April 16, 2018

The House Rules Committee today asked members of the House of Representatives to submit any proposed amendments to the Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization bill (H.R. 4) by 2 p.m. on Thursday, April 19.

Amendments must be drafted to the text of H.R. 4 as introduced last week.

The Rules Committee has been through this exercise before. Last September, the panel set an October 5, 2017 deadline for amendments to the earlier iteration of the FAA bill (H.R. 2997). 160 amendments were submitted (see list here). But the Rules Committee never got to the point of culling that amendment list.

Today’s Rules announcement is very specific that “All previously submitted amendments to H.R. 2997 must be redrafted to H.R. 4 and resubmitted to the Rules Committee or they will not be considered by the Committee.” So variants of many of the amendments submitted last year to H.R. 2997 (except for those dealing with title II of H.R. 2997, the air traffic control spinoff plan, since title II has been dropped from H.R. 4).

The 2 p.m. Thursday deadline gives the Rules Committee staff, the Speaker’s staff, and Transportation and Infrastructure chairman Shuster’s (R-PA) staff Friday, the weekend, and most of Monday to figure out which amendments are acceptable to Shuster (in consultation with ranking minority member Peter DeFazio (D-OR) and can either be incorporated into a forthcoming Shuster-DeFazio manager’s amendment, which amendments should get a floor vote on their own, and which amendments should not receive floor consideration.

The Rules Committee will meet early next week to limit amendments to H.R. 4 and take other steps to allow the bill to come before the House later that week.

Meanwhile, as we await the filing of amendments to the FAA bill, here is an updated list of transportation-related committee hearings scheduled on Capitol Hill this week.

• Tuesday, April 17 – House Appropriations – Subcommittee on Homeland Security – subcommittee hearing on the FY 2019 budget request for the U.S. Coast Guard – 10:00 a.m., 2359 Rayburn.
• Tuesday, April 17 – House Transportation and Infrastructure – Subcommittee on Railroads, Pipelines, and Hazardous Materials – subcommittee hearing on the implementation of the Surface Transportation Board Reauthorization Act of 2015 (witness list to be posted here) – 10:00 a.m., 2167 Rayburn.
• Tuesday, April 17 – Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs – full committee hearing to examine the nomination of Thelma Drake for Federal Transit Administrator – 10:00 a.m., SD-538 Dirksen.
• Tuesday, April 17 – Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation – full committee hearing to examine the nomination of Karl Schultz to be Commandant of the Coast Guard – 10:00 a.m., SR-253 Russell.
• Wednesday, April 18 – House Appropriations – Subcommittee on Transportation and Housing – subcommittee hearing for House Members to testify on the FY 2019 budget request – 10:00 a.m., 2358-A Rayburn.
• Wednesday, April 18 – Senate Appropriations – Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development – subcommittee hearing on the FY 2019 budget request for the Army Corps of Engineers water resources program – 2:30 p.m., SD-430 Dirksen.
• Thursday, April 19 – House Oversight and Government Reform – Subcommittee on Government Operations – subcommittee hearing on the use of private activity bonds in the All Aboard Florida rail project – 10:00 a.m., 2154 Rayburn.