John,

Congress has until March 22―just 7 days―to pass the final package of spending bills for FY2024. And right-wing extremists are still trying to add poison pill amendments to this must-pass legislation.

These poison pill riders are so divisive and unpopular that they would never pass through Congress as standalone legislation.

To date, House Republicans tried to add more than 560 poison pills to their draft FY2024 spending bills.¹ These riders have nothing to do with funding the government, instead they attack civil and labor rights and the LGBTQIA community, get rid of climate change protections, and propose extreme anti-immigrant policies.

Thanks to you, we were able to defeat one of these anti-immigration poison pills last week with the passage of the first six spending bills, but attacks on our communities are far from over―and extremists are planning more attacks in the next week as Congress finalizes this year’s spending bills.

Spending bills are supposed to do one thing: provide resources that serve the people. If Congress doesn’t pass the remaining FY2024 funding bills in the next week, we’ll enter a partial government shutdown at midnight on March 22.

Send a letter to your members of Congress demanding they reject poison pills and pass a clean spending bill that funds critical resources.

We’ve defeated egregious poison pill riders before and we must do it again.

In past years, one poison pill rider would have prohibited the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from updating national ozone pollution standards to prevent 4,300 deaths per year.² Another would have gotten rid of a rule that prevented for-profit colleges from defrauding their students.³

Our federal budget must not be a tool to be used in ideological culture wars. The American public deserves a budget that funds priorities we truly care about and that invest in our communities and our future.

Send a direct message to your members of Congress and tell them to reject toxic poison pill riders in the final spending bills for FY2024.

Thank you for all you do,

Deborah Weinstein
Executive Director, Coalition on Human Needs

¹ Topline Spending Deal Sets Stage for Showdown Over Poison Pill Riders
² Earmarking Away the Public Interest How Congressional Republicans Use Antiregulatory Appropriations Riders to Benefit Powerful Polluting Industries
³ Republicans Aim to Hamper Obama’s Policies With Spending Bills