CONGRESS

The House Education and Workforce Committee passed its reconciliation bill by a 21 to 14 vote.

The Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee held a markup of S.558, the Antisemitism Awareness Act of 2025, and S.163, the Protecting Students on Campus Act of 2025. Final votes on both bills were postponed.

The House Financial Services Committee passed its reconciliation bill by a 30 to 22 vote. The bill would cut funding for the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau.

ADMINISTRATION

The Office of Management and Budget released its fiscal year 2026 discretionary spending recommendations.

President Trump released an Executive Order titled “Ending Taxpayer Subsidization of Biased Media.”

The U.S. Department of Education (ED) held a public hearing to receive feedback on its announcement of its intent to establish one or more negotiated rulemaking committees to prepare proposed regulations on various programs authorized under Title IV of the Higher Education Act of 1965

POLITICO reported that ED is terminating approximately $1 billion worth of Federal mental health grants approved by Congress.

ED announced initial actions to comply with Executive Order 14279, the Reforming Accreditation to Strengthen Higher Education. These include issuing a Dear Colleague Letter, informing institutions of higher education that they will no longer have to go through a “lengthy process” before changing an accreditor; removing the Biden Administration’s moratorium on accepting and reviewing applications for initial recognition of potential new accreditors; and notifying one applicant that its petition is no longer paused and will be reviewed.

The U.S. Department of Labor issued guidance on how to determine employee or independent contractor status when enforcing the Fair Labor Standards Act.

COURTS

A district court judge issued a temporary restraining order stating that the acting director of the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) shall not take any further actions to dissolve IMLS or its operations; terminate or put any additional IMLS staff on administrative leave; or further pause, cancel or otherwise terminate IMLS grants or contracts or fail to fund such grants or contracts.

EVENTS

Penn Hill Group plans on providing clients with a summary of the following events next week:

May 7: House Education and Workforce Full Committee Hearing titled “Beyond the Ivy League: Stopping the Spread of Antisemitism on American Campuses.”

May 7: House Oversight Subcommittee Hearing titled “Unfair Play: Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports.”