Appropriators Still Determining Topline Spending Levels for FY26 – Take Action Today!

By Kim Johnson, NLIHC Senior Director of Policy 

Appropriators in the House and Senate have yet to release anticipated topline funding levels—known as “302(b)s”—for their fiscal year (FY) 2026 draft spending bills, including the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development (THUD) spending bill that funds HUD’s vital affordable housing, homelessness, and community development programs.  

House Appropriators have nevertheless moved forward with reviewing a handful of bills. However, House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole (R-OK) revised his committee’s anticipated schedule for reviewing and voting on bills, a process known as “markup,” after committee Democrats successfully delayed votes by providing opening statements and offering a significant number of amendments to the bills under review. While subcommittee and full committee markups for the House’s draft THUD spending bill are still slated for July 14 and July 17, respectively, the committee will need to continue the nearly nine-hour markup of their draft Agriculture spending bill on July 23; comparatively, markup for the Agriculture bill took just under four hours last year. The federal Agriculture spending bill funds food assistance programs for low-income families, as well as rural development and rural housing assistance programs. See an analysis of the rural housing provisions of the House Agriculture bill here.  

Chair Cole has previously stated he will aim to write FY26 spending bills as close as possible to President Trump’s FY26 budget request, which called for an extreme 44% cut to HUD funding from FY25, including a proposal to block grant and slash funding for rental assistance programs by 43%. So far, the bills released by the House have provided roughly the same level of funding as the previous fiscal year. The House Appropriations THUD Subcommittee will need to release the text of their draft bill in advance of the scheduled markups in July. Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Susan Collins (R-ME) and Vice Chair Patty Murray (D-WA) are reportedly still discussing topline spending agreements and a schedule for markups.   

Congress has until October 1, the beginning of the federal fiscal year, to draft, negotiate, and pass final FY26 spending bills. Without a final spending agreement, Congress will need to enact a short-term funding patch known as a continuing resolution (CR) to maintain funding for federal programs and avoid a partial federal government shutdown. While Republicans control both the House and the Senate, any spending bill needs at least 60 votes to pass the Senate, so final appropriations bills will need bipartisan support to be enacted. 

The need for additional voucher renewal funding  

Appropriators face a steep challenge in securing sufficient funding to renew all existing housing vouchers in FY26. The final FY25 spending bill for HUD programs underfunded HUD’s Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) program, and over time, is expected to result in a loss of 32,000 HCVs through turnover. In addition to the cost of renewing existing vouchers, in FY26, Congress should provide sufficient funding to make up for the gap left by the FY25 spending bill.  

It is also vital that Congress provide sufficient funding to continue existing assistance under HUD’s Emergency Housing Voucher (EHV) program. The EHV program was created in the “American Rescue Plan Act of 2021,” which provided $5 billion for 70,000 new tenant-based rental assistance vouchers specifically targeted to people experiencing or at immediate risk of homelessness, including people escaping intimate partner violence or human trafficking. The EHV program requires public housing authorities (PHAs), which are responsible for administering the program, to collaborate with their local Continuums of Care (CoCs) to identify individuals and families at risk of or experiencing homelessness and connect them to EHV plus wrap-around services when needed for long-term housing stability.   

The EHV program has been extremely successful and currently assists almost 60,000 households—in particular families with children—to find and maintain stable housing. While funding for the program was initially slated to last until 2030, the rapid increase in rent costs over the last four years has caused the funding to run out much more quickly than expected. Unless Congress allocates additional funding, HUD estimates that some Public Housing Authorities (PHAs) will begin running out of funding for the program as soon as the end of the year. House Financial Services Ranking Member Maxine Waters (D-CA), Senate Banking Committee Ranking Member Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), and Senator Alex Padilla (D-CA) led nearly 100 other lawmakers in a letter to House and Senate THUD Appropriations leaders, calling on them to provide sufficient funding in the FY26 spending bill to ensure no voucher recipients lose their assistance.   

Take action TODAY: Urge Congress to expand, not cut, funding for vital affordable housing and homelessness assistance programs!  

Use NLIHC’s toolkits and resources to take action on FY26 funding, including by: 

• Using NLIHC’s new advocacy toolkit, “Opposing Cuts to Federal Investments in Affordable Housing,” to call on Congress to protect and expand affordable housing and homelessness resources, including NLIHC’s priorities: 
• Full funding to renew all existing Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) contracts and funding to renew 60,000 Emergency Housing Vouchers (EHVs). 
• Increased funding for public housing operations and public housing capital needs. 
• $4.922 billion for HUD’s Homeless Assistance Grants (HAG) program. 
• $20 million for the Eviction Protection Grant Program (EPGP). 
• At least $1.3 billion for HUD’s Tribal housing programs and $150 million for competitive funds targeted to Tribes with the greatest needs. 

The toolkit includes talking points, advocacy materials, engagement ideas, and more resources for advocates to weigh-in with their members of Congress on the importance of these vital resources!  

• Emailing or calling congressional members’ offices to tell them about the importance of affordable housing, homelessness, and community development resources to you, your family, your community, or your work. You can use NLIHC’s Take Action page to look up your member offices or call/send an email directly!
• Sharing stories of those directly impacted by homelessness and housing instability. Storytelling adds emotional weight to your message and can help lawmakers see how their policy decisions impact actual people. Learn about how to tell compelling stories with this resource. 

National, state, local, Tribal, and territorial organizations can also join over 2,700 organizations on CHCDF’s national letter calling on Congress to support the highest level of funding possible for affordable housing, homelessness, and community development resources in FY26.