prompt_front: You are given two reports by the government agency.



Question: Write a one-page summary of the report 1.

Report 1: USPS has a wide range of domestic competitive products that are a growing sector of its business  The volume of USPS’s competitive products increased from approximately 750 million pieces in fiscal year 2008 to 4 9 billion pieces in fiscal year 2017  Revenue from these products increased from about 10 percent of all USPS mail revenues in fiscal year 2008 to about 28 percent in fiscal year 2017 (see fig  1)  USPS forecasts that continued growth in e-commerce will increase the volume of its competitive products, especially for the “last-mile” delivery service to consumers—which involves delivery from retail locations and fulfillment centers (i e , where online orders are processed, packaged, and shipped out to USPS for delivery) to customers  USPS reported that in fiscal year 2017, revenue from competitive products exceeded USPS’s expectations by $500 million due to the growth in e-commerce and successful marketing and sales campaigns  USPS expects increased competition, though, in the first- and last-mile delivery services—collection and delivery of packages—from other delivery providers  To remain competitive in the competitive product delivery market, USPS officials have stated that information gained from scanning is leveraged to provide customers with real-time visibility for the location of a competitive product in USPS’s delivery process as well as accurate estimates of the delivery time of USPS’s competitive products  Further, USPS’s latest strategic plan states that this information is one factor used to reduce its own costs through optimizing its network, including processing facilities, post offices, and numerous other facilities across the United States, and streamlining its operations  USPS delivers competitive products across the nation, which it divides into seven postal areas comprised of 67 postal districts (see fig  2)  Managers at each level—postal area, postal district, and post office—are responsible for overseeing and reporting on the performance of the level below them  For example, each district manager is accountable to the area vice president  Postmasters, who manage individual post offices, are accountable to district managers and also monitor the performance of employees at their post office  To track the movement of competitive products, USPS leverages automation (i e , scanning by postal-processing equipment) and passive and active scan technology (i e , scanning devices used by postal employees) to capture barcode information  In addition, when competitive products are not able to go through all the automated scans, USPS employees are to manually scan barcodes that have been placed on each item  These barcodes link the item with information in USPS’s databases such as: the delivery address, the type of USPS product, and when the item was accepted by USPS  According to USPS procedures, competitive products could be scanned up to 13 times to generate visibility necessary for USPS, mailers, and customers to track their packages as they move through USPS’s network (see fig  3)  For example, the first scan of the product—the “Acceptance” scan—is made when the item is dropped off at the post office or by a carrier if the product is picked up at a mailbox or customer address  The last scan—the “Acceptable Delivery Event” scan—generally means the item was successfully delivered to the addressee or that a delivery attempt was made (e g , the product requires a signature but the recipient was not at home so another attempt will need to be made or the recipient will need to pick up the product)  The interim scans reflect the product’s progress through the postal network, including through mail-processing plants and equipment  The scan data are transmitted to USPS’s data systems throughout the day  Scan information from these systems is available to USPS managers as well as mailers and customers who wish to track the progress of their items  USPS’s employees use devices to scan competitive products in postal facilities and on delivery routes (see scans 1, 2, and 11–13 in fig  3)  Carriers usually use a handheld Mobile Delivery Device (MDD) to scan a package’s barcode  MDDs contain Global Positioning System (GPS) technology and transmit package scanning data and carrier location data using a cellular network  USPS employees working inside post offices or other facilities use similar scanning devices without GPS technology, such as the handheld Intelligent Mail Device (IMD) to perform the manual scans (see fig  4)  USPS reports we reviewed indicate that competitive products are almost always scanned and scanned correctly  USPS has an overall organizational goal of accurately scanning 100 percent of all mail pieces—both competitive and other products—that have a barcode  This includes scanning each competitive product at several points from acceptance, as described earlier  However, individual management employee-performance goals for scanning are set slightly lower than 100 percent, as USPS officials stated that they recognize that some scanning issues, such as for missing or damaged barcodes, may occur across post offices  According to USPS data we reviewed for the first three quarters of fiscal year 2018, all but one of USPS’s 67 districts met USPS’s scanning goals for all five required scans for competitive products  Additionally, in one district we visited, a USPS internal report showed that every group of post offices in the district met its scanning goal for the arrival-at-unit scan for the week, the preceding 4 weeks, and the year-to- date periods, and all but one group of post offices met their scanning goals for the acceptable delivery scan for the same measurement period  In addition, representatives for mailers we interviewed that use USPS’s competitive products stated that they were generally satisfied with USPS’s scanning performance  Representatives of all the major mailers we spoke with that rely on USPS’s delivery network said they believed that USPS is generally scanning competitive products accurately, although issues still occur  Representatives of mailers told us that they receive scanning data from USPS for their items throughout the day, with some mailers receiving the data every 15 minutes, a rate that allows them to track their items through USPS  Some mailers use this information to calculate the expected time of delivery and monitor USPS’s progress against their own estimates of delivery time to measure USPS’s performance  Representatives for major mailers we spoke with said they also get complaints from customers if items are late, lost, or inaccurately scanned, so the customers provide another source of information on any scanning issues  Four of the five representatives for major mailers we interviewed that sent items via USPS competitive products told us that they have seen improvement in USPS’s scanning performance in recent years  Additionally, all of the representatives for mailers we spoke with stated that USPS has increased the amount of scanning and the information provided from the scans in recent years  Although USPS has a high scanning rate, some missed and inaccurate scans for competitive products do occur, errors that could potentially affect millions of competitive products  For example, several USPS OIG reports between 2016 and 2018 found that instances of missed or inaccurate scans still occurred both nationwide and that in nine USPS districts they analyzed, were due in part, to post office personnel not always following proper scanning procedures and post office supervisors not adequately monitoring how scanning procedures were implemented  For example, the USPS OIG analyzed approximately 2 billion delivery scans over a 6-month period in 2017 and found that 1 9 million delivery scans (about 0 1 percent) occurred at the post office instead of at the delivery address and were considered improper scans  Furthermore, examples of USPS’s internal reports we reviewed containing scanning performance results showed that a small percentage of competitive mail items had not been scanned  For example, one USPS internal report for a district we visited showed that for one week, USPS employees in the district missed about 0 73 percent of the expected delivery scans for competitive products  Due to USPS’s large volume of competitive products, a small percentage of products not scanned can represent large numbers of items  For example, about 155,000 competitive products were missing a delivery scan in one district’s 2018 year-to-date report we reviewed  Additionally, the representatives of mailers we interviewed also reported occasional scanning issues with USPS’s competitive products  Most of the mailers’ representatives stated that when they see competitive items missing scanning data, it is generally an isolated situation and USPS usually fixes the issue  According to these representatives, USPS provides them with points of contact to work with to resolve scanning issues immediately and on a regular basis  However, one major mailer’s representative we spoke with stated that even though USPS’s employees are generally good at scanning packages, inaccurate delivery scanning is an issue  The representative stated that about 8 to 10 percent of the company’s products sent through USPS were scanned by carriers as delivered, but not at the customer’s delivery address—contrary to USPS’s standard operating procedures for scanning  The representative stated that, although this percentage has decreased in recent years, the mailer would like to see that number decrease further because delivery to the destination address assures them that the item was left as close as possible to the customer  USPS is taking some steps to address missed or inaccurate scans  For example, USPS officials stated that the current electronic scanning device carried by almost all carriers on their routes does not prevent scanning a mail item as delivered to an address that is not the delivery address associated with the item’s barcode information  They also stated that USPS is updating scanning devices to alert carriers when they scan items as delivered when not physically at the correct delivery address  According to USPS officials, as of May 2018, 80 percent of hand-held electronic scanning devices used by USPS carriers had this functionality and that this functionality is being fine-tuned  This capability, though, still does not preclude all scanning errors, as it only affects the final delivery scan  USPS officials also stated that employees may still encounter scanning issues, such as damaged barcodes, which could lead to missed scans  USPS has not based its operational policies and procedures, such as those that support the accurate scanning of competitive products, on any standards for internal controls  USPS officials told us that they have not used any specific criteria for designing, implementing, and operating an internal control system for meeting its operational policies and internal controls, such as those that help ensure competitive products are accurately scanned  According to USPS officials, USPS does not follow the COSO Framework to design, implement or evaluate its operational internal controls as they believe that the COSO Framework standards are traditionally related to internal controls over financial reporting  In addition, USPS officials stated that USPS is not required to follow Standards for Internal Control in the Federal Government, and therefore USPS does not follow these standards as well  Instead, USPS officials stated that USPS has designed its operational policies and internal controls over the years based on its unique responsibilities, management experience, and sound business practices  However, officials could not identify any specific standards or framework they had followed  We have reported that standards for the design, implementation, and operation of their internal-control system provide an overall framework for establishing and maintaining an effective internal-control system—which is a key factor in achieving an entity’s mission  Further, internal controls help managers achieve desired results through effective stewardship of public resources  USPS has options to choose from in selecting standards for internal controls  Two widely used standards are the COSO Framework and Standards for Internal Control in the Federal Government, which was adapted for federal entities from the COSO Framework  Both standards are designed to help an entity design, implement, and maintain an effective internal-control system  Such a system should encompass all aspects of an entity’s objectives, including operations, reporting, and compliance objectives, and can help an entity adapt to shifting environments, evolving demands, changing risks, and new priorities  Non-federal entities can adopt either of these standards in their efforts to design, implement, and operate an effective internal control system  As stated above, we found that the COSO Framework to be a reasonable and relevant set of internal control standards to evaluate USPS’s operational internal-control activities  However, we and the USPS OIG have applied both the COSO Framework and Standards for Internal Control in the Federal Government in evaluating USPS’s operational internal controls in recent reports  Without standards for an effective internal-control system for its operational policies and procedures for scanning competitive products, USPS may miss opportunities to improve how it achieves its mission to deliver those important products  USPS management has designed standard operating procedures to provide assurance that competitive products are scanned accurately  We found some of these procedures to be consistent with the COSO Framework, which states that an organization should deploy control activities through policies that establish what is expected and procedures that put policies into action  USPS has developed a scanning policy for its products, stating that “properly scanning all barcodes will result in World Class Visibility and be instrumental in retaining and growing our shipping business and providing valuable data to drive improved operational performance and reduce costs ” USPS also has procedures that establish the responsibilities of employees for accurately scanning barcodes for competitive products at various points in the mail flow  Although USPS officials stated that employees should rely on prompts from their scanning devices to ensure scans are done correctly, USPS communicates these procedures in three main ways: documents, such as City Carrier Handbook and Rural Carrier Handbook, that outline scanning procedures and that explain carriers’ duties, including scanning; job aids, such as posters showing proper scanning procedures (see fig  5); and, standard work steps or guidance that lists procedural steps either for competitive products or for scanning mail in general (see fig  6)  Following these procedures is important to fulfill USPS’s scanning goals  As stated above, the USPS OIG found instances of missed or inaccurate scans for competitive items in recent reports  Further, the USPS OIG also recently found that USPS employees at all 15 postal facilities it visited in the Los Angeles District did not follow correct scanning procedures for USPS’s competitive Parcel Return Service product, leading to inconsistent counts for these products  Such errors can put USPS at risk of not collecting revenue for these products  The USPS OIG has made several recommendations in its recent reports to USPS management to reinforce the importance of these procedures to employees  USPS officials agreed with some of these recommendations and stated that they are taking action to address them  While reinforcing these procedures can be helpful, we found that USPS’s scanning procedures may not provide the necessary assurance for accurate scanning because they are not consistent  For example: The USPS’s City Carrier Handbook states that mail with a barcode should be scanned at the delivery point (or address)  However, a standard operating procedures document for city carriers at a post office we visited stated that carriers must scan each delivery confirmation mail piece but did not specify that this scan had to be at the delivery point or address  Locally developed procedures may not be uncommon, as one district manager told us that USPS headquarters allows managers to make a certain amount of flexibility to adapt the standard operating procedures for each post office  The USPS document, SCANNING at a Glance: Delivering 100% Visibility, states that all mail items that require delivery scanning should be scanned at the delivery address, but this document also provides additional scanning procedures not contained in the City Carrier Handbook and other standard operating procedures documents we examined  In particular, the document contained procedures for scanning to account for mail being held for customers on vacation; scanning items correctly to account for mail not delivered to business that were closed; and for mail that was refused by the addressee  This inconsistency in USPS’s scanning procedures has likely occurred because many of the documents have been updated at different times and have not always reflected new operations  For city carriers, the online version of the USPS’s City Carrier Handbook was last updated in April 2001  USPS officials stated that the most recent update regarding scanning was issued in November 2015 via a separate Postal Bulletin  Further, a separate standard operating procedure document for city carriers at a post office we visited was dated June 2006


