HR6500-119

What This Bill Does

The Senate engrossed amendment replaces the House-passed AGOA Extension Act with the Continuing Appropriations and Extensions Act, 2027. Division A supplies actual fiscal year 2027 appropriations at generally the same rates, authority, and conditions as the listed fiscal year 2026 appropriations laws. Unless a full-year appropriation or an omission in a later appropriations act occurs first, that authority expires on December 11, 2026. The continuing resolution covers the ordinary federal departments and agencies funded through the 12 listed appropriations measures, including direct-loan and loan-guarantee costs.

The base rules preserve current operations but generally prohibit new starts, resumed projects, higher Defense production rates, and new multiyear procurements. Agencies must use the most limited funding action available and generally cannot front-load grants or distributions in a way that would constrain Congress's final decisions. Mandatory benefits and Food and Nutrition Act activities continue at current-law program levels, including certain payments due shortly after the expiration date. Civilian personnel accounts may be apportioned as needed to avoid furloughs, but agencies must first reduce or defer nonpersonnel administrative expenses. Existing emergency and disaster designations receive updated budget treatment, and OMB must report continuing rescissions or cancellations to the appropriations committees.

Division A includes targeted exceptions to those general limits. It permits funding rates sufficient for farm ownership loans, WIC participation, commodity food caseloads, livestock reporting, the 2030 Census, the GeoXO weather-satellite schedule, Justice Department legal work, federal judicial security, FBI preparation for the 2028 Olympics, and disaster or wildfire response. It accommodates the District of Columbia's enacted local budget, increased Small Business Administration loan demand, the National Flood Insurance Program, Essential Air Service, Indian Health Service facilities, Navajo-Hopi relocation functions, and a federal wildland-firefighter premium-pay waiver.

Defense and energy exceptions permit specified prior-year Navy shipbuilding cost increases, up to $2.853 billion for Defense-wide national security systems, military housing work at Joint Base San Antonio, selected nuclear-security projects, and a Waste Isolation Pilot Plant procurement. Other provisions extend availability or reprogram unobligated balances for broadband middle-mile deployment, transit capital grants, highway infrastructure, FAA research, homeless assistance, and fair-housing activities. HUD may use prior tenant-based rental-assistance balances to prevent voucher terminations and provide emergency housing vouchers for units under lease on September 30, 2026. A separate HUD provision permits qualifying small nonprofit assisted properties to have Flex Sub debt satisfied and provides $6.258 million while rescinding $4.258 million from an older account.

The resolution freezes Members of Congress cost-of-living adjustments during the covered period and appropriates two $174,000 survivor payments. It also delays through December 11 a proposed revision of government-wide grant Uniform Guidance. Several fund shifts are structured as rescissions followed by equivalent new budget authority, changing availability and timing without necessarily increasing the stated face amount.

Division B temporarily extends 19 authorities. These include grain inspection standards, Forest Service participation in the ACES program, Food for Peace, the Defense Production Act, Toxic Substances Control Act fee authority, cybersecurity information sharing, federal cybersecurity protection, Homeland Security joint task forces, the Technology Modernization Fund Board, Patent and Trademark Office fee setting, the Commission on International Religious Freedom, and Western Hemisphere passport fees. It increases the Northern Mariana Islands fiscal year 2026 Medicaid ceiling by $21.4 million and reduces the Medicare Improvement Fund by $21 million.

Trade provisions extend African Growth and Opportunity Act preferences and Haiti's apparel preference program through 2028, while customs user-fee and Korea trade-agreement dates move to March 31, 2032. Unlike the House text it replaces, the Senate AGOA provision does not include the House's retroactive liquidation, 180-day refund-claim process, or 90-day payment rule for entries made after September 30, 2025. Division B also excludes the budgetary effects of divisions B through D from specified PAYGO and scorekeeping procedures and temporarily narrows the application of a 2025 hemp-definition amendment to specified product categories through December 11.

Division C continues federal surface-transportation laws from October 1 through December 11, 2026. Highway, transit, and other covered programs receive fiscal year 2027 authorization based on the fraction of the year in the extension period and generally retain fiscal year 2026 allocation and obligation rules. The Appalachian Regional Commission and sport-fish restoration provisions continue, selected Highway Trust Fund balances remain available through September 30, 2027, and expenditure authority for the highway, transit, sport-fish, boating, and leaking-underground-storage-tank trust funds continues through December 12.

Division D prevents a broad set of veterans authorities from expiring before December 11. It continues VA copayment collection, mandatory nursing-home care for qualifying service-connected veterans, rural ambulance reimbursement, VA-DOD health-resource sharing, the Philippines regional office, restoration of education benefits after school closure, veteran transportation, VA Inspector General subpoenas, adapted housing, the vendee loan program, property transfers, and advisory committees. Temporary funding includes $236,713 for the rural RANGE mental-health program, $1.973 million for caregiver mental-health support, $197,261 for reintegration grants serving homeless women veterans and homeless veterans with children, $130.192 million for very-low-income veteran-family housing services, $986,302 for homeless-veteran special-needs grants, and $3.156 million for adaptive sports. Suicide-prevention grants, homeless-veteran treatment and housing, minority-veteran advice, and plot allowances also continue.

Who Benefits and How

Federal employees, contractors, benefit recipients, food-assistance participants, disaster survivors, farmers, small businesses, defense suppliers, housing-voucher families, and users of federal services benefit from avoiding an immediate funding lapse. States, local governments, Tribes, transit agencies, highway programs, public-safety agencies, and research or infrastructure projects receive short-term continuity. AGOA and Haiti preference beneficiaries retain market access; importers keep lower-duty supply channels. Veterans and their families retain health, housing, education, mental-health, transportation, oversight, and rehabilitation services. Congress preserves time to negotiate full-year appropriations while limiting most new commitments.

Who Bears the Burden and How

Federal budget offices must operate under temporary rates, special apportionment rules, reporting duties, and more than 50 program-specific exceptions. Agencies and grantees cannot assume full-year funding and may be unable to start new work or make normal early distributions. Taxpayers finance the continuing appropriations and specified additions. Importers continue paying customs user fees, while domestic producers continue facing preferential imports. The House's retroactive AGOA refund beneficiaries lose that proposed relief. Members of Congress forgo a cost-of-living adjustment. Businesses and recipients affected by the proposed Uniform Guidance rule receive a temporary delay, while OMB cannot finalize that rule during the covered period. Programs ending on December 11 face another funding or authorization deadline unless Congress acts again.

Key Provisions

• Appropriates temporary fiscal year 2027 funding at generally fiscal year 2026 rates through December 11, 2026.
• Limits new starts, production increases, grant front-loading, and other commitments that could constrain final appropriations.
• Protects mandatory benefits, food assistance, federal staffing, disaster response, housing vouchers, public safety, and specified agency operations.
• Provides targeted defense, nuclear-security, infrastructure, Indian Health Service, transportation, housing, and loan-program exceptions.
• Extends trade, cybersecurity, environmental-fee, patent-fee, international-affairs, and other authorities.
• Continues AGOA and Haiti trade preferences through 2028 and customs user fees through March 31, 2032.
• Extends surface-transportation programs and trust-fund spending authority on a prorated basis.
• Extends veterans health, mental-health, housing, education, oversight, transportation, and assistance programs through December 11.
• Uses rescissions, reappropriations, budget designations, and PAYGO exclusions to manage temporary budget effects.
• Replaces the House AGOA refund bill, omitting its retroactive customs-reliquidation procedure.