Ranking Member Meng Remarks at Fiscal Year 2026 Department of Commerce Budget Hearing

WASHINGTON — CongresswomanGrace Meng (D-NY-06), Ranking Member of the Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies Appropriations Subcommittee, delivered the following remarks at the subcommittee’s fiscal year 2026 budget hearing for the Department of Commerce:

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you very much, Mr. Secretary, for testifying today. We meet today to discuss the Commerce Department’s fiscal year 2026 budget request. At the same time, I must express my strong disappointment that we are still awaiting the complete details of the budget request. We are also awaiting the full, legally required details of the Commerce Department’s fiscal year 2025 operating plan—despite the fact that such details were legally required to be sent to the Appropriations Committee more than a month ago.

These delays are unacceptable. They are also, disturbingly, a pattern that we have seen over the last four and a half months—a pattern of significant and often illegal actions by Federal agencies, including the Commerce Department.

In most cases, we have learned of these actions not from the Department itself, but from news media reporting and from grant and contract recipients whose critical grant funding and contract extensions have been delayed or frozen, often in direct violation of the Impoundment Control Act of 1974. We have also heard from numerous Federal workers who have been fired without any good justification.

The National Weather Service has taken a huge hit under this Administration. Hundreds of meteorologists and other Weather Service employees were fired or felt pressured to sign up for Elon Musk’s deferred resignation program. As a result, the National Weather Service has been scrambling to keep a minimum staff at weather forecast offices around the country.

This staffing shortage has also forced the Weather Service to reduce its deployments of weather balloons, which have long provided critical information for accurate weather forecasting in local areas.

This is all happening, by the way, right when both hurricane season and wildfire season are just beginning.

The Weather Service announced earlier this week that it is moving its limited resources around—which will only change the locations that are experiencing staffing shortages. It also announced it has received permission to hire 126 new employees. 

But this is obviously far short of the number of working employees the Weather Service has lost since February. It is unclear when these new employees will be onboarded, let alone when they will be fully trained to the level of performance of the recently-departed Weather Service employees.

Five former directors of the National Weather Service, who served under both Republican and Democratic administrations, wrote an open letter last month expressing their strong concerns. They wrote that National Weather Service staff, quote, “will have an impossible task to continue its current level of services…Not only are there fewer forecasters, but there are also fewer electronic technicians… responsible for maintaining the critical NEXRAD radars. Our worst nightmare is that weather forecast offices will be so understaffed that there will be needless loss of life.” Unquote.

The Administration is also holding back various emergency-designated fiscal year 2025 Commerce Department funds. This is funding that Congress appropriated to support weather forecasting, create and preserve American private sector jobs, and protect our national security. Holding this funding back is unacceptable, and the administration should issue the required emergency designations immediately.

The Administration and the Commerce Department have released some initial details regarding their fiscal year 2026 budget request, most of which I find greatly concerning.

For example, the Administration is proposing to end funding for the Economic Development Administration, or EDA, contrary to Secretary Lutnick’s testimony at his Senate confirmation hearing, in which he answered that he would maintain the programs at EDA. The EDA helps create jobs and economic opportunities in distressed communities across the country, and historically, two-thirds of its budget has helped create jobs in rural areas. 

The Administration is also proposing to end funding for the Minority Business Development Agency, or MBDA, again contrary to Secretary Lutnick’s Senate confirmation hearing testimony, in which he answered that he did not support dismantling MBDA.

In addition, contrary to the Trump Administration’s stated goal of bringing manufacturing jobs back to America, the Trump Administration is proposing to eliminate funding for the Manufacturing Extension Partnership program, a successful, bipartisan program that helps small and medium-sized U.S. manufacturers in every state grow improve their operations, and create jobs.

Furthermore, the budget request further effectively cuts the operating budget of the National Weather Service in 2026. It creates a real risk of a future gap in critical weather satellite data. This needlessly risks lives, property, and public infrastructure across the country, especially during periods of hurricanes, wildfires, and other extreme weather events.

The Administration proposes to slash funding for other vital efforts, including grant funding to protect coastal and Great Lakes communities, as well as funding to better study and prepare for the consequences of climate change. 

I very much hope that the appropriations bill this Subcommittee considers next month will reject these extreme cuts.

I look forward to further discussing these and other concerns at this hearing. Again, thank you very much, Mr. Secretary, for your testimony today.

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