Noteworthy House Education and Oversight Committee Hearings Taking Place This Thursday
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Overview
As first noted last Thursday during CSPEN’s regularly scheduled Federal Legislative & Regulatory Update webinar, this coming Thursday the House Education & Workforce Committee has requested Secretary of Education Linda McMahon provide testimony highlighting the Administration’s Education Agenda. The hearing, entitled “Examining the Policies and Priorities of the Department of Education”, will begin at 10:15 AM ET and presented live via the Committee’s YouTube channel here (us.list-manage.com/xPJODg_9ffQ?e=05bce952ad&c2id=828e2f13ae2569477ba2b7da4ef30812) .
Later that afternoon, the House Economic Growth, Energy Policy, and Regulatory Affairs Subcommittee of the House Oversight & Government Reform Committee is scheduled to hold a “roundtable” entitled ““Reducing America’s National Debt: Rooting Out Federal Waste, Fraud, and Overregulation” beginning at 2PM ET and presented live via the Committee’s YouTube channel here (us.list-manage.com/16Hl9vRoIkC?e=05bce952ad&c2id=828e2f13ae2569477ba2b7da4ef30812) .
Below is a brief attempt to predict some of what we anticipate will occur during each hearing.
Education Committee Hearing – Examining the Policies and Priorities of the Department of Education
CSPEN anticipates that Secretary McMahon will be similar to portions of the testimony which she shared with the Seante Appropriations Committee on April 28^th. That hearing focused on Secretary McMahon providing details on President Trump’s Fiscal Year 2027 Budget Request. However, both the Secretary’s testimony and the Q&A with the Senators dug deep into issues related to the Administration’s plan to eliminate the Department of Education, key policy directives, and what the priorities were moving forward. And, like the prior Senate hearing, we anticipate that Secretary McMahon will once again face similar, but even more direct questions.
As CSPEN has shared with the higher education community most recently, we anticipate that the entangled issues related to the federal student loan program will be on full display.
Oversight Committee Roundtable – Reducing America’s National Debt: Rooting Out Federal Waste, Fraud, and Overregulation
In his press release announcing the roundtable, the vision for the meeting were described as an opportunity for members to:
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* Survey how America’s historically high and continuously growing national debt threatens the country’s economic future, national security, and the affordability of daily life; and
* Explore actions the House Oversight Committee can add to measures it already has taken this term to help shrink the national debt through the reduction of waste, fraud, and abuse in federal programs and excessive federal regulation.
In his own comments, Subcommittee Chairman Burlison stated,
“A key step towards shrinking the national debt is to put a stop to the waste, fraud, and abuse that plague federal government programs. I look forward to hearing from participants the unique ways in which the House Oversight Committee can tackle government waste and overregulation to help shrink the national debt and spur economic growth”.
The Roundtable will include testimony from three panelists:
* Dr. William W. Beach – Executive Director, The Fiscal Lab on Capitol Hill
* Dr. Joshua D. Rauh – Chairman, Fiscal Policy Initiative, Hoover Institution
* Dr. Douglas Holtz-Eakin – President, American Action Forum, and former Director of the Congressional Budget Office
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What’s Next
CSPEN will provide a summary of these two hearings as part of a SPECIAL Monday edition of our regularly scheduled Thursday afternoon CSPEN Federal Legislative & Regulatory Update webinars. This Thursday and Friday the CSPEN Board will be holding one of two annual in-person meetings. During the SPECIAL Monday edition of our webinar we will be not only sharing summaries of the hearings noted in this email, but will also be providing a comprehensive presentation of CSPEN’s public comment submission related to the Accountability in Higher Education and Access Through Demand-Driven Workforce Pell: Student Tuition and Transparency System (STATS) and Earnings Accountability Notice of Proposed Rulemaking.
