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Republican (1854-present)

James Lankford

Before his service in Congress, James served students and families for more than 20 years in ministry, including 15 years as the Director of Student Ministry for the Baptist Convention of Oklahoma and Director of the Falls Creek Youth Camp, the largest youth camp in the United States, with more than 51,000 individuals attending each summer.

James and his staff enjoy serving people from all backgrounds across Oklahoma. As Ranking Member of the Government Operations and Border Management  Subcommittee, which covers border security, management, and operations; regulatory reform; and the federal workforce. He demands we have a secure, more fiscally responsible, and transparent federal government, and our nation remains the world leader. He believes that the federal government has an important role in our nation, but empowered families, individual people, and private businesses grow our economy and pass down our values.

Federal Budget and Spending Background

  • The fiscal year for the federal government begins on October 1 and ends on September 30.
  • Each fiscal year, the federal government is required by law to pass a congressional budget, use that budget to put together 12 separate appropriations (spending) bills, and pass those 12 bills in some form.
  • That process has only worked four times since the legislation put in place that requires it was enacted in 1974. That’s four times in 44 years. 
  • CLICK HERE to listen to Senator Lankford’s recent podcast on the broken budget and spending process.
  • Under the proper process, in February each year, the President offers his budget (which is never passed in Congress, but is simply used as a suggested proposal)and Congress (both the Senate and House or sometimes just one or the other) is supposed to follow suit and present a budget proposal and pass it to provide top-line numbers for the Appropriations Committees to begin work on setting the actual dollar values to fund all federal departments and agencies. However, even that process is broken since even agreeing on a budget (the first step in the process)  has been difficult for Washington over the years.
  • Next, both the Senate and House have corresponding subcommittees in the full Appropriations Committee to work through each of the 12 appropriations bills.
  • The 12 appropriations bill names originate from the federal agencies and departments they fund.  Some are combined with other agencies and some are separate. The 12 bills and their commonly used “Inside-the-Beltway” names are:
    • Agriculture (“Ag”)
    • Commerce, Justice, Science (“CJS”)
    • Defense (“DOD”)
    • Energy & Water
    • Financial Services and General Government (“FSGG”)
    • Homeland Security (“DHS”)
    • Interior
    • Labor-Health & Human Services-Education (“Labor-HHS-Ed”)
    • Legislative Branch (“Leg. Branch”)
    • Military Construction-VA (“Milcon-VA”)
    • State & Foreign Operations (“SFOPS”)
    • Transportation-Housing & Urban Development (“T-HUD”)
  • Senator Lankford serves on the Senate Committee on Appropriations and on six of its subcommittees including: CJS; Energy & Water; DHS; Labor-HHS-Ed, and SFOPS. He also serves as the Chairman of the FSGG Subcommittee.
  • Frustratingly often, Congress uses stop-gap funding mechanisms known as continuing resolutions (or “CRs”) to fund the government at the most recently approved appropriations or at previous levels. The process of using CRs to fund the government shirks Congress’ duty to budget and appropriate.  Most recently, Congress has increasingly leaned on CRs for short-term extensions while larger spending bills are finalized.  But the process of funding the government in this manner is unnecessary if Congress does its job and passes a budget and all of the appropriations bills in a timely manner.
  • As the Budget and Appropriations Committees members work on the budget and the 12 spending bills, individual Senators and Members of Congress are theoretically supposed to work on legislation that eliminates waste and reforms federal programs to save taxpayer dollars.
  • Senator Lankford continues to work to cut examples of wasteful federal spending, highlight and eliminate waste, fraud, and abuse of federal tax dollars, and improve our broken budget and appropriations process.