Advocacy at a Glance

Advocacy at a Glance offers you the bullet point summary of current advocacy issues associated with the goals of the Alliance for a Stronger FDA.

• Deadline Extended: Still Time to Join the Alliance’s Sign-on Letter in Support of FDA Funding.  The Alliance is circulating a sign-on letter to make sure that appropriators understand the importance of FDA and  why it should receive the highest possible level of FY 19 funding. For the most part, the higher levels are in the House bill, but we are also advocates for the food safety funding and larger increase in monies for opioids and generics that are in the Senate bill. More than 25 organizations have already signed on, but many have told us that they need a bit more time. Accordingly, if you want to sign on, please let Eden know before COB on Friday, June 29. If you have questions, direct them to Ladd Wiley or to Steven Grossman. Note: organizations do not need to be Alliance members to sign on.

• Defense Appropriations in the House Next Week; Others After the July 4 Recess. The House and Senate schedules for next week are evolving quickly. The House would like to take up Defense Appropriations, but won’t have time to do any other funding bills. At this point, the Senate is likely to wait for the House to act first on appropriations bills. After recess, we expect that remaining appropriations bills will be bundled in mini-buses containing two or three separate appropriations bills. In a typical year, Ag/FDA appropriations are the fourth, fifth, or sixth bill considered, making it a likely candidate for the next mini-bus. However, no announcements have been made and it is possible that Ag/FDA will not be in the next mini-bus.

• Proposed Government Reorganization Would Affect FDA. On June 21, the White House unveiled its sweeping plan for reorganizing the federal government. One of the proposals would take FDA’s food safety programs and move them to USDA and merge them with the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS). The goal would be to create a single federal food safety agency. In the past, advocates for this approach have envisioned the single food agency reporting to the Secretary of HHS. Because CFSAN and FSIS operate under different laws and regulations and have different cultures, we are told this part of the reorganization is extremely unlikely to be adopted, although it is concerning. The Administration will have a chance to state its priorities when the totality of the reorganization plan is discussed at a June 27 hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.