The bills are supposed to be due every year by Oct. 1. Aderholt and fellow Alabama appropriator Rep. Dale Strong, R-Huntsville, happily clapped and cheered as Speaker Mike Johnson applauded the efforts to craft and pass the bills with bipartisan support.

“I think it’s a big day for America and a big day for the Republican Party to get a lot closer to regular order,” Strong told ADN.

Sewell touted that her Nancy Gardner Sewell Medicare Multi-Cancer Early Detection Screening Coverage Act was included in the appropriations package. The bill would require Medicare to cover the tests upon their approval by the Food and Drug Administration.

“This critical milestone is years in the making, and was only made possible thanks to the efforts of amazing organizations, survivors and patient advocates,” Sewell said.

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But the DHS funding bill did not garner much Democratic support after leadership announced their opposition to the measure because it failed to include “meaningful, reasonable and necessary reforms meant to protect everyday Americans and immigrant families from the administration’s reckless and violent tactics.”

Democrats called for restraints on Immigration and Customs Enforcement after an agent fatally shot Renee Good in Minneapolis, and as the agency has ramped up deportation efforts.

Appropriators did provide $20 million for body cameras for ICE and Border Patrol agents and outlined de-escalation training for immigration enforcement officers, but for most Democrats, those additions were not enough to gain their support.

Overall, the bill allocates $64.4 billion for DHS, which also covers TSA, the Coast Guard and FEMA. That includes $513 million to sustain 22,000 Border Patrol agents.

Rep. Shomari Figures, D-Mobile, said he wanted to see Congress have more oversight over the Department of Homeland Security, especially in the wake of the immigration crackdown.

“We’re seeing enforcement in manners that we have just not historically seen in this country, certainly not in a very long time and something that we should not be reverting back to,” Figures told ADN. “And so DHS needs to be held accountable for that.”

Sewell also opposed the DHS bill because she could not “support providing additional funding to ICE as they continue their campaign of cruelty.”

Republicans supported the measure to fund DHS and focused on the need to secure borders.

“I can’t speak to every situation, but I will say that these ICE agents and these people that work on a day-to-day basis in the government and trying to make sure our borders are secure, they’re doing the best job they can,” Aderholt said.

For the Department of Defense, the funding bill provides $838.7 billion to the Pentagon, a more than $8 billion increase from Trump’s budget request. It includes a 3.8% pay raise for service members, authorized in the National Defense Authorization Act.

It allocates $13.4 billion to the Golden Dome, Trump’s missile defense shield initiative, including $9.6 billion in Missile Defense Agency programs and $3.8 billion in Space Force programs, according to House Republican appropriators.

The package includes numerous earmarks for Alabama, including funding for bridges and roads, a fire, EMS and police substation in Gadsden and a workforce development and multipurpose center at Athens State University.

The Senate will need to approve this final four-bill package, coupled with two other spending bills, to complete all 12 annual appropriations bills before next Friday’s deadline.