Report 2:  For rural carriers, the most recently updated scanning procedures we found was dated 2013  As a result, some of these documents are not updated with the latest information on new scanning procedures  In a related example, the USPS OIG recently found that employees at three of the six USPS facilities the USPS OIG visited did not have an adequate understanding of the procedures for processing election and political mail due, in part, to guidance that was not updated, even though the procedures were centrally documented on an internal USPS website  USPS officials recognized this issue and stated that these handbooks are not updated regularly as the content of the handbooks are subject to labor negotiations  Therefore, new procedures are presented to USPS employees outside of the handbooks  However, given that these efforts rely on employees to orally communicate information, having consistent documented procedures is even more important  In addition to stating that the organization should deploy control activities through policies and procedures, the COSO Framework states that senior management should communicate objectives clearly through the organization so that other management and personnel understand their individual roles in the organization  By not having consistent procedures, USPS risks not clearly communicating to its employees how they should carry out scanning procedures and therefore contributing to scanning errors  As discussed below, USPS officials told us that management updates its procedures typically through regular meetings with employees, which are documented in handouts or slides  USPS officials stated that management stresses the importance of scanning and that employees should follow the prompts on their electronic devices when scanning competitive products  However, employees can still scan competitive products as delivered even if they are not, as device prompts can be misread, misinterpreted, or ignored  Furthermore, even with current prompts, scanning errors can and do occur  Consistent procedures, clearly communicated to employees, have become increasingly important as USPS hires new employees to handle, in part, anticipated growth in the volume of competitive packages  For example, GAO analysis of USPS data showed that USPS’s carrier workforce increased by 6 4 percent between fiscal years 2015 and 2017  The USPS OIG has found that these new employees require training and guidance to properly perform their roles and to reduce turnover  In addition to deploying policies and procedures to achieve an organization’s objectives, the COSO Framework states that an organization should internally communicate objectives and responsibilities that are necessary to support the functioning of internal controls  This process can be accomplished through training and meetings  Specifically, the COSO Framework states that training should enable individuals to develop competencies appropriate for assigned roles and responsibilities, among other things, and that active forms of communication such as face-to-face meetings are often more effective than passive forms such as broadcast e-mails and intranet postings  To communicate how its procedures should be correctly implemented, USPS has developed both initial and on-going training for employees  USPS officials stated that new employees are formally trained in scanning procedures when they start their employment  For example, carriers are trained how to use USPS’s electronic scanning devices, when to scan competitive items, the correct codes to use for different delivery situations (i e , signature required, vacation holds, how to code where a package was left at a delivery address)  Any new procedures can be introduced through presentations given by managers during meetings, as described below  Required regular meetings may be tracked by USPS management to ensure they are completed  Some district officials we spoke with stated that they certify that their employees have received required training and send that certification to area and USPS headquarters officials  Additional training also helps USPS reinforce correct scanning procedures  When scanning procedures are not being followed or scanning goals are not met at a post office, USPS officials stated that reminders of the correct procedures designed to reinforce USPS’s scanning procedures are presented to employees through presentations, posters, job aids, and additional documents such as carriers’ handbooks  For example, the representative of the major mailer we spoke with that had 8 to 10 percent of competitive products not scanned to the final delivery address stated that training was needed for both new and experienced carriers to reinforce that they should scan items at the delivery address  To further ensure the accurate scanning of competitive products, USPS reported that it holds internal and external meetings  Specifically, these meetings are designed to: Reinforce procedures: Post office managers can use stand-up talks— weekly meetings between management and employees at the post office—to discuss scanning issues with employees and opportunities to address those issues  For example, the postmaster at one post office we visited stated that this post office reinforces the standard work procedures designed to improve the scanning performance of employees during these meetings  Carriers and clerks can ask questions and learn why they are asked to do something or how to do a specific task, allowing for additional training and reinforcement of procedures  For example, we reviewed a handout developed by USPS headquarters to provide managers with talking points for service talks  This handout provided information on carriers delivering and scanning accurately and instructions on scanning at point of delivery on rural routes  Introduce new procedures: USPS officials told us that post office managers use stand-up talks to introduce new procedures and processes with carriers and clerks  For example, postmasters stated that they used these meetings to introduce and train carriers on new scanning features at the post offices  USPS district and area management develop and disseminate memos and handouts to assist managers conducting these meetings  We reviewed handouts USPS provided to managers for service talks  These handouts provided information on the rollout of some of the most recent scanning procedure changes  Continuously improve operations: District managers we interviewed stated that post offices with low scanning performance scores are placed on a district’s list of underperforming post offices  USPS district managers we interviewed told us that they meet with these post offices to determine how each post office plans to improve its scanning performance  District management also conducts audits of underperforming post offices and post offices that are in need of improvement  Our review of one district office’s service review checklist identified the key areas of audit for underperforming post offices  Reassess procedures: Representatives of mailers we interviewed told us that they meet with USPS representatives to discuss ways USPS can share scanning information for competitive products  Given that inaccurate scans can and do occur, it is important that postal managers explore and investigate any instances of missed or inaccurate scans  To do so, USPS managers—including area vice presidents, district managers, and postmasters—use a variety of reports as tools to ensure that the required scans are made at the appropriate place and time, and take action to monitor the status of competitive products, track lost items, and identify scanning issues  USPS headquarters designs reports used by managers to review performance at the local level across the country  Managers at each level are responsible for overseeing and reporting on the performances of the level below them  For example, the postmaster monitors performance of employees at the post office and is accountable to the district manager  In turn, each district manager is held accountable by the area vice president  To monitor performance of scanning of competitive products, these managers have access to several USPS data systems to generate reports  They can use the reports to monitor scanning performance of carriers and clerks at each post office and to identify the causes of scanning issues, such as missing or incorrect scans  Managers can also use these reports to track the status of competitive products or to investigate customer complaints of lost items  Some examples of reports available to managers include the following: Report 1: USPS officials told us that each post office receives this report from their District Office  The report identifies competitive products that do not have all the required scans, such as scans when the item arrives at the post office or when a delivery attempt was made  For example, one district official sends postmasters weekly reports on competitive products that do not have all the required scans  The officials told us that these reports help managers investigate the cause of incorrect scans identified in the report and how to prevent future occurrences  Report 2: USPS officials told us that this report is generated by district managers to proactively identify scanning irregularities, such as scans that may be out of sequence or multiple competitive products that are scanned at the same time but are for different addresses  District management can query postmasters about these scans and ask them to investigate the reason for the irregularities and determine if the scan was appropriate  Report 3: USPS officials told us that this report is generated by postmasters to monitor scanning status and performances for each competitive product that has received an arrival scan but lacks a delivery scan  While this may indicate a problem, it could also just reflect that the final scan had not been made by the end of the day or the scan that had not been uploaded into the USPS data systems when the report was generated  While having these reports are helpful, their full potential to help USPS managers may be limited because USPS lacks detailed and up-to-date standard operating procedures for how managers should use these reports or conduct other activities to efficiently investigate and resolve scanning issues  USPS’s Scanning Performance: Delivery Standard Operating Procedures for managers are a list of bullet points outlining managers’ responsibilities to meet scanning performance target goals and not a list of detailed procedures for managers to follow, such as how to use Report 1 to identify items that do not have all the required scans  In addition, USPS officials told us that this list has not been updated since approximately October 2005  The COSO Framework states that organizations should internally communicate information, including objectives and responsibilities for internal control, necessary to support the functioning of internal control  Further, it states that a process should be in place to communicate required information to enable all personnel to understand and carry out their internal-control responsibilities  Absent such communication, managers may take different actions to address problems or may have difficulty knowing where to find the appropriate information to locate a missing item to resolve a customer’s complaint quickly  For example, one post office manager told us that he will look at the scanning history in the USPS data systems to determine if the item received an acceptable delivery event scan or what the status of the item is on the route, while another post office manager told us he will use GPS data to see where the scans were made to determine if the item was delivered to the right address  If managers do not know where to find the appropriate information, they may spend more time investigating and be less efficient in resolving issues  Further, not having detailed standard operating procedures means managers may not be aware of all the reports available to them  For example, some post office managers told us that they use Report 3 while other post office managers told us that this report was not available to them  Without using Report 3, some managers told us that they look in several sources to find the same information needed to resolve the issue, such as locating a lost package  Some managers told us that USPS management discontinued the report because it was being misused by some managers  Specifically, managers told us that some managers were manually entering scanning or service-performance information retroactively to improve their performance scores  However, they told us that USPS management recently made Report 3 available to managers again but changed features to reduce any misuse  Additionally, USPS may miss opportunities to prevent scanning issues from happening again by not clearly communicating how managers should use the various reports to address specific scanning issues  For example, the USPS OIG recently determined that instances of missed and inaccurate scans for competitive products were a result of USPS management not adequately monitoring the implementation of those procedures  Without detailed procedures to guide managers in finding and using specific information in available reports and other tools, managers will not have consistent information to use to investigate and resolve customer complaints quickly or accurately  In addition, new managers may not know where to go for the most appropriate information and how to use this information to address some issues  As competitive products have become essential to USPS’s economic viability, it is increasingly important for USPS to accurately track them to remain competitive in this market  While USPS may be scanning most mail accurately, there continue to be instances where mail is not scanned accurately or is missing scans  Given the volume and growth in these competitive products, even a small percentage of inaccurately scanned products could be a large number of such products  Since USPS’s procedures were developed absent standards for internal control, the adoption of a set of internal control standards could enhance USPS’s efforts to continuously improve the design, implementation, and evaluation of its operational internal controls for scanning of competitive products  Further, since USPS’s standard operating procedures for scanning are located in numerous documents and are not always consistent—and given USPS’s reliance on stand-up talks and meetings to keep employees current—USPS employees may not always have accurate scanning procedures easily accessible to them  Having consistent standard operating procedures is increasingly important to ensure that employees are making accurate scans  Additionally, standard procedures that guide managers to investigate and resolve scanning issues would help managers more efficiently address these issues and ideally prevent these issues from happening again  To improve USPS’s competitive products scanning, we recommend that the Postmaster General take the following three actions  The Postmaster General should identify and adopt a set of internal control standards that can be used as the basis for operational internal-control activities, such as those for scanning competitive products  (Recommendation 1) The Postmaster General should improve the communication of standard operating procedures for scanning competitive products by, for example, updating or consolidating USPS documents, job aids, and standard work steps  (Recommendation 2) The Postmaster General should create standard operating procedures for managers on how to address inaccurate scans and use available reports to investigate and resolve scanning issues  (Recommendation 3) We provided a draft of this product to USPS for its review and comment  USPS’s comments are reproduced in appendix I  USPS stated that it cannot agree with our recommendation to identify and adopt a set of internal control standards for USPS’s operational internal control activities at this time  Although USPS has adopted an internal control framework for its financial internal control activities, USPS does not know what the benefits and costs are of adopting internal control standards for its operational internal control activities  As a result, USPS agreed to conduct a cost study to determine whether to commit resources to identifying and adopting a set of internal control standards for its operational internal control activities  We are encouraged that USPS is planning to conduct such a study and anticipate that performing this study will result in the implementation of an appropriate set of internal control standards  USPS agreed with the two recommendations regarding scanning procedures and committed to completing corrective actions by November of 2018  In its general comments, USPS noted that our reference to the USPS OIG’s report, Processing Readiness for Election and Political Mail for the 2018 Midterm Elections did not appear germane to the scanning of competitive mail  We recognize that this report was focused on a different type of mail, but as USPS noted in its letter, we use the OIG report as a related example of how USPS has taken efforts to improve the communication of its scanning procedures to employees  Therefore, we determined that our use of the report is appropriate  We have added information from the OIG report to characterize the OIG’s recommendations and USPS’s actions to address those recommendations  USPS also provided technical comments, which we incorporated as appropriate  We will send copies of this report to the appropriate congressional committees, the Postmaster General, the Chairman of the Postal Regulatory Commission, and other interested parties  In addition, the report will be available at no charge on the GAO website at http://www gao gov  If you or your staff have any questions about this report, please contact me at (202) 512-2834 or rectanusl@gao gov  Contact points for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on the last page of this report  GAO staff making key contributions to this report are listed in appendix II  In addition to the individual named above, Kyle Browning (Assistant Director); Greg Hanna (Analyst-in-Charge); Michael Hansen; Thanh Lu; John Mingus; Faye Morrison; Malika Rice; Amy Rosewarne; Crystal Wesco; Elizabeth Wood; and Matthew Zaun made key contributions to this report 

ground_truth: Federal law contains a wide variety of disclosure requirements, including food labels, securities registrations, and disclosures about prescription drugs in direct-to-consumer advertising. These disclosure provisions require commercial actors to make statements that they otherwise might not, compelling speech and implicating the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment. Nonetheless, while commercial disclosure requirements may regulate protected speech, that fact in and of itself does not render such provisions unconstitutional. The Supreme Court has historically allowed greater regulation of commercial speech than of other types of speech. Since at least the mid-1970s, however, the Supreme Court has been increasingly protective of commercial speech. This trend, along with other developments in First Amendment law, has led some commentators to question whether the Supreme Court might apply a stricter test in assessing commercial disclosure requirements in the near future. Nonetheless, governing Supreme Court precedent provides that disclosure requirements generally receive lesser judicial scrutiny when they compel only commercial speech, as opposed to noncommercial speech. In National Institute of Family and Life Advocates v. Becerra, a decision released in June 2018, the Supreme Court explained that it has applied a lower level of scrutiny to compelled disclosures under two circumstances. First, the Supreme Court has sometimes upheld laws that regulate commercial speech if the speech regulation is part of a larger regulatory scheme that is focused on conduct and only incidentally burdens speech. If a law is properly characterized as a regulation of conduct, rather than speech, then it may be subject to rational basis review, a deferential standard that asks only whether the regulation is a rational way to address the problem. However, it can be difficult to distinguish speech from conduct, and the Supreme Court has not frequently invoked this doctrine to uphold laws against First Amendment challenges. Second, the Supreme Court has sometimes applied a lower level of scrutiny to certain commercial disclosure requirements under the authority of a 1985 case, Zauderer v. Office of Disciplinary Counsel. In Zauderer, the Court upheld a disclosure requirement after noting that the challenged provision compelled only "factual and uncontroversial information about the terms under which . . . services will be available." The Court said that under the circumstances, the service provider's First Amendment rights were sufficiently protected because the disclosure requirement was "reasonably related" to the government's interest "in preventing deception of consumers." Lower courts have generally interpreted Zauderer to mean that if a commercial disclosure provision requires only "factual and uncontroversial information" about the goods or services being offered, it should be analyzed under rational basis review. If a commercial disclosure requirement does not qualify for review under Zauderer, then it will most likely be analyzed under the intermediate standard that generally applies to government actions that regulate commercial speech. Some legal scholars have argued that recent Supreme Court case law suggests the Court may subject commercial disclosure provisions to stricter scrutiny in the future, either by limiting the factual circumstances under which these two doctrines apply or by creating express exceptions to these doctrines. If a court applies a heightened level of scrutiny, it may require the government to present more evidence of the problem it is seeking to remedy and stronger justifications for choosing a disclosure requirement to achieve its purposes.

