Lawmakers slash benefits and insurance oversight spending, spare NIH

"The bill before us today balances the need for responsible fiscal stewardship with continuing key investments in biomedical research, schools and public health," Aderholt said.

Related: Senate Appropriations Committee reverses federal benefits agency budget cuts

Democrats on the committee expressed sadness and anger about many of the spending cuts still in the bill.

Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman, D-N.J., said some of the remaining cuts will eliminate adult job training programs at a time when AI is about to force many workers to retrain for new careers.

Spending decisions

The appropriations bill drafters:

Provided $181 million for the U.S. Labor Department's Employee Benefits Security Administration.

EBSA helps handle tasks such as responding to employees' complaints about benefits at employers' self-insured health plans.

EBSA is spending about $191 million this year. The Trump administration proposed trimming funding 5%, to $181 million. The Senate Appropriations Committee voted to hold EBSA funding at $191 million.

Provided $3.5 billion for program management at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

The CMS program management team runs Affordable Care Act programs that affect commercial health insurance, such as the ACA public exchange program and a program that requires health insurers to provide rebates if less than 85% of large-group premiums or less than 80% of small-group premiums goes toward paying for health care and care quality improvement efforts.

The CMS program management team is spending about $3.7 billion this year.

The Trump administration proposed cutting CMS program management spending 6%, to $3.5 billion. The Senate Appropriations Committee voted to hold funding at $3.7 billion.

The House Appropriations subcommittee voted to let funding fall to $3.5 billion.

Provided $48 billion for the National Institutes of Health.

NIH was originally on track to spend about $48 billion this year. The Trump administration has refused to spend much of the NIH's funding. The NIH funding streams are the subject of lawsuits that are still in progress.

The Trump administration proposed cutting NIH funding by 40%, to $30 billion, but The Senate Appropriations Committee voted to keep NIH funding at $48 billion and The House Appropriations subcommittee also voted to maintain NIH funding at $48 billion.

What lawmakers said: Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., the highest-ranking Democrat on the HHS, Labor and Education subcommittee, had surgery to correct spinal stenosis while the House was in recess. Her return to subcommittee work led to a few moments of bipartisan warmth.

Aderholt looked at DeLauro early in his opening remarks and said she is someone with whom "we might not always agree on all the issues, but whom I have the utmost respect for."

DeLauro thanked Aderholt for his good wishes. She also thanked several Republican committee staffers by name, as well as Democratic committee staffers. DeLauro then went on to blast the many cuts the appropriations bill under consideration still included.

Rep. Steny Hoyer, D-Md., attacked the Trump administration's medical research funding cuts, and especially the cuts that eliminated the Pediatric Brain Tumor Consortium and pushed scientists out of agencies like the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"Is that what we're for?" Hoyer asked. "Did anybody discuss that? Did the president in his campaign say to the American people, 'I'm going to cut research on pediatric cancer"? Of course not. The American people don't support that."

Hoyer predicted that Trump will continue to eliminate research programs by refusing to spend the cash that Congress has appropriated.

"Unless we assert our authority, the administration will keep purging scientists," Hoyer said.