Administration Opposes House Funding Bill With CPSC Funding Cuts, New Cuba Restrictions
President Barack Obama’s senior advisers would recommend that he veto a House fiscal 2017 spending bill, partly because it proposes to cut $5 million from the Consumer Product Safety Commission’s current $125 million budget, and would ban use of funds to further transactions involving Cuban government-confiscated property, according to an Office of Management and Budget Statement of Administration Policy released June 21 (here). The $120 million for CPSC proposed in the House Appropriations Committee’s version of the fiscal 2017 Financial Services and General Government Appropriations bill falls short of Obama’s request by $11 million.
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The statement criticizes the bill’s prohibition of funding to implement mandatory standards for recreational off-highway vehicles (ROVs) until CPSC completes a study with the National Academy of Sciences. “This provision could indefinitely delay CPSC's ability to complete rulemaking on ROVs, potentially compromising public safety,” the White House said. “The language also would undermine the Commission's statutory independence and authority to write public safety regulations, interfering with its regulatory independence and public safety mission.”
The Obama administration also expressed opposition to four Cuba provisions, which would not only prevent funding to facilitate imports of property confiscated by the Cuban government, but would also bar funding to support any financial transaction with an entity controlled by the Cuban military or intelligence service or their members' immediate families. The administration in its statement also pushed back against a provision that would generally prevent use of funds to approve an Office of Foreign Assets Control general license or another specific U.S.-granted license pertaining to any trade name, trademark or commercial name that is the same or “substantially similar” to another trade name, trademark or commercial name that the Cuban government confiscated. The provision "could severely chill authorized U.S.-Cuba commerce designed to support the Cuban people,” the statement says. The bill is now on the House floor for consideration, paralleling its Senate companion (see 1606170045).