prompt_front: You are given two reports by the government agency.



Question: Write a one-page summary of the report 2.

Report 1: Disclosure provisions that require commercial actors to convey specified information to consumers occupy an uneasy and shifting space in First Amendment jurisprudence  The First Amendment's Free Speech Clause protects the right to speak as well as the right not to speak, and at least outside the context of commercial speech, courts generally disfavor any government action that compels speech  Indeed, the Supreme Court in 1943 described the First Amendment's protection against compelled speech as a "fixed star in our constitutional constellation " Accordingly, government actions mandating speech are generally subject to strict scrutiny by courts, and will be upheld "only if the government proves that they are narrowly tailored to serve compelling state interests " However, the Court has also long accepted a variety of laws that require commercial actors to make certain disclosures to consumers, confirming that Congress can compel certain disclosures, even those involving protected speech, without running afoul of the First Amendment  Commercial disclosure requirements have largely withstood constitutional scrutiny in part because, historically, commercial speech has received less protection under the First Amendment than other speech  The government's ability to more freely regulate commercial speech has been linked to its general authority "to regulate commercial transactions " Thus, notwithstanding the fact that commercial disclosure requirements compel speech, courts generally have not analyzed such provisions under the strict scrutiny standard  Instead, courts have often employed less rigorous standards to evaluate such provisions  The precise nature of a court's First Amendment analysis, however, will depend on the character of the disclosure requirement at issue  In a recent decision, the Supreme Court distilled and explained its prior cases on this subject  First, the Court said that it has upheld some commercial disclosure requirements that target conduct and only incidentally burden speech  This rubric likely only applies if the disclosure provision is part of a larger scheme regulating commercial conduct  If the disclosure provision instead regulates "speech as speech," it might be subject either to intermediate scrutiny, as a government regulation of commercial speech, or to something closer to rational basis review, if the disclosure provision qualifies for review under the Supreme Court's decision in Zauderer v  Office of Disciplinary Counsel   Some of the Court's recent cases, however, have suggested that in certain circumstances, disclosure requirements may be subject to heightened scrutiny  This report begins with a short background on how courts generally view commercial speech under the First Amendment, then reviews in more detail the possible legal frameworks for analyzing the constitutionality of commercial disclosure requirements  Supreme Court precedent explaining the application of the First Amendment to commercial disclosure requirements is relatively recent  The Court did not squarely hold that purely commercial speech was entitled to any protection under the First Amendment until 1976 in Virginia State Board of Pharmacy v  Virginia Citizens Consumer Council   The Court has defined commercial speech alternately as speech that "does 'no more than propose a commercial transaction'" and as "expression related solely to the economic interests of the speaker and its audience " In Virginia Board of Pharmacy , the Court said that commercial speech was protected, but it also emphasized that the First Amendment did not prohibit all regulations of such speech  In particular, the Court said that it foresaw "no obstacle" to government regulation of "false" speech, or even of commercial speech that is only "deceptive or misleading " In subsequent cases, the Court has explained why "regulation to assure truthfulness" is more readily allowed in the context of commercial speech, as compared with other types of speech  While the First Amendment usually protects even untruthful speech, in order to better encourage uninhibited and robust debate, the Court has recognized that regulating "for truthfulness" in the commercial arena is unlikely to "undesirably inhibit spontaneity" because commercial speech is generally less likely to be spontaneous  Instead, it is more calculated, motivated by a "commercial interest " In particular, if a particular advertisement concerns a subject in which "the public lacks sophistication" and cannot verify the claims, the Court has suggested that the government may have a freer hand to address such concerns  Four years after Virginia Board of Pharmacy , in 1980, the Supreme Court set out the standard that generally governs a court's analysis of government restrictions on commercial speech in Central Hudson Gas & Electric Corp  v  Public Service Commission   The Court first explained that commercial speech enjoys "lesser protection" than "other constitutionally guaranteed expression " After emphasizing that First Amendment protection for commercial speech "is based on the informational function of advertising," the Court said that "there can be no constitutional objection to the suppression of commercial messages that do not accurately inform the public about lawful activity " Accordingly, the Court held that the government may prohibit "forms of communication more likely to deceive the public than to inform it" as well as "commercial speech related to illegal activity " But if the regulated "communication is neither misleading nor related to unlawful activity," the government's action is subject to intermediate scrutiny  Under Central Hudson 's intermediate standard, the government must prove that the government's interest is "substantial," and that the regulation "directly advances" that interest and is "not more extensive than is necessary to serve that interest " The Central Hudson test continues to govern the constitutional analysis of government acts that infringe on commercial speech  However, in certain circumstances, commercial speech may lose its commercial character if "it is inextricably intertwined with otherwise fully protected speech " And more generally, some members of the Supreme Court have questioned whether commercial speech should categorically receive less protection under the First Amendment, suggesting that in at least some circumstances, infringements on commercial speech should instead be subject to strict scrutiny  Commentators have pointed out that, as a practical matter, Supreme Court decisions have increasingly struck down, rather than upheld, restrictions on commercial speech  Also relevant to the discussion of disclosure requirements, judges and legal scholars have noted that the Court may be adjusting the role of the content neutrality doctrine with respect to commercial speech  As a general matter, if a law is "content-based," in the sense that it "target[s] speech based on its communicative content," it will be subject to strict scrutiny  The Supreme Court stated in Reed v  Town of Gilbert that a regulation is content-based if it "applies to particular speech because of the topic discussed or the idea or message expressed," if it "cannot be 'justified without reference to the content of the regulated speech,'" or if it was "adopted by the government 'because of disagreement with the message [the speech] conveys '" Disclosure requirements are generally considered content-based, given that they require regulated parties to speak a certain message, and outside the commercial context, ordinarily trigger the application of strict scrutiny  In Central Hudson , however, the Supreme Court explained that in the context of commercial speech, "regulation of its content" is permissible  And, as commentators have pointed out, "the very category of commercial speech is a content-based category " Nonetheless, the Court has struck down certain regulations that prohibit commercial speech solely because its content is commercial, suggesting that content neutrality might be relevant in the commercial sphere  In its 2011 decision in Sorrell v  IMS Health, Inc  , the Supreme Court considered the constitutionality of a state law prohibiting pharmacies from disclosing certain pharmacy records for marketing purposes  After observing that the law included "content- and speaker-based restrictions on the sale, disclosure, and use of" covered information, the Court concluded that the law was "designed to impose a specific, content-based burden on protected expression" because it applied specifically to marketing, a particular type of speech  Consequently, the law was subject to "heightened judicial scrutiny," notwithstanding the fact that the "burdened speech result[ed] from an economic motive" and was therefore commercial  Ultimately, however, the Court declined to say definitively whether Central Hudson or "a stricter form of judicial scrutiny" should apply because, in the Court's view, the law failed to pass constitutional muster even under Central Hudson   As discussed in more detail below, the shifting role of content neutrality in commercial speech doctrine holds special significance for commercial disclosure requirements: these requirements are content-based because they "compel[] individuals to speak a particular message " At least one legal scholar has suggested that lower courts have read Sorrell as an expression of the Supreme Court's increasing skepticism toward restrictions on commercial speech and, since that decision, have been more likely to strike down commercial disclosure requirements  However, the Court did not expressly limit the reach of Central Hudson in Sorrell or in subsequent cases, suggesting that, at least for now, Central Hudson 's standard of review applies even when a challenged action would otherwise trigger strict scrutiny as a content-based regulation of speech  Indeed, lower courts analyzing commercial disclosure requirements usually ask whether Zauderer or Central Hudson supplies the appropriate standard of review, contemplating at most only intermediate scrutiny —even in cases decided after Sorrell   In its First Amendment jurisprudence, the Supreme Court has generally distinguished between laws that regulate conduct and laws that regulate speech  The Court has held that conduct-focused regulations will not violate the First Amendment by merely incidentally burdening speech  For instance, while the government may regulate prices, attempts to regulate "the communication of prices" implicate the First Amendment  To take another example, the Court has noted that pursuant to "a ban on race-based hiring," a regulation "directed at commerce or conduct," the government "may require employers to remove 'White Applicants Only' signs " To differentiate a regulation targeting conduct from one targeting speech, the Court generally looks to the purpose of the law, asking whether the law appears to target certain content or certain speakers  As part of this inquiry, the Court may also ask whether a regulation applies because of the communicative content of the regulated party's actions  This distinction between speech and conduct is especially significant in the context of commercial speech, given that such speech "occurs in an area traditionally subject to government regulation " Thus, in 1978, the Supreme Court said: "[I]t has never been deemed an abridgment of freedom of speech or press to make a course of conduct illegal merely because the conduct was in part initiated, evidenced, or carried out by means of language, either spoken, written, or printed " Numerous examples could be cited of communications that are regulated without offending the First Amendment, such as the exchange of information about securities, corporate proxy statements, the exchange of price and production information among competitors, and employers' threats of retaliation for the labor activities of employees  Each of these examples illustrates that the State does not lose its power to regulate commercial activity deemed harmful to the public whenever speech is a component of that activity  The Court has previously "upheld regulations of professional conduct that incidentally burden speech " For example, the Court upheld an informed consent requirement in Planned Parenthood of S outheastern Pennsylvania v  Casey   The Casey challengers argued that a law requiring doctors to inform patients seeking abortions about "the nature of the procedure, the health risks of the abortion and of childbirth, and the probable gestational age of the unborn child" compelled doctors to speak in violation of the First Amendment  The Court rejected that argument, concluding that while "the physician's First Amendment rights not to speak are implicated," this was "only as part of the practice of medicine, subject to reasonable licensing and regulation by the State " In National Institute of Family and Life Advocates (NIFLA) v  Becerra , the Supreme Court emphasized that the informed consent requirement upheld in Casey was part of the broader regulation of professional conduct: specifically, the practice of medicine  By contrast, the Court held that the disclosure requirement at issue in NIFLA , which required certain health facilities to provide clients with information about state-sponsored services, could not be upheld as "an informed-consent requirement or any other regulation of professional conduct" because it was not tied to any medical procedure  Instead, in the Court's view, the requirement "regulate[d] speech as speech," as opposed to regulating speech only incidentally  While the Court has made clear that the First Amendment does not prohibit such incidental regulation of commercial speech, it has not articulated one overarching standard for evaluating whether such provisions are constitutionally permissible  Its decisions in this area have considered a wide variety of government actions incidentally burdening speech, and it may be that the standard varies according to the nature of the particular speech restriction evaluated  In some cases, the Court has suggested that "the First Amendment is not implicated by the enforcement" of a broader regulatory scheme where the regulated conduct does not have "a significant expressive element" or the statute does not inevitably single out "those engaged in expressive activity " In other cases where the Court has upheld a regulation that it characterized as focused on conduct rather than speech, the Court investigated the strength of the government's interest and asked whether the regulation advances that interest, suggesting that the Court subjected the regulation to some First Amendment scrutiny—albeit using a relatively relaxed standard  The Court has never explicitly held that a commercial disclosure requirement qualifies as a constitutionally permissible incidental restriction on commercial speech  While Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v  Casey did involve a disclosure requirement, the Court did not address whether the informed consent requirement involved commercial or noncommercial speech either in Casey or when discussing that requirement in NIFLA   In NIFLA , the Court held that a state law imposing disclosure requirements on clinics providing pregnancy-related services could not be characterized as a regulation that only incidentally burdened speech because the requirement was not tied to any specific medical procedures  However, the Court never expressly stated whether it considered the disclosures to consist of commercial or noncommercial speech  Similarly, in Expressions Hair Design v  Schneiderman , the Court rejected the application of this doctrine without expressly characterizing the government action as a commercial disclosure requirement  In that case, the Court considered the constitutionality of a state law prohibiting sellers from imposing surcharges on customers who use credit cards  The Supreme Court rejected the argument that this law primarily "regulated conduct, not speech," concluding that the law did not merely regulate pricing, but regulated the communication of prices by prohibiting merchants from posting a cash price and an additional credit card surcharge  The Court then remanded the case to the lower courts to consider the First Amendment challenges in the first instance, leaving open the question of whether the provision could be characterized as a requirement for sellers to disclose an item's credit card price, rather than as a prohibition of certain speech  As these cases suggest, the Court has seemed reluctant in recent years to uphold government actions as conduct-focused regulations that merely incidentally burden speech, especially in the context of compelled disclosure requirements  Instead, the Court has distinguished the few cases upholding government acts as incidental restrictions and subjected disclosure requirements to further scrutiny  Nonetheless, the Court has left open the possibility that commercial disclosure requirements might, in the future, qualify as permissible incidental speech regulation, if they are part of a broader regulatory scheme  If the government regulates "speech as speech," its actions will implicate the First Amendment's protections for freedom of speech and may trigger heightened standards of scrutiny  However, the First Amendment does not prescribe a single analysis for all government actions that potentially infringe on free speech protections  Instead, a court's review will depend on the nature of both the government action and the speech itself  This section first introduces the three possible levels of scrutiny a court might use to analyze a speech regulation and then explains their application to compelled commercial disclosures in more detail  In the context of commercial disclosure