And how you can take action to keep vital funding for the community from being cut.
What if your PrEP or other HIV medication is no longer affordable because the program that helps keep your medication costs low has had its funding slashed and you no longer qualify for their services? Imagine facing discrimination based on who you love or who you are, but when you turn to the government for aid, they tell you they can’t intercede because the person who harmed you was acting on their religious beliefs. Their hands are tied. Or, what if said agency virtually no longer exists because their funding was cut so much that they don’t have the manpower to help everyone who needs them? You would wonder: how could this happen? When did these funding cuts get passed? And who would pass such laws that interfere with one’s right to live authentically?
While the above scenarios are currently hypothetical, we are in no way guaranteed that that they won’t become our reality.
Members of Congress are actively making decisions right now about how to fund our government, and some are hoping to use this as an opportunity to force through a discriminatory agenda. Much attention has been paid to the shocking onslaught of anti-LGBTQ+ bills introduced in statehouses across the country, but, unfortunately, lawmakers on the federal level are following suit. Far-right extremists, especially in the U.S. House of Representatives, are attempting to eliminate or severely curtail government funding of programs meant to improve the health, safety, and well-being of LGBTQ+ folks and people living with HIV. By using the federal appropriations process, anti-equality lawmakers can shoehorn in their unpopular and bigoted policy agendas by defunding or gutting crucial federal programs that provide resources to their most vulnerable constituents, all while attempting to avoid any real public scrutiny of their policy positions and hateful rhetoric.
What are Federal Appropriations?
Appropriations are the part of the budgeting process in which Congress decides how to allocate the discretionary portion of the federal budget. This portion of the budget funds a range of federal agencies and government programs like environmental protection, public education, scientific research, and federal employee salaries. The U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate each have Appropriations Committees tasked with allocating these funds and the task is further delegated to 24 specialized subcommittees (12 per chamber). Traditionally, each of these subcommittees produces its own appropriations bill. Alternatively, lawmakers can put together what is called a ‘continuing resolution’ (CR) to fund the government. Historically, a CR is a temporary measure to fund the government and avoid a government shut down until a final appropriations bill is passed. However, it is becoming more common for CRs to be used to fund the government for an entire fiscal year instead of passing a traditional appropriations bill.
Far-right lawmakers are using what should be the innocuous government process of apportioning funds to executive agencies as a cover to force through their harmful, bigoted policy goals in hopes that their policy changes will pass, knowing many members of Congress will feel pressured to vote affirmatively on budget bills simply because they want to avoid a government shutdown. This is the process of adding riders to a bill. These unpopular policy changes ‘ride’ through by virtue of being attached to bills that must pass for the government to function. With this method, they can circumvent the traditional means of passing policies and laws by hijacking the appropriations process to push through their priorities without needing to garner the level of support needed to pass standalone legislation.
Across the 24 bills from the House and Senate subcommittees, these harmful anti-equality policy riders fall broadly into eight categories:
- Gender-Affirming Care Bans: Attempts to restrict access to best practice medical care for trans people. These bills have a range of extremes, from prohibiting hormone therapy to a global gag rule for gender-affirming care. Some provisions only apply to youth, but some apply to both trans youth and adults.
- License to Discriminate: Allows for discrimination against same-sex couples under the guise of “protecting” people, nonprofits, and businesses with discriminatory beliefs about same-sex marriage and allows for the flagrant violation of non-discrimination policies. This type of rider is in all twelve House appropriations bills.
- Drag Bans: Bans drag performances, specifically in military spaces and U.S. foreign assistance programs.
- Pride Flag Bans: Prohibits funding the display and flying of the Pride flag in applicable federal buildings.
- Blocking Rulemaking & Enforcement of Nondiscrimination: Prevents federal agencies from implementing nondiscrimination policies that would protect LGBTQ+ people by defunding attempts to comply with the standard for sex discrimination set out in the Supreme Court case Bostock v. Clayton County, which ruled that sex discrimination statutes also protect people from discrimination based on sexual orientation and transgender status.
- Anti-DEI: Restricts diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts to help ensure marginalized and underserved communities have equal access to government programs. There is an anti-DEI rider in all but one of the House appropriation bills.
- Defunding of HIV/AIDS programs and projects: Proposes cutting $541 million from HIV domestic prevention and treatment programs, cutting the entire budget for the Ending the HIV Epidemic in the U.S. initiative, as well as funding cuts to the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program and Minority AIDS programs administered by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
- Defunding of LGBTQ+ offices, programs, and projects: Slashes the funding of LBGTQIA+ programs and government positions largely affecting LGBTQ+ people. Specifically, there is a rider proposed to defund the office of the Special Envoy to Advance the Human Rights of LGBTQI+ Persons, an office within the Department of State that oversees governmental efforts to support the rights of LGBTQ+ people around the world.
The lawmakers behind these attacks are counting on the public not paying attention because the process, like many other government functions, is designed to be complicated and technical —even boring on the surface. It is to their advantage that we remain in the dark because then they can avoid any pushback on their openly discriminatory policy ideas. They recognize that they do not have the support to actually pass their policies into law without holding funding hostage under threat of government shutdown.
The chart below shows which riders are before each subcommittee, as well as the appropriations bills that have already passed in the House, with an asterisk noting similar riders that have passed in the Senate.
- Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration, and Related Agencies (Ag)
- Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies (CJS)
- Defense, Energy and Water Development (E&W)
- Financial Services and General Government (Financial Services)
- Homeland Security (Homeland)
- Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies (Interior)
- Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies (Labor-H)
- Legislative Branch (Leg Branch)
- Military Construction, Veterans Affairs, and Related Agencies (MilCon-VA)
- State, Foreign Operations and Related Programs (SFOPs) and
- Transportation, Housing and Urban Development, and Related Agencies (T-HUD).
For fiscal year 2024, we thankfully managed to strip 51 of the 52 anti-LGBTQ+ riders from the final version of the funding package. Unfortunately, for FY25, we are facing nearly identical attacks on equality and equity, as more than 50 anti-LGBTQ+ policy riders have been introduced in the House. At this point in the process, the House has passed five of its 12 appropriations bills (all of which contain anti-equality riders); the Senate has passed 11 of the 12 appropriations bills (one bill contains two anti-equality riders).
Lambda Legal unequivocally denounces these continued attempts to weaponize the federal appropriations process to attack and marginalize LGBTQ+ people and people living with HIV. We are only as healthy as the community around us and only as free as the most marginalized among us, so it is imperative that we don’t get discouraged and remain vigilant against efforts to deny access to best practice medical care and programs that foster diversity, equity, and belonging. We must push our lawmakers to block this unpopular, far-right policy agenda and shift focus back to funding the programs and offices that really matter to their constituents.
Congressional leaders are back in Washington and are currently discussing how to fund the government, which will run out of money on December 20th. In January, there will be a new Congress sworn in with a conservative majority in both chambers that could push through their anti-equality agenda with little pushback. Now is the time to fight.
Call the U.S. Capitol switchboard right now at (202) 224-3121 [TTY: (202) 224-3091]. Take just a few moments to contact your Congressperson. Demand a clean spending bill and urge them not to support any spending bill that includes anti-LGBTQ+ riders or attacks on the vital resources that keep our communities safe and supported.
With you by our side, we successfully defeated similar attacks last year and we will do it again this year.