Leadership Changes in Congress Create New Federal Advocacy Opportunities

Posted on November 17, 2022 by Erin Huppert

When Congress convenes next January, the United States will return to a divided government with narrow margins of control in both the US House and US Senate. In the House, Republicans will retake the majority over Democrats. In the Senate, the Democrats will maintain a one or two-vote margin over the Republicans, pending a run-off election in Georgia.

While Minnesota's political picture became clear last week, several very close races across the country left control of Congress up for grabs until this weekend.

How did Minnesota's delegation fare?

All eight of Minnesota's members of Congress will return to office next year. Representatives Craig, Omar, McCollum, and Phillips will be in the minority caucus, and Representatives Emmer, Fischbach, Stauber, and Finstad will be in the majority caucus. Further, in an exciting development for Minnesota, Congressman Tom Emmer (R – Congressional District 6) was elected by his peers to a leadership post, making him the third-ranking member of the House Majority Caucus. We welcome the opportunity to work with Congressman Emmer in his new role and look forward to strengthening relationships with our federal delegation members in the months ahead.

What can we expect from the current Congress by the end of the year?

Before the end of the year, the current Congress must finalize the Fiscal Year 2023 budget and tax extender programs. There are important policies that our delegation could include in those bills that will help address our workforce shortage and improve housing supports for seniors:

• Enacting the Labor and HHS Appropriations bill to provide $348 million in workforce pipeline activities;
• Enacting the bi-partisan Health Care Workforce Resilience Act (S. 1024, HR 2255) to recapture unused employment-based immigrant visas and make them available to 40,000 foreign nurses and doctors; and
• Enacting Transportation and HUD appropriations to provide $1.3 billion in affordable housing supports and services.

Take action today to urge your federal legislators to support seniors and their professional caregivers!