requirements, there are three primary categories of First Amendment analysis that may be relevant  First, as a general rule, government actions that compel speech are usually subject to strict scrutiny  To survive strict scrutiny, the government must show that the challenged action is "narrowly tailored to serve compelling state interests " Laws are unlikely to meet this "stringent standard " Second, as discussed above, government actions regulating commercial speech generally receive only intermediate scrutiny  The intermediate scrutiny standard, pursuant to Central Hudson , requires a "substantial" state interest and requires the government to prove that the law "directly advances" that interest and "is not more extensive than is necessary to serve that interest " This standard is less demanding than strict scrutiny, but laws may still be struck down under this test  The final and most lenient category—one specific to commercial disclosure requirements—comes from a 1985 case, Zauderer v  Office of Disciplinary Counsel   In that case, the Supreme Court considered the constitutionality of state disciplinary rules regulating attorney advertising  As relevant here, the rules required advertisements referring to contingent-fee rates to disclose how the fee would be calculated  An attorney who had been disciplined by the state for violating these provisions argued that this disclosure requirement was unconstitutional because the state failed to meet the standards set out in Central Hudson   The Court acknowledged that it had previously held that prohibitions on commercial speech were subject to heightened scrutiny under Central Hudson , and that it had "held that in some instances compulsion to speak may be as violative of the First Amendment as prohibitions on speech " "But," the Court said, "[t]he interests at stake in this case are not of the same order as those" implicated in cases involving the compulsion of noncommercial speech  Instead, the Court noted that the state's provision only involved "commercial advertising, and its prescription has taken the form of a requirement that appellant include in his advertising purely factual and uncontroversial information about the terms under which his services will be available " In this commercial context, the Court said that the attorney's "constitutionally protected interest in not providing any particular factual information in his advertising is minimal," noting that in previous cases it had stated that states might "appropriately require[]" warnings or disclaimers "in order to dissipate the possibility of consumer confusion or deception " Rather than applying heightened scrutiny, the Court held that under these circumstances, "an advertiser's rights are adequately protected as long as disclosure requirements are reasonably related to the State's interest in preventing deception of consumers " The Zauderer Court did warn, however, that commercial disclosure requirements raise First Amendment concerns, observing that "unjustified or unduly burdensome disclosure requirements might offend the First Amendment by chilling protected commercial speech " But the Court rejected the contention that the disclosure requirement before it was unduly burdensome  Instead, the Court concluded that "[t]he State's position that it is deceptive to employ advertising that refers to contingent-fee arrangements without mentioning the client's liability for costs is reasonable enough to support a requirement that information regarding the client's liability for costs be disclosed " Although the state had not submitted evidence that clients were in fact being misled, the Court stated that "the possibility of deception" was "self-evident," making the state's "assumption that substantial numbers of potential clients would be       misled" regarding the terms of payment reasonable  Zauderer sets out the most lenient of the three standards of review discussed above, and, as a result, a commercial disclosure requirement is most likely to be upheld if it is reviewed under the rubric of that case  However, the Zauderer standard of review has been interpreted to apply only to certain types of disclosure requirements  As described by the Court and discussed above, the state regulation upheld in Zauderer required "purely factual and uncontroversial information about the terms under which [attorneys'] services [would] be available," and the provision was "reasonably related to the State's interest in preventing deception of consumers " Subsequent cases in both the Supreme Court and the lower courts have tested the extent to which this reasonableness review applies outside of the specific factual circumstances presented in Zauderer   The Supreme Court has decided whether to apply Zauderer review to government acts compelling commercial speech in three significant cases  First, in United States v  United Foods , decided in 2001, the Court invalidated a federal statute that compelled "handlers of fresh mushrooms to fund advertising for the product " United Foods thus involved a compelled subsidy, rather than a compelled disclosure  The Court concluded that these statutorily compelled subsidies for government-favored speech implicated the First Amendment and that "mandat[ing] support" from objecting parties was "contrary to       First Amendment principles " The Court held that Zauderer was inapplicable, noting that in the case before it, there was "no suggestion       that the mandatory assessments       are somehow necessary to make voluntary advertisements nonmisleading for consumers " By contrast, the Court applied Zauderer in a 2010 decision, Milavetz, Gallop & Milavetz, P A  v  United States , another case concerning attorney advertising  In that case, the Court considered an attorney's First Amendment challenges to a federal statute that required "debt relief agencies" to "make certain disclosures in their advertisements " "Debt relief agencies" was a statutorily defined term covering some attorneys who provided clients with bankruptcy assistance  Among other things, agencies advertising "bankruptcy assistance services or       the benefits of bankruptcy" were required to disclose that they were "a debt relief agency" that "help[ed] people file for bankruptcy relief under the Bankruptcy Code " Rejecting the challenger's contention that Central Hudson 's intermediate scrutiny governed the disclosure requirement, the Court held instead that "the less exacting scrutiny described in Zauderer " governed its review  The Court concluded that the provision "share[d] the essential features of the rule at issue in Zauderer  " The disclosure requirement was "intended to combat the problem of inherently misleading commercial advertisements—specifically, the promise of debt relief without any reference to the possibility of filing for bankruptcy, which has inherent costs " Further, the law required the covered entities to provide "only an accurate statement identifying the advertiser's legal status and the character of the assistance provided " As in Zauderer , where the "possibility of deception" was "self-evident," the Court was not troubled by the lack of evidence that current advertisements were misleading  Instead, "evidence in the congressional record demonstrating a pattern of advertisements that hold out the promise of debt relief without alerting consumers to its potential cost" was "adequate " The Court ultimately upheld the disclosure requirement as "reasonably related to the [Government's] interest in preventing deception of consumers " Most recently, in 2018, the Court considered the application of Zauderer in NIFLA   That case involved two distinct disclosure requirements imposed by California's Reproductive Freedom, Accountability, Comprehensive Care, and Transparency Act (FACT Act), which regulated crisis pregnancy centers  First, the FACT Act required any " licensed covered facility" to notify clients that "California has public programs that provide immediate free or low-cost access to comprehensive family planning services (including all FDA-approved methods of contraception), prenatal care, and abortion for eligible women," and give the telephone number of the local social services office  Second, any " unlicensed covered facility" had to provide notice that the "facility is not licensed as a medical facility by the State of California and has no licensed medical provider who provides or directly supervises the provision of services " The Court first held that Zauderer 's reasonableness review did not apply to the licensed notice  In the Court's view, the notice was "not limited to 'purely factual and uncontroversial information about the terms under which       services will be available '" The Court explained that the disclosure requirement "in no way relate[d] to the services that licensed clinics provide " The Court said that instead, the law "require[d] these clinics to disclose information about state -sponsored services—including abortion, anything but an 'uncontroversial' topic " The Court ultimately held that the licensed notice could not "survive even intermediate scrutiny " Turning to the unlicensed notice, the Court determined that it did not need to "decide whether the Zauderer standard applies to the unlicensed notice" because the disclosure requirement failed scrutiny even under Zauderer   The Court said that "under Zauderer , a disclosure requirement cannot be 'unjustified or unduly burdensome '" The Court interpreted this statement to require that the government prove it was seeking "to remedy a harm that is 'potentially real, not purely hypothetical '" Based on the record on appeal, the Court found that California's stated interest in "ensuring that pregnant women in California know when they are getting medical care from licensed professionals" was "purely hypothetical " Further, the Court held in the alternative that "[e]ven if California had presented a nonhypothetical justification for the unlicensed notice, the FACT Act unduly burden[ed] protected speech" by requiring a government statement to be placed in all advertisements, regardless of an advertisement's length or content  The Court also expressed concern that the unlicensed notice "target[ed]" certain speakers in imposing those burdens by focusing on "facilities that primarily provide 'pregnancy-related' services " While the Supreme Court has emphasized that Zauderer 's reasonableness review is available only for certain types of compelled commercial disclosures, lower courts have disagreed on the precise circumstances required to apply Zauderer   A few requirements have emerged in the case law  First, courts agree that to qualify for review under Zauderer , a commercial disclosure requirement must compel speech that is "factual and uncontroversial " Next, the disclosure must be related to the goods or services the speaker provides  Finally, courts have disagreed on the type of government interest that may be asserted to justify a Zauderer -eligible regulation: while Zauderer itself approved of the challenged disclosure requirement after concluding that the state was permissibly seeking to "prevent[] deception of consumers," lower courts have sometimes applied Zauderer review even where the regulation is not specifically intended to prevent deception  Before discussing the particulars of these requirements, it is worth noting that these elements are related to the Court's overarching justifications for affording the government more leeway to regulate commercial speech  The seminal Supreme Court case establishing that commercial speech is protected by the First Amendment, Virginia State Board of Pharmacy v  Virginia Citizens Consumer Council , tied commercial speech's value to its ability to inform consumers  Critically, the Court said that governments could continue to ban false or misleading commercial speech , noting in another case that "the public and private benefits from commercial speech derive from confidence in its accuracy and reliability " It was against this background that the Court in Zauderer concluded that the provision requiring the disclosure of factual information about contingent fee arrangements did not involve First Amendment interests "of the same order as those" involved in other cases involving the compulsion of noncommercial speech  Accordingly, the state acted reasonably by prescribing that attorneys had to include in their advertising "purely factual and uncontroversial information about the terms under which [their] services [would] be available " The first element for a commercial disclosure requirement to be eligible for Zauderer review is that the government regulation must require the disclosure of "factual and uncontroversial" information  The two parts of Zauderer's initial requirement are often evaluated as one, although courts have sometimes pointed out that "factual" and "uncontroversial," logically, connote two different things  Viewing the two words together, some have characterized the "factual and uncontroversial" requirement as distinguishing regulations that compel the disclosure of facts from those that compel individuals to state opinions or ideologies  As discussed, the Supreme Court has said that the value of commercial speech largely lies in its ability to inform consumers  And in Zauderer , the Court emphasized that because protection for commercial speech is justified by its informational value, the attorney challenging the disclosure requirement had a "minimal" First Amendment interest "in not providing any particular factual information in his advertising " As the Second Circuit has explained: Commercial disclosure requirements are treated differently from restrictions on commercial speech because mandated disclosure of accurate, factual, commercial information does not offend the core First Amendment values of promoting efficient exchange of information or protecting individual liberty interests  Such disclosure furthers, rather than hinders, the First Amendment goal of the discovery of truth and contributes to the efficiency of the "marketplace of ideas " Protection of the robust and free flow of accurate information is the principal First Amendment justification for protecting commercial speech, and requiring disclosure of truthful information promotes that goal  In such a case, then, less exacting scrutiny is required than where truthful, nonmisleading commercial speech is restricted  In this vein, the Supreme Court upheld disclosure requirements regarding the nature of contingent fee arrangements in Zauderer and statements clarifying the nature of the bankruptcy-related assistance provided by debt relief agencies in Milavetz   Lower courts have approved as "factual and uncontroversial" within the meaning of Zauderer a variety of other commercial disclosure requirements, including regulations requiring the disclosure of: country-of-origin information for meat; calorie information at restaurants; the fact that products contain mercury; and textual and graphic warnings about the health risks of tobacco products  By contrast, in a 2015 opinion, the D C  Circuit concluded that a federal regulation requiring firms to disclose whether their products used "conflict minerals" that originated "in the Democratic Republic of the Congo or an adjoining country" could not be characterized as factual and uncontroversial  The court said that "[t]he label '[not] conflict free' is a metaphor that conveys moral responsibility for the Congo war        An issuer, including an issuer who condemns the atrocities of the Congo war in the strongest terms, may disagree with that assessment of its moral responsibility        By compelling an issuer to confess blood on its hands, the statute interferes with that exercise of the freedom of speech under the First Amendment " Similarly, the Seventh Circuit, in a 2006 opinion, held that disclosure requirements in a state law regulating sexually explicit video games were not "factual and uncontroversial" as required for Zauderer to apply  In relevant part, the law required "video game retailers to place a four square-inch label with the numerals '18' on any 'sexually explicit' video game," and to post signs and provide brochures "explaining the video game rating system " The court held first that the sticker "ultimately communicates a subjective and highly controversial message—that the game's content is sexually explicit " Similarly, the panel concluded that "the message" communicated by the signs and brochures was "neither purely factual nor uncontroversial" because it was "intended to communicate that any video games in the store can be properly judged pursuant to the standards described in the       ratings " As mentioned above, some courts have treated "factual" and "uncontroversial" as two distinct requirements  But at times, courts have struggled to define "controversial," standing alone  The D C  Circuit has suggested that controversial must mean that a disclosure "communicates a message that is controversial for some reason other than dispute about simple factual accuracy " One trial court interpreting a decision of the Second Circuit suggested that "it is the nature of the regulation of compelled speech that controls, not the nature of the legislative debate that gave rise to its enactment " That court then noted that other courts had equated controversial messages with disclosures that are "opinion-based " Courts have disagreed about whether a disclosure may be characterized as "controversial" because it is "inflammatory" or "evoke[s] an emotional response " In NIFLA , the Supreme Court struck down the licensed notice after noting that the required disclosures related to "abortion, anything but an 'uncontroversial' topic," although it did not further explain when a topic is "uncontroversial" for purposes of Zauderer  Second, to be eligible for review under Zauderer , a commercial disclosure