D.C. Budget Bill Sets Spending Limits and CFO Power

What it does

This bill sets how much money Washington, D.C. can spend in 2025. It ties spending to money D.C. expects to collect. The Chief Financial Officer must enforce spending limits. The bill stops using building money for daily operations.

Who it affects

D.C. taxpayers and the D.C. government are affected. The bill limits spending and requires money in reserve.

One thing to notice

The bill does not say what happens if the Chief Financial Officer does not follow the limits.

From the analysis of the bill text, linked under Primary records below.

Where it stands

6 cosponsors: 6 Democrats.

• Mar 14, 2025 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in Senate”
• Mar 14, 2025 — Passed the Senate · Congress.gov: “Passed/agreed to in Senate: Introduced in the Senate, read twice, considered, read the third time, and passed…”

Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.

Money around this bill

9 groups reported lobbying about this bill. They filed 12 reports from Mar 2025 to Jun 2026.

Those reports show $2,082,923 in lobbying spending. Each report lists about 26 bills. So that money was not all for this bill.

More groups named this bill than 89% of bills with any report.

Susan Collins, who sponsored the bill, received $2,343,513 from PACs for the 2026 election.

• American Fed of Government Employees AFL-CIO — $840,426 in 2 reports
• Service Employees International Union Ctw-clc — $836,000 in 3 reports
• International Association of Fire Fighters — $184,304 in 1 report
• National Fraternal Order of Police — $100,000 in 1 report
• The Sentencing Project — $52,193 in 1 report

Lobbying is legal. These reports show who lobbied about this bill, not what changed.

Words to know

• Chief Financial Officer — the person in charge of a government's money and spending
• enforce — make sure rules are followed
• reserve — money kept aside and not spent
• lobbying — Trying to influence lawmakers about a bill. Companies and groups pay people to do this.
• PACs — Groups that collect money and give it to candidates for office.
• sponsored — To sponsor a bill is to introduce it in Congress and put your name on it.