requirement must be related to the services provided by the speaker  In Zauderer itself, the Court had noted that the disputed disclosure required the attorney to provide information in his advertising "about the terms under which his services will be available " By and large, lower courts, at least prior to NIFLA, had not treated this relationship to the speaker's services as a distinct requirement  The Court in NIFLA , however, said that this was a necessary prerequisite for Zauderer review and held in that case that the notice requirement for licensed clinics at issue was not "relate[d] to the services that licensed clinics provide" because it instead provided information "about state -sponsored services " Judges have disagreed on whether there exists a third requirement for Zauderer review  In Zauderer itself, the Supreme Court noted that the disclosure requirements at issue in that case were intended to "prevent[] deception of customers " Further, when applying Zauderer review to the bankruptcy-related disclosures at issue in Milavetz , the Court stated that the disclosures were "intended to combat the problem of inherently misleading commercial advertisements " Perhaps most notably, in United Foods , the Court explained its decision not to apply Zauderer by noting that there was "no suggestion" that the compelled subsidies at issue in that case were "somehow necessary to make voluntary advertisements nonmisleading for consumers " The Supreme Court's decisions applying Zauderer have thus suggested that one factor in deciding whether to apply this "reasonably related" review is whether the targeted commercial speech is misleading, or whether the state's interest in requiring the disclosure is to prevent "consumer confusion or deception " Nonetheless, the Court has not squarely held that this is a necessary condition for Zauderer review, and several lower courts have rejected this position  The D C  Circuit concluded that Zauderer 's justification characterizing "the speaker's interest in opposing forced disclosure of such information as 'minimal' seems inherently applicable beyond" the state's "interest in remedying deception " The Second Circuit has also held that Zauderer review applies more broadly  In rejecting a litigant's argument that the Supreme Court's decision in United Foods limited Zauderer only to laws intended to prevent consumer deception, the Second Circuit said that United Foods "simply distinguishes Zauderer on the basis that the compelled speech in Zauderer was necessary to prevent deception of consumers; it does not provide that all other disclosure requirements are subject to heightened scrutiny " If a commercial disclosure requirement involves only "purely factual and uncontroversial information" about the goods or services being sold, and is therefore eligible for review under Zauderer , then it will be constitutional so long as the disclosure requirement is "reasonably related" to the government's interest  This reasonableness review is relatively lenient, especially as compared with the standards that would otherwise apply to compelled speech  But, as emphasized in NIFLA , even under Zauderer , "unjustified or unduly burdensome disclosure requirements might offend the First Amendment by chilling protected commercial speech " Lower courts had previously come to different conclusions regarding whether "unjustified or unduly burdensome" presented an additional inquiry, to be conducted separately from the reasonableness inquiry otherwise prescribed by Zauderer , or whether instead this inquiry was subsumed by the "reasonably related" inquiry  NIFLA did not entirely resolve this issue, although it did frame its analysis using the "unjustified or unduly burdensome" language rather than the language of rational basis review  In Zauderer , the Supreme Court upheld the contingent fee disclosure after concluding that the requirement was "reasonably related to the State's interest in preventing deception of consumers " But as noted above, lower courts have largely concluded that Zauderer 's reasonableness review may govern the analysis even when the government asserts an interest other than preventing consumer deception  The D C  Circuit has, so far, largely declined to articulate a clear standard for "what type of interest might suffice " That court did conclude in one case that where the government's interest was "substantial under Central Hudson 's standard," that would qualify as a sufficient interest under Zauderer   Perhaps taking a different approach, in a case upholding a disclosure requirement under Zauderer , the Second Circuit described the state's interest as "legitimate and significant " Other than "the interest in correcting misleading or confusing commercial speech," the federal courts of appeals have upheld commercial disclosure requirements where the government asserted interests in food safety, preventing obesity, "protecting human health and the environment from mercury poisoning," and in protecting health benefit providers "from questionable       business practices " By contrast, the Second Circuit held in International Dairy Foods Association v  Amestoy that "consumer curiosity alone is not a strong enough state interest to sustain the compulsion of even an accurate, factual statement " In NIFLA , the Supreme Court indicated that under Zauderer , the government must assert an interest that is "more than 'purely hypothetical '" As discussed above, the State of California's justification for the notice requiring unlicensed clinics to disclose that they were unlicensed was to "ensur[e] that pregnant women in California know when they are getting medical care from licensed professionals " The Court concluded that the state had "point[ed] to nothing suggesting that pregnant women do not already know that the covered facilities are staffed by unlicensed medical professionals " NIFLA 's requirement that the government provide evidence supporting an asserted interest differs from the Court's approach in Zauderer itself and in Milavetz   In both Zauderer and Milavetz , the Court rejected arguments that the government had failed to present sufficient evidence to support its interest in the disclosure requirement, concluding that in both of those cases, "the possibility of deception" in the regulated advertisements was "self-evident " Although the standard is not entirely clear, it is possible that in future cases the Court could conclude again that a particular advertisement is so obviously deceptive that the government does not need to submit significant evidence proving that the advertisements are misleading  If the government has asserted a sufficient interest, then under Zauderer , it needs to show only that the disputed disclosure requirement is "reasonably related" to that interest  Describing the Supreme Court's decision in Zauderer , the D C  Circuit has said that the "evidentiary parsing" required by more rigorous First Amendment tests "is hardly necessary when the government uses a disclosure mandate to achieve a goal of informing consumers about a particular product trait, assuming of course that the reason for informing consumers qualifies as an adequate interest " That court further elaborated that "[t]he self-evident tendency of a disclosure mandate to assure that recipients get the mandated information may in part explain why, where that is the goal, many such mandates have persisted for decades without anyone questioning their constitutionality " Similarly, the Second Circuit has observed in one case that "while the First Amendment precludes the government from restricting commercial speech without showing that 'the harms it recites are real and that its restriction will in fact alleviate them to a material degree,'" the First Amendment "does not demand 'evidence or empirical data' to demonstrate the rationality of mandated disclosures in the commercial context " Notwithstanding the suggestion that little evidence is required to show that a disclosure requirement is reasonably related to an appropriate government interest, lower courts have often relied on the government's evidence supporting the disputed requirement when they uphold the provision  This showing may be easiest where the government asserts an interest in preventing misleading speech, given "the self-evident tendency of a disclosure mandate to assure that recipients get the mandated information " Additionally, courts have sometimes held that commercial disclosure requirements fail even this lenient test for rationality, particularly where the government has asserted an interest other than preventing consumer confusion  For example, in National Association of Manufacturers v  SEC , the D C  Circuit held that a provision requiring companies to disclose whether their products were "conflict free" violated the First Amendment  In defending this rule, the government asserted an interest in "ameliorat[ing] the humanitarian crisis in the [Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC)] " In the court's view, however, the government had failed to demonstrate that its measure would achieve this interest  The D C  Circuit observed that the government had "offered little substance beyond" statements by political officials to support "the effectiveness of the measure " The court assumed that the government's theory "must be that the forced disclosure regime will [lead to boycotts that] decrease the revenue of armed groups in the DRC and their loss of revenue will end or at least diminish the humanitarian crisis there " But in the view of the court, this theory could not justify the regulation, as the idea was "entirely unproven and rest[ed] on pure speculation " To take another example, the Third Circuit struck down a commercial disclosure requirement concerning attorney advertising in Dwyer v  Cappell   In that case, an attorney challenged a state regulation that prohibited attorneys from using quotations from judicial opinions in their advertising unless they presented "the full text" of those opinions  The state argued that such quotations were "inherently misleading because laypersons       would understand them to be judicial endorsements " The court, however, said that even assuming "that excerpts of judicial opinions are potentially misleading to some persons," the state had failed "to explain how [an attorney's] providing a complete judicial opinion somehow dispels this assumed threat of deception " The court reasoned that "providing a full judicial opinion does not reveal to a potential client that an excerpt of the same opinion is not an endorsement " Additionally, the court held that the disputed requirement was "unduly burdensome," as it "effectively rules out the possibility that [an attorney] can advertise with even an accurately quoted excerpt of a judicial statement about his abilities " And in the view of the Third Circuit, "that type of restriction—an outright ban on advertising with judicial excerpts—would properly be analyzed under the heightened Central Hudson standard of scrutiny " As Dwyer suggests, courts may strike down disclosure requirements under Zauderer if the requirement is "unduly burdensome " In NIFLA , the Supreme Court held that the unlicensed notice was likely unconstitutional because it "unduly burden[ed] protected speech," noting that it applied to all advertisements for these licensed facilities, regardless of their content  In particular, the majority opinion highlighted one hypothetical discussed at oral argument, noting that "a billboard for an unlicensed facility that says 'Choose Life' would have to surround that two-word statement with a 29-word statement from the government, in as many as 13 different languages " In this instance, the Court said, the notice would "drown[] out the facility's own message," and therefore be unduly burdensome  If a commercial disclosure requirement is not a factual and uncontroversial disclosure related to the speaker's goods or services under Zauderer , courts will likely apply a heightened standard of review  Under prevailing Supreme Court precedent, if a provision does not qualify for Zauderer 's reasonableness review, a court may review the challenged regulation under Central Hudson   As discussed above, Central Hudson established the general standard of review for government restrictions on commercial speech  The Supreme Court described "a four-part analysis:" At the outset, we must determine whether the expression is protected by the First Amendment  For commercial speech to come within that provision, it at least must concern lawful activity and not be misleading  Next, we ask whether the asserted governmental interest is substantial  If both inquiries yield positive answers, we must determine whether the regulation directly advances the governmental interest asserted, and whether it is not more extensive than is necessary to serve that interest  The Court has described the Central Hudson test as "intermediate" scrutiny  If a disclosure requirement affects commercial speech but does not qualify for Zauderer review, courts have generally held that Central Hudson 's intermediate scrutiny applies  However, courts have sometimes suggested that some higher standard of review, more stringent than Central Hudson 's intermediate scrutiny, should apply to commercial disclosure requirements that do not qualify for review under Zauderer   Some lower court judges have concluded that because such disclosures compel particular speech and are by definition not content-neutral, they should be evaluated under strict scrutiny  In contrast to Central Hudson review, which requires the government to show that a law is "not more extensive than is necessary to serve" a "substantial" interest, strict scrutiny "requires the Government to prove that the restriction furthers a compelling interest and is narrowly tailored to achieve that interest " The Supreme Court has suggested—but not squarely held—that at least some types of commercial disclosure requirements might be subject to some form of scrutiny more strict than Central Hudson   In NIFLA , the Supreme Court considered the constitutionality of state provisions requiring crisis pregnancy centers to make certain disclosures to clients and in their advertising  The Court suggested that the provision requiring licensed facilities to disseminate notices about state-provided services might be subject to strict scrutiny as a content-based regulation of speech, but concluded that it did not need to resolve that question because the notice could not "survive even intermediate scrutiny " Significantly, however, the NIFLA Court never described the licensed notice as involving commercial speech  In the decision below, the Ninth Circuit had held that the notice should not be subject to strict scrutiny because it regulated "professional speech " That court, like other federal courts of appeals, had recognized "speech that occurs between professionals and their clients in the context of their professional relationship" "as a separate category of speech that is subject to different rules " The Ninth Circuit had concluded that speech that was part of the practice of a profession could be regulated by the state, subject only to intermediate scrutiny  The Court rejected this idea, saying that the First Amendment does not encompass a tradition of lower scrutiny "for a category called 'professional speech '" Ultimately, the Court said that it saw no "persuasive reason" to treat "professional speech as a unique category that is exempt from ordinary First Amendment principles " To the extent that "professional speech" could be seen to overlap with commercial speech, this sentence could be read to suggest that commercial speech should also be subject to "ordinary First Amendment principles " This suggestion would seem to conflict with prior cases saying that commercial speech occupies a "subordinate position in the scale of First Amendment values " Although the NIFLA Court implicitly suggested that disclosure requirements for professionals might constitute commercial speech by evaluating the FACT Act's requirements under Zauderer and Central Hudson , it never expressly clarified whether "professional speech" overlaps with commercial speech  Because the FACT Act's requirements applied outside of the advertising context, it may be open to some debate whether these licensed notices involved commercial speech  The unlicensed notice challenged in NIFLA was required to be included in advertising, and advertisements are "classic examples of commercial speech " But the unlicensed notice was also required to be posted on-site, and the state required licensed facilities to post disclosures on-site or to otherwise distribute the notice to clients directly  Further, in a similar context, at least one federal court of appeals concluded that a Baltimore ordinance requiring certain pregnancy centers to make specified disclosures regulated noncommercial speech  That court said the pregnancy centers were not motivated by economic interest or proposing a commercial transaction, but were instead "provid[ing] free information about pregnancy, abortion, and birth control as informed by a religious and political belief " If the licensed disclosures in NIFLA did not regulate commercial speech, then it would be unsurprising that the Court would consider applying strict scrutiny rather than Central Hudson   Others, however, have pointed out that crisis pregnancy centers, even if they do not charge fees, operate "in a marketplace where other providers generally charge fees," and argued that these centers "are engaged in commercial activity by providing physical and mental health services to pregnant women " And more generally, some have pointed out the similarities between "professional" and commercial speech  The fact that the NIFLA Court did not directly address the relationship between professional and commercial speech may suggest that heightened scrutiny may be necessary with respect to some commercial disclosure requirements  Specifically, the Court did not cite the commercial speech doctrine as "a persuasive reason for treating professional speech as a unique category that is exempt from ordinary First Amendment principles " At least one commentator has argued that the Court's failure to mention Central Hudson —"not even to dismiss it as       another inapposite exception to Reed 's general rule [of strict scrutiny]"—may suggest that the Court is seeking to limit Central Hudson 's holding that commercial speech may be more freely regulated than other speech under the First Amendment  Although NIFLA may not have expressly altered the framework used to evaluate commercial disclosure requirements, it may nonetheless signal that the Supreme Court will view them with more skepticism in the future  The majority opinion, authored by Justice Thomas, emphasized that "[t]he dangers associated with content-based regulations of speech are also present in the context of professional speech " Even if "professional speech" is not coterminous with "commercial speech," this statement does seem to suggest that the Court believes content neutrality principles are relevant in the commercial sphere  In dissent, Justice Breyer, viewing the majority opinion as adopting such a view, argued that the majority's approach, "if taken literally, could radically change prior law, perhaps placing much securities law or consumer protection law at constitutional risk " He pointed out that "[v]irtually every disclosure law could be considered 'content based,' for virtually every disclosure law requires individuals 'to speak a particular message '" In response to Justice Breyer, the NIFLA majority stated that it did not "question the legality of health and safety warnings long considered permissible, or purely factual and uncontroversial disclosures about commercial products " This view echoed the Court's prior statement that "[p]urely commercial speech is more susceptible to compelled disclosure requirements " Following the Court's 2010 decision in Reed , in which the Court articulated a more "precise test to determine whether speech regulations are content based," many lower courts had rejected the idea that content-based requirements affecting only commercial speech should be subject to strict scrutiny, even if they otherwise discriminated based on content under Reed   But because NIFLA appeared to suggest that content neutrality is relevant in the commercial sphere, it seems reasonable to think that lower courts may now be more likely to conclude that strict scrutiny could apply to content-based commercial disclosure requirements  This would be consistent with what some commentators have described as the Court's increasingly heightened scrutiny of restrictions on commercial speech  For now, though, Central Hudson generally continues to govern the analysis of government actions affecting lawful, non-misleading commercial speech, including commercial disclosure requirements that do not qualify for Zauderer review  As discussed, Central Hudson requires that the government prove that its interest is "substantial," and that the regulation "directly advances" that interest and is "not more extensive than is necessary to serve that interest " Government regulations are more likely to fail this more rigorous standard than the Zauderer reasonableness standard, often because a court believes there is some less restrictive means available for the government to achieve its goals  Courts will require more "evidence of a measure's effectiveness" under Central Hudson , as compared to Zauderer   However, Central Hudson is more forgiving than strict scrutiny, and courts do uphold government actions infringing on commercial speech under Central Hudson   For example, in Spirit Airlines v  Department of Transportation , the D C  Circuit concluded that a federal regulation governing the way that airlines must display flight prices "satisfie[d]       the Central Hudson test " In the court's view, "[t]he government interest—ensuring the accuracy of commercial information in the marketplace—[was] clearly and directly advanced by a regulation requiring that the total, final price be the most prominent" price displayed  And the regulation was "reasonably tailored to accomplish that end" because the rule "simply regulate[d] the manner of disclosure " Government actions are unlikely to be upheld if a court applies strict scrutiny  Nonetheless, some scholars have argued that many disclosure requirements might survive strict scrutiny, and the Supreme Court has, in rare instances, said that the government may "directly regulate speech to address extraordinary problems, where its regulations are appropriately tailored to resolve those problems without imposing an unnecessarily great restriction on speech " It is possible that a court could hold that the government has a compelling interest in protecting consumers, for example, and that particular disclosures are narrowly tailored to meet that interest  The Supreme Court has long emphasized that the government can regulate commercial activity "deemed harmful to the public " But a court would likely require more proof from the government under strict scrutiny and likely would not simply accept the government's allegations as "self-evident" under such review  Congress has enacted a wide variety of disclosure requirements, many of which arguably compel commercial speech  For example, the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934 sets out disclosure requirements for registering securities  Federal law, among a host of other food labeling requirements, requires "bioengineered food" to bear a label disclosing that the food is bioengineered  Direct-to-consumer advertisements for prescription drugs must contain a series of disclosures, including the drug's name and side effects  Certain appliances must contain labels disclosing information about their energy efficiency  Bills in the 115 th and 116 th Congresses have proposed additional disclosure requirements, including a bill that would require large online platforms to disclose any studies conducted on users for the purposes of promoting engagement, and a bill that would require public companies to disclose climate-related risks  Recent Supreme Court precedent suggests that the Court is more closely reviewing commercial disclosure requirements, perhaps moving away from a more deferential treatment of such provisions  In NIFLA , the Court held that a disclosure requirement was likely unconstitutional under Zauderer because the government had not presented sufficient evidence to justify the measure —even though in other cases, the Court had rejected similar challenges to commercial disclosure requirements, saying that the government did not need to present more evidence because the harm it sought to remedy was "self-evident " Further, the Court has recently suggested that if a law regulating commercial speech discriminates on the basis of content—as all disclosure requirements seemingly do —then this content discrimination might subject the law to heightened scrutiny  If the Court further embraces this view, it could be a marked departure from its opinions holding that commercial speech could be regulated on the basis of its content, so long as the government's justification for the content discrimination were sufficiently related to its legitimate interests in regulating the speech  In concurring and dissenting opinions that have been joined by other Justices, Justice Breyer has argued that insofar as the Court's recent decisions suggest that commercial disclosure requirements should be subject to heightened scrutiny, they are inconsistent with prior case law and are not a proper application of the First Amendment  The Supreme Court said in NIFLA that it was "not question[ing] the legality of health and safety warnings long considered permissible, or purely factual and uncontroversial disclosures about commercial products " And lower courts have frequently upheld commercial disclosure requirements, perhaps suggesting that disclosures of the kind cited by Justice Breyer are not in danger of wholesale invalidation under the First Amendment  However, the majority opinion in NIFLA did not clarify what kind of disclosures it would consider permissible, and its opinion made clear that disclosure requirements should be scrutinized in light of the speakers they cover and the burdens they pose  Moreover, although the NIFLA Court said that it was not questioning these disclosures' "legality," it left open the possibility that these disclosure should nonetheless be subject to heightened scrutiny  This statement may mean only that the Court believes that many commercial disclosure requirements would meet a higher standard of scrutiny  At least one federal appellate court seems to have taken NIFLA as a signal that lower courts should more closely scrutinize commercial disclosure requirements  In American Beverage Association v  City & County of San Francisco , the Ninth Circuit, sitting en banc , relied on NIFLA to reverse a prior decision that had upheld an ordinance requiring "health warnings on advertisements for certain sugar-sweetened beverages " While a panel of judges had previously concluded that the disclosure requirement was constitutional under Zauderer , the full Ninth Circuit, reviewing that decision, said: " NIFLA requires us to reexamine how we approach a First Amendment claim concerning compelled speech " Namely, the court held that, in light of NIFLA , the health warnings were likely unjustified and unduly burdensome under Zauderer , noting that the regulation required the warnings to "occupy at least 20% of those products' labels or advertisements"—but that the record showed that "a smaller warning—half the size—would accomplish [the government's] stated goals " As such, the court held that the warnings violated the First Amendment "by chilling protected speech " Accordingly, when Congress and federal agencies consider adopting new commercial disclosure requirements, or reauthorizing old ones, it may be wise to develop a record with more evidence demonstrating a need for the regulation  Under any level of scrutiny, courts will examine the government's asserted purpose for the legislation, as well as how closely tailored the disclosure requirement is to achieve that purpose  Under Zauderer , particularly in light of NIFLA , courts may ask for evidence to support the government's claim that the regulated speech is misleading or that the government has some other interest in regulating that speech, and will likely scrutinize the disclosure requirement to make sure it is not unduly burdensome  Under intermediate scrutiny or strict scrutiny, a court may also ask whether the government considered alternative policies that would be less restrictive of speech, examining more closely the government's justifications for choosing a disclosure requirement 


Report 2: The Energy and Water Development appropriations bill includes funding for civil works projects of the U S  Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), the Department of the Interior's Central Utah Project (CUP) and Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation), the Department of Energy (DOE), and a number of independent agencies, including the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and the Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC)  Figure 1 compares the major components of the Energy and Water Development bill from FY2017 through the FY2020 request  President Trump submitted his FY2020 detailed budget proposal to Congress on March 18, 2019 (after submitting a general budget overview on March 11)  The budget requests for agencies included in the Energy and Water Development appropriations bill total $38 02 billion—$6 64 billion (15%) below the FY2019 appropriation  (See Table 3  ) A $1 309 billion increase (12%) is proposed for DOE nuclear weapons activities  For FY2019, the conference agreement on H R  5895 ( H Rept  115-929 ) provided total Energy and Water Development appropriations of $44 66 billion—3% above the FY2018 level and 23% above the FY2019 request  The bill was signed by the President on September 21, 2018 ( P L  115-244 )  Figures for FY2019 exclude emergency supplemental appropriations totaling $17 419 billion provided to USACE and DOE for natural disaster response by the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018 ( P L  115-123 ), signed February 9, 2018  For more details, see CRS Report R45258, Energy and Water Development: FY2019 Appropriations , by Mark Holt and Corrie E  Clark, and CRS Report R45326, Army Corps of Engineers Annual and Supplemental Appropriations: Issues for Congress , by Nicole T  Carter  The FY2020 budget request proposes substantial reductions from the FY2019 enacted level for DOE energy research and development (R&D) programs, including a reduction of $178 million (-24%) in fossil fuels and $502 million (-38%) in nuclear energy  Energy efficiency and renewable energy R&D would decline by $1 724 billion (-83%)  DOE science programs would be reduced by $1 039 billion (-16%)  Programs targeted by the budget for elimination or phaseout include energy efficiency grants, the Advanced Research Projects Agency—Energy (ARPA-E), and loan guarantee programs  Funding would be reduced for USACE by $2 172 billion (-31%), and Reclamation and CUP by $462 million (-29%)  Congress did not enact similar reductions included in the FY2018 and FY2019 budget requests  Congressional consideration of the annual Energy and Water Development appropriations bill is affected by certain procedural and statutory budget enforcement measures  These consist primarily of limits associated with the budget resolution on total discretionary spending and allocations of this amount that apply to spending under the jurisdiction of each appropriations subcommittee  Statutory budget enforcement is derived from the Budget Control Act of 2011 (BCA; P L  112-25 )  The BCA established separate limits on defense and nondefense discretionary spending  These limits are in effect for each of the fiscal years from FY2012 through FY2021, and are primarily enforced by an automatic spending reduction process called sequestration, in which a breach of a spending limit would trigger across-the-board cuts within that spending category  The BCA's statutory discretionary spending limits were increased for FY2018 and FY2019 by the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018 (BBA 2018; P L  115-123 ), enacted February 9, 2018  However, the BCA discretionary spending limits have not been increased for FY2020  As a result, the limits currently in place for FY2020 are substantially lower than the limits that were in place for FY2019  For discretionary defense spending, the FY2020 limit drops from $647 billion to $576 billion (-11%), while the nondefense limit drops from $597 billion to $542 billion (-9%)  A bill to raise the defense and nondefense spending limits for FY2020 and FY2021 was reported by the House Budget Committee April 5, 2019 ( H R  2021 , H Rept  116-35 )  (For more information, see CRS Report R44874, The Budget Control Act: Frequently Asked Questions , by Grant A  Driessen and Megan S  Lynch ) Several issues raised by the Administration's budget request could generate controversy during congressional consideration of Energy and Water Development appropriations for FY2020  The issues described in this section—listed approximately in the order the affected agencies appear in the Energy and Water Development bill—were selected based on the total funding involved, the percentage of proposed increases or decreases, and potential impact on broader public policy considerations  For USACE, the Trump Administration requested $4 827 billion for FY2020, which is $2 172 billion (-31%) below the FY2019 appropriation  The request includes no funding for initiating new studies and construction projects (referred to as new starts)  The FY2020 request seeks to limit funding for ongoing navigation and flood risk-reduction construction projects to those whose benefits are at least 2 5 times their costs, or projects that address safety concerns  Many congressionally authorized USACE projects would not meet that standard  The Administration also proposes to transfer the Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program from USACE to DOE  For Reclamation, FY2020 funding would be reduced by $461 6 million (29%) from the FY2019 level, to $1 11 billion  For more details, see CRS In Focus IF11137, Army Corps of Engineers: FY2020 Appropriations , by Nicole T  Carter and Anna E  Normand; CRS In Focus IF11158, Bureau of Reclamation: FY2020 Appropriations , by Charles V  Stern; and CRS Report R45326, Army Corps of Engineers Annual and Supplemental Appropriations: Issues for Congress , by Nicole T  Carter  DOE's FY2020 budget request includes three mandatory proposals related to the Power Marketing Administrations (PMAs)—Bonneville Power Administration (BPA), Southeastern Power Administration (SEPA), Southwestern Power Administration (SWPA), and Western Area Power Administration (WAPA)  PMAs sell the power generated by the dams operated by Reclamation and USACE  The Administration proposes to divest the assets of the three PMAs that own transmission infrastructure: BPA, SWPA, and WAPA  These assets consist of thousands of miles of high voltage transmission lines and hundreds of power substations  The budget request projects that mandatory savings from the sale of these assets would total approximately $5 8 billion over a 10-year period  The FY2020 budget request includes a proposal to repeal the borrowing authority for WAPA's Transmission Infrastructure Program, which facilitates the delivery of renewable energy resources  The FY2020 budget also proposes eliminating the statutory requirement that PMAs limit rates to amounts necessary to recover only construction, operations, and maintenance costs; the budget proposes that the PMAs instead transition to a market-based approach to setting rates  The Administration has estimated that this proposal would yield $1 9 billion in new revenues over 10 years  The budget also calls for repealing $3 25 billion in borrowing authority provided to WAPA for transmission projects enacted under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 ( P L  111-5 )  The proposal is estimated to save $640 million over 10 years  All of these proposals would need to be enacted in authorizing legislation, and no congressional action has been taken on them to date  The proposals have been opposed by groups such as the American Public Power Association and the National Rural Electrical Cooperative Association, and they have been the subject of opposition letters to the Administration from several regionally based bipartisan groups of Members of Congress  PMA reforms have been supported by some policy research institutes, such as the Heritage Foundation  For further information, see CRS Report R45548, The Power Marketing Administrations: Background and Current Issues , by Richard J  Campbell  The FY2020 budget request proposes to terminate both the DOE Weatherization Assistance Program and the State Energy Program (SEP)  The Weatherization Assistance Program provides formula grants to states to fund energy efficiency improvements for low-income housing units to reduce their energy costs and save energy  The SEP provides grants and technical assistance to states for planning and implementation of their energy programs  Both the weatherization and SEP programs are under DOE's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE)  The weatherization program received $257 million and SEP $55 million for FY2019, after also having been proposed for elimination in that year's budget request, as well as in FY2018  According to DOE, the proposed elimination of the grant programs is "due to a departmental shift in focus away from deployment activities and towards early-stage R&D " Appropriations for DOE R&D on energy efficiency, renewable energy, nuclear energy, and fossil energy would be reduced from $4 133 billion in FY2019 to $1 729 billion (-58%) under the Administration's FY2020 budget request  Major proposed reductions include bioenergy technologies (-82%), vehicle technologies (-79%), natural gas technologies (-79%), advanced manufacturing (-75%), building technologies (-75%), wind energy (-74%), solar energy (-73%), geothermal technologies (-67%), and nuclear fuel cycle R&D (-66%)  DOE says the proposed reductions would primarily affect the later stages of energy research, which tend to be the most costly  "The Budget focuses DOE resources toward early-stage R&D, where the Federal role is strongest, and reflects an increased reliance on the private sector to fund later-stage research, development, and commercialization of energy technologies," according to the FY2020 DOE request  Similar reductions proposed by the Administration for FY2019 were not enacted  The Administration's FY2020 budget request, for the first time since FY2010, would provide new funding for a proposed nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain, NV; similar Administration requests for the repository project were not included in the enacted funding measures for FY2018 and FY2019  Under the FY2020 request, DOE would receive $116 million to seek an NRC license for the repository and to develop interim nuclear waste storage capacity  NRC would receive $38 5 million to consider DOE's application  DOE's total of $116 million in nuclear waste funding would come from two appropriations accounts: $90 million from Nuclear Waste Disposal and $26 million from Defense Nuclear Waste Disposal (to pay for defense-related nuclear waste that would be disposed of at Yucca Mountain)  DOE submitted a license application for the Yucca Mountain repository in 2008, but NRC suspended consideration in 2011 for lack of funding  The Obama Administration had declared the Yucca Mountain site "unworkable" because of opposition from the state of Nevada  The House voted to provide the Yucca Mountain funding requested for FY2018 and a $100 million increase for FY2019, but the Senate Appropriations Committee did not include it for FY2018, and it was not included in the Senate-passed bill for FY2019  Also as in FY2018, the FY2019 Senate bill included an authorization for a pilot program to develop an interim nuclear waste storage facility at a voluntary site (§304)  The enacted FY2019 appropriations measure did not include the House-passed funding for Yucca Mountain or the Senate's nuclear waste pilot program provisions  For more background, see CRS Report RL33461, Civilian Nuclear Waste Disposal , by Mark Holt  The FY2020 budget request would halt further loans and loan guarantees under DOE's Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program and the Title 17 Innovative Technology Loan Guarantee Program  Similar proposals to eliminate the programs in FY2018 and FY2019 were not enacted  The FY2020 budget request would also halt further loan guarantees under DOE's Tribal Energy Loan Guarantee Program  Under the FY2020 budget proposal, DOE would continue to administer its existing portfolio of loans and loan guarantees  Unused prior-year authority, or ceiling levels, for loan guarantee commitments would be rescinded, as well as $169 5 million in unspent appropriations to cover loan guarantee "subsidy costs" (which are primarily intended to cover potential losses)  On March 22, 2019, after the FY2020 budget request had been submitted, DOE provided $3 7 billion in additional Title 17 loan guarantees for two new reactors under construction at the Vogtle nuclear plant in Georgia  The Vogtle project had previously received $8 3 billion in loan guarantees under the DOE program  The Administration's request for DOE includes $107 million in FY2020 for the U S  contribution to the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER), which is under construction in France by a multinational consortium  "ITER will be the first fusion device to maintain fusion for long periods of time" and is to lay the technical foundation "for the commercial production of fusion-based electricity," according to the consortium's website  The FY2020 DOE appropriation request, 19% below the FY2020 level, would pay for components supplied by U S  companies for the project, such as central solenoid superconducting magnet modules  ITER has long attracted congressional concern about management, schedule, and cost  The United States is to pay 9% of the project's construction costs, including contributions of components, cash, and personnel  Other collaborators in the project include the European Union, Russia, Japan, India, South Korea, and China  The total U S  share of the cost was estimated in 2015 at between $4 0 billion and $6 5 billion, up from $1 45 billion to $2 2 billion in 2008  DOE funding for the project was $122 million in FY2018 and $132 million in FY2019  The Trump Administration's FY2020 budget would eliminate the Advanced Research Projects Agency—Energy (ARPA-E) and rescind $287 million of the agency's unobligated balances  ARPA-E funds research on technologies that are determined to have potential to transform energy production, storage, and use  "This elimination facilitates opportunities to integrate the positive aspects of ARPA-E into DOE's applied energy research programs," according to the DOE request  The Administration also proposed to terminate ARPA-E in its FY2018 and FY2019 budget requests, but Congress increased the program's funding in both years  Because ARPA-E provides advance funding for projects for up to three years, oversight and management of the program would still be required during a phaseout period  According to the Administration budget request, "ARPA-E will utilize the remainder of its unobligated balances to execute the multi-year termination of the program, with all operations ceasing by FY 2022 " The FY2020 budget request for DOE Weapons Activities is 12% greater than the FY2019 enacted level ($12 4 billion vs  $11 1 billion)  Weapons Activities programs are carried out by the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), a semiautonomous agency within DOE  Under Weapons Activities, FY2020 funding for nuclear warhead life-extension programs (LEPs) would increase by 10% ($2 1 billion vs $1 9 billion)  The two most notable increases within that account are the funding request for W80-4 LEP, which increases by 37% ($898 6 million vs  $654 8 million) and the initiation of funding for the W87-1 LEP  The increase in the request for the W80-4 warhead, which is due to be carried on the new long-range standoff weapon (a new cruise missile), apparently is the result of a new budget estimate, as the Department of Defense is not accelerating development of the missile  The FY2020 request seeks $112 million for the W87-1 warhead (formerly the Interoperable Warhead 1, or IW-I), which received $53 million in FY2019  This warhead is to be carried by the Ground Based Strategic Deterrent, a new land-based missile that is scheduled to enter the force in the 2030s  The FY2020 budget request seeks $10 million for the W76-2 LEP, down from $65 million in FY2019  Work on this warhead is nearly complete  It is a low-yield modification of the current W76 warhead carried by U S  submarine-launched ballistic missiles  It remains controversial in Congress despite its relatively low price tag  In FY2020, NNSA is seeking $51 5 million, in the Stockpile Systems account, for surveillance efforts for the B83 gravity bomb, the most powerful bomb in the U S  inventory  This effort represents a 47% increase over the $35 million request in FY2019  The Obama Administration had planned to retire this bomb, but the Trump Administration reversed that decision in its 2018 Nuclear Posture Review  This decision may also prove controversial, as several Senators have been vocal supporters of the plan to retire the bomb  Within the Strategic Materials account in the NNSA budget, funding for Plutonium Sustainment would increase 97%, from $361 million enacted for FY2019 to $712 million requested for FY2020  This increase would support the Administration's plans to produce plutonium pits (or cores) for nuclear warheads at two facilities—Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico and the Savannah River Site in South Carolina  The Administration is seeking $410 million to begin conceptual design and pre-Critical Decision (CD)-1 activities at Savannah River  For more information, see CRS Report R44442, Energy and Water Development Appropriations: Nuclear Weapons Activities , by Amy F  Woolf  DOE's Office of Environmental Management (EM) is responsible for environmental cleanup and waste management at the department's nuclear facilities  The total FY2020 appropriations request for EM activities of $6 469 billion would be a decrease of $706 million (-10%) from FY2019  The budgetary components of the EM program are Defense Environmental Cleanup (-9%), Non-Defense Environmental Cleanup (-20%), and the Uranium Enrichment Decontamination and Decommissioning Fund (-15%)  The FY2020 request includes a proposal to transfer management of the Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program (FUSRAP) from USACE to the Office of Legacy Management (LM), the DOE office responsible for long-term stewardship of remediated sites  The FY2020 LM budget request includes $141 million for FUSRAP, down from $150 million appropriated to USACE for the program in FY2019  According to the DOE budget justification, "USACE will continue to conduct cleanup of FUSRAP sites on a reimbursable basis " Table 1 indicates the steps during consideration of FY2020 Energy and Water Development appropriations  (For more details, see the CRS Appropriations Status Table at http://www crs gov/AppropriationsStatusTable/Index  ) As of the publication date of this report, no markups had been held  Table 2 includes budget totals for energy and water development appropriations enacted for FY2011 through FY2019, plus the FY2020 request  The annual Energy and Water Development appropriations bill includes four titles: Title I—Corps of Engineers—Civil; Title II—Department of the Interior (Central Utah Project and Bureau of Reclamation); Title III—Department of Energy; and Title IV—Independent Agencies, as shown in Table 3   Major programs in the bill are described in this section in the approximate order they appear in the bill  Previous appropriations and budget recommendations for FY2020 are shown in the accompanying tables, and additional details about many of these programs are provided in separate CRS reports as indicated  For a discussion of current funding issues related to these programs, see " Funding Issues and Initiatives ," above  Congressional clients may obtain more detailed information by contacting CRS analysts listed in CRS Report R42638, Appropriations: CRS Experts , by James M  Specht and Justin Murray  FY2020 budget justifications for the largest agencies funded by the annual Energy and Water Development appropriations bill can be found through the following links: Title I, U S  Army Corps of Engineers, Civil Works, http://www usace army mil/Missions/CivilWorks/Budget Title II Bureau of Reclamation, https://www usbr gov/budget/ Central Utah Project, https://www doi gov/sites/doi gov/files/uploads/fy2020_cupca_budget_justification pdf Title III, Department of Energy, https://www energy gov/cfo/downloads/fy-2020-budget-justification Title IV, Independent Agencies Appalachian Regional Commission, http://www arc gov/images/newsroom/publications/fy2020budget/FY2020PerformanceBudgetMar2019 pdf Nuclear Regulatory Commission, https://www nrc gov/docs/ML1906/ML19065A279 pdf Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, https://www dnfsb gov/about/congressional-budget-requests Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board, http://www nwtrb gov/about-us/plans USACE is an agency in the Department of Defense with both military and civilian responsibilities  Under its civil works program, which is funded by the Energy and Water appropriations bill, USACE plans, builds, operates, and in some cases maintains water resources facilities for coastal and inland navigation, riverine and coastal flood risk reduction, and aquatic ecosystem restoration  In recent decades, Congress has generally authorized Corps studies, construction projects, and other activities in omnibus water authorization bills, typically titled Water Resources Development Acts (WRDA), prior to funding them through appropriations legislation  Recent Congresses enacted the following omnibus water resources authorization acts: in June 2014, the Water Resources Reform and Development Act of 2014 (WRRDA, P L  113-121 ); in December 2016, the Water Resources Development Act of 2016 (Title I of P L  114-322 , the Water Infrastructure Improvements for the Nation Act [WIIN]); and in October 2018, the Water Resources Development Act of 2018 (Title I of P L  115-270 , America's Water Infrastructure Act of 2018 [AWIA 2018])  These acts consisted largely of authorizations for new USACE projects, and they altered numerous USACE policies and procedures  Unlike in highways and municipal water infrastructure programs, federal funds for USACE are not distributed to states or projects based on formulas or delivered via competitive grants  Instead, USACE generally is directly involved in planning, designing, and managing the construction of projects that are cost-shared with nonfederal project sponsors  Prior to FY2010, in addition to site-specific project funding included in the President's annual budget request for USACE, Congress, during the discretionary appropriations process, had identified many additional USACE projects to receive funding or had adjusted the funding levels for the projects identified in the President's request  Starting in the 112 th Congress, site-specific project line items added or increased by Congress (i e , earmarks) became subject to House and Senate earmark moratorium policies  As a result, Congress generally has not added funding at the project level since FY2010  In lieu of the project-based increases, Congress has included "additional funding" for select categories of USACE projects and provided direction and limitations on the use of these funds  For more information, CRS In Focus IF11137, Army Corps of Engineers: FY2020 Appropriations , by Nicole T  Carter and Anna E  Normand  Previous appropriations and the President's request for FY2020 are shown in Table 4   Most of the large dams and water diversion structures in the West were built by, or with the assistance of, the Bureau of Reclamation  While the Corps of Engineers built hundreds of flood control and navigation projects, Reclamation's original mission was to develop water supplies, primarily for irrigation to reclaim arid lands in the West for farming and ranching  Reclamation has evolved into an agency that assists in meeting the water demands in the West while working to protect the environment and the public's investment in Reclamation infrastructure  The agency's municipal and industrial water deliveries have more than doubled since 1970  Today, Reclamation manages hundreds of dams and diversion projects, including more than 300 storage reservoirs, in 17 western states  These projects provide water to approximately 10 million acres of farmland and 31 million people  Reclamation is the largest wholesale supplier of water in the 17 western states and the second-largest hydroelectric power producer in the nation  Reclamation facilities also provide substantial flood control, recreation, and other benefits  Reclamation facility operations are often controversial, particularly for their effect on fish and wildlife species and because of conflicts among competing water users during drought conditions  As with the Corps of Engineers, the Reclamation budget is made up largely of individual project funding lines, rather than general programs that would not be covered by congressional earmark requirements  Therefore, as with USACE, these Reclamation projects have often been subject to earmark disclosure rules  The current moratorium on earmarks restricts congressional steering of money directly toward specific Reclamation projects  Reclamation's single largest account, Water and Related Resources, encompasses the agency's traditional programs and projects, including construction, operations and maintenance, dam safety, and ecosystem restoration, among others  Reclamation also typically requests funds in a number of smaller accounts, and has proposed additional accounts in recent years  Implementation and oversight of the Central Utah Project (CUP), also funded by Title II, is conducted by a separate office within the Department of the Interior  For more information, see CRS In Focus IF11158, Bureau of Reclamation: FY2020 Appropriations , by Charles V  Stern  Previous appropriations and recommendations for FY2020 are shown in Table 5   The Energy and Water Development bill has funded all DOE programs since FY2005  Major DOE activities include (1) research and development (R&D) on renewable energy, energy efficiency, nuclear power, fossil energy, and electricity; (2) the Strategic Petroleum Reserve; (3) energy statistics; (4) general science; (5) environmental cleanup; and (6) nuclear weapons and nonproliferation programs  Table 6 provides the recent funding history for DOE programs, which are briefly described further below  DOE's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) conducts research and development on transportation energy technology, energy efficiency in buildings and manufacturing processes, and the production of solar, wind, geothermal, and other renewable energy  EERE also administers formula grants to states for making energy efficiency improvements to low-income housing units and for state energy planning  The Sustainable Transportation program area includes electric vehicles, vehicle efficiency, and alternative fuels  DOE's electric vehicle program aims to "reduce the cost of electric vehicle batteries by more than half, to less than $100/kWh [kilowatt-hour] (ultimate goal is $80/kWh), increase range to 300 miles, and decrease charge time to 15 minutes or less " DOE's vehicle fuel cell program is focusing on the costs of fuel cells and their hydrogen fuel  According to the FY2020 budget request, "To be cost competitive with gasoline-powered internal combustion engines on a cents-per-mile driven basis, the cost of hydrogen delivered and dispensed needs to be less than $4/gge [gasoline gallon equivalent] (untaxed), and the cost of a durable fuel cell system to be less than $40/kW " Bioenergy goals include the development of "drop-in" fuels—fuels that would be largely compatible with existing energy infrastructure and vehicles, with a goal of $3/gge  Renewable power programs focus on electricity generation from solar, wind, water, and geothermal sources  The solar energy program has a goal of achieving, by 2030, costs of 3 cents per kWh for unsubsidized, utility-scale photovoltaics (PV)  Wind R&D is to focus on early-stage research and testing to reduce costs and improve performance and reliability  The geothermal program is to focus on developing "enhanced geothermal systems" with an electricity generation cost target of 20 8 cents/kWh by 2022  In the energy efficiency program area, the advanced manufacturing program focuses on improving the energy efficiency of manufacturing processes and on the manufacturing of energy-related products  The building technologies program includes R&D on lighting, space conditioning, windows, and control technologies to reduce building energy-use intensity  The energy efficiency program also provides weatherization grants to states for improving the energy efficiency of low-income housing units and state energy planning grants  For more details, see CRS Report R44980, DOE's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE): Appropriations Status , by Corrie E  Clark  The Office of Cybersecurity, Energy Security, and Emergency Response (CESER) was created from programs that were previously part of the Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability  The programs that were not moved into CESER became part of the DOE Office of Electricity (OE)  OE's mission is to lead DOE efforts "to strengthen, transform, and improve energy infrastructure so that consumers have access to secure and resilient sources of energy " Major priorities of OE are developing a model of North American energy vulnerabilities, pursuing megawatt-scale electricity storage, integrating electric power system sensing technology, and analyzing electricity policy issues  The office also includes the DOE power marketing administrations, which are funded from separate appropriations accounts  CESER is the federal government's lead entity for energy sector-specific responses to energy security emergencies—whether caused by physical infrastructure problems or by cybersecurity issues  The office conducts R&D on energy infrastructure security technology; provides energy sector security guidelines, training, and technical assistance; and enhances energy sector emergency preparedness and response  DOE's Multiyear Plan for Energy Sector Cybersecurity describes the department's strategy to "strengthen today's energy delivery systems by working with our partners to address growing threats and promote continuous improvement, and develop game-changing solutions that will create inherently secure, resilient, and self-defending energy systems for tomorrow " The plan includes three goals that DOE has established for energy sector cybersecurity: strengthen energy sector cybersecurity preparedness; coordinate cyber incident response and recovery; and accelerate game-changing research, development, and demonstration (RD&D) of resilient energy delivery systems  DOE's Office of Nuclear Energy (NE) "focuses on three major mission areas: the nation's existing nuclear fleet, the development of advanced nuclear reactor concepts, and fuel cycle technologies," according to DOE's FY2020 budget justification  It calls nuclear energy "a key element of United States energy independence, energy dominance, electricity grid resiliency, national security, and clean baseload power " The Reactor Concepts program area includes research on advanced reactors, including advanced small modular reactors, and research to enhance the "sustainability" of existing commercial light water reactors  Advanced reactor research focuses on "Generation IV" reactors, as opposed to the existing fleet of commercial light water reactors, which are generally classified as generations II and III  R&D under this program focuses on advanced coolants, fuels, materials, and other technology areas that could apply to a variety of advanced reactors  To help develop those technologies, the Reactor Concepts program is developing a Versatile Test Reactor that would allow fuels and materials to be tested in a fast neutron environment (in which neutrons would not be slowed by water, graphite, or other "moderators")  Research on extending the life of existing commercial light water reactors beyond 60 years, the maximum operating period currently licensed by NRC, is being conducted by this program with industry cost-sharing  The Fuel Cycle Research and Development program includes generic research on nuclear waste management and disposal  One of the program's primary activities is the development of technologies to separate the radioactive constituents of spent fuel for reuse or solidifying into stable waste forms  Other major research areas in the Fuel Cycle R&D program include the development of accident-tolerant fuels for existing commercial reactors, evaluation of fuel cycle options, and development of improved technologies to prevent diversion of nuclear materials for weapons  The program is also developing sources of high-assay low enriched uranium (HALEU), in which uranium is enriched to between 5% and 20% in the fissile isotope U-235, for potential use in advanced reactors  For more information, see CRS Report R45706, Advanced Nuclear Reactors: Technology Overview and Current Issues , by Danielle A  Arostegui and Mark Holt  Much of DOE's Fossil Energy R&D Program focuses on carbon capture and storage for power plants fueled by coal and natural gas  Major activities include Advanced Coal Energy Systems and Carbon Capture, Utilization, and Storage (CCUS); Natural Gas Technologies; and Unconventional Fossil Energy Technologies from Petroleum—Oil Technologies  Advanced Coal Energy Systems includes R&D on modular coal-gasification systems, advanced turbines, solid oxide fuel cells, advanced sensors and controls, and power generation efficiency  Elements of the CCUS program include the following: Carbon Capture subprogram for separating CO 2 in both precombustion and postcombustion systems; Carbon Utilization subprogram for R&D on technologies to convert carbon to marketable products, such as chemicals and polymers; and Carbon Storage subprogram on long-term geologic storage of CO 2 , focusing on saline formations, oil and natural gas reservoirs, unmineable coal seams, basalts, and organic shales  For more information, see CRS In Focus IF10589, FY2019 Funding for CCS and Other DOE Fossil Energy R&D , by Peter Folger, and CRS Report R44472, Funding for Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS) at DOE: In Brief , by Peter Folger  The Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), authorized by the Energy Policy and Conservation Act ( P L  94-163 ) in 1975, consists of caverns built within naturally occurring salt domes in Louisiana and Texas  The SPR provides strategic and economic security against foreign and domestic disruptions in U S  oil supplies via an emergency stockpile of crude oil  The program fulfills U S  obligations under the International Energy Program, which avails the United States of International Energy Agency (IEA) assistance through its coordinated energy emergency response plans, and provides a deterrent against energy supply disruptions  DOE has been conducting a major maintenance program to address aging infrastructure and a deferred maintenance backlog at SPR facilities  The federal government has not purchased oil for the SPR since 1994  Beginning in 2000, additions to the SPR were made with royalty-in-kind (RIK) oil acquired by DOE in lieu of cash royalties paid on production from federal offshore leases  In September 2009, the Secretary of the Interior announced a phaseout of the RIK Program  By early 2010, the SPR's capacity reached 727 million barrels  A series of oil sales and purchases since then have resulted in a net reduction of the SPR inventory  Currently, the SPR contains about 649 million barrels  Congress has enacted several laws since 2015 that mandate sales of SPR oil, including the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015 ( P L  114-74 ), the Fixing America's Surface Transportation Act ( P L  114-94 ), the 21 st Century Cures Act of 2016 ( P L  114-255 ), the 2017 Tax Revision ( P L  115-97 ), the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018 ( P L  115-123 ), and the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2018  Broadly considered, this legislation requires oil to be sold from the reserve over the period FY2017 through FY2027, totaling 266 million barrels  For more information, see CRS Report R45577, Strategic Petroleum Reserve: Mandated Sales and Reform , by Robert Pirog, and CRS In Focus IF10869, Reconsidering the Strategic Petroleum Reserve , by Robert Pirog  The DOE Office of Science conducts basic research in six program areas: advanced scientific computing research, basic energy sciences, biological and environmental research, fusion energy sciences, high-energy physics, and nuclear physics  According to DOE's FY2020 budget justification, the Office of Science "is the Nation's largest Federal sponsor of basic research in the physical sciences and the lead Federal agency supporting fundamental scientific research for our Nation's energy future " DOE's Advanced Scientific Computing Research (ASCR) program focuses on developing and maintaining computing and networking capabilities for science and research in applied mathematics, computer science, and advanced networking  The program plays a key role in the DOE-wide effort to advance the development of exascale computing, which seeks to build a computer that can solve scientific problems 1,000 times faster than today's best machines  DOE has asserted that the department is on a path to have a capable exascale machine by the early 2020s  Basic Energy Sciences (BES), the largest program area in the Office of Science, focuses on understanding, predicting, and ultimately controlling matter and energy at the electronic, atomic, and molecular levels  The program supports research in disciplines such as condensed matter and materials physics, chemistry, and geosciences  BES also provides funding for scientific user facilities (e g , the National Synchrotron Light Source II, and the Linac Coherent Light Source-II), and certain DOE research centers and hubs (e g , Energy Frontier Research Centers, as well as the Batteries and Energy Storage and Fuels from Sunlight Energy Innovation Hubs)  Biological and Environmental Research (BER) seeks a predictive understanding of complex biological, climate, and environmental systems across a continuum from the small scale (e g , genomic research) to the large (e g , Earth systems and climate)  Within BER, Biological Systems Science focuses on plant and microbial systems, while Biological and Environmental Research supports climate-relevant atmospheric and ecosystem modeling and research  BER facilities and centers include four Bioenergy Research Centers and the Environmental Molecular Science Laboratory at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory  Fusion Energy Sciences (FES) seeks to increase understanding of the behavior of matter at very high temperatures and to establish the science needed to develop a fusion energy source  FES provides funding for the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) project, a multinational effort to design and build an experimental fusion reactor  According to DOE, ITER "aims to provide fusion power output approaching reactor levels of hundreds of megawatts, for hundreds of seconds " However, many U S  analysts have expressed concern about ITER's cost, schedule, and management, as well as the budgetary impact on domestic fusion research  The High Energy Physics (HEP) program conducts research on the fundamental constituents of matter and energy, including studies of dark energy and the search for dark matter  Nuclear Physics supports research on the nature of matter, including its basic constituents and their interactions  A major project in the Nuclear Physics program is the construction of the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams at Michigan State University  A separate DOE office, the Advanced Research Projects Agency—Energy (ARPA-E), was authorized by the America COMPETES Act ( P L  110-69 ) to support transformational energy technology research projects  DOE budget documents describe ARPA-E's mission as overcoming long-term, high-risk technological barriers to the development of energy technologies  For more details, see CRS Report R45150, Federal Research and Development (R&D) Funding: FY2019 , coordinated by John F  Sargent Jr  DOE's Loan Programs Office provides loan guarantees for projects that deploy specified energy technologies, as authorized by Title 17 of the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (EPACT05, P L  109-58 ), direct loans for advanced vehicle manufacturing technologies, and loan guarantees for tribal energy projects  Section 1703 of the act authorizes loan guarantees for advanced energy technologies that reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and Section 1705 established a temporary program for renewable energy and energy efficiency projects  Title 17 allows DOE to provide loan guarantees for up to 80% of construction costs for eligible energy projects  Successful applicants must pay an up-front fee, or "subsidy cost," to cover potential losses under the loan guarantee program  Under the loan guarantee agreements, the federal government would repay all covered loans if the borrower defaulted  Such guarantees would reduce the risk to lenders and allow them to provide financing at below-market interest rates  The following is a summary of loan guarantee amounts that have been authorized (loan guarantee ceilings) for various technologies: $8 3 billion for nonnuclear technologies under Section 1703; $2 0 billion for unspecified projects from FY2007 under Section 1703; $18 5 billion for nuclear power plants ($12 0 billion committed); $4 billion for loan guarantees for uranium enrichment plants; $1 18 billion for renewable energy and energy efficiency projects under Section 1703, in addition to other loan guarantee ceilings, which can include applications that were pending under Section 1705 before it expired; and In addition to the loan guarantee ceilings above, an appropriation of $161 million was provided for subsidy costs for renewable energy and energy efficiency loan guarantees under Section 1703  If the subsidy costs averaged 10% of the loan guarantees, this funding could leverage loan guarantees totaling about $1 6 billion  The only loan guarantees under Section 1703 were $8 3 billion in guarantees provided to the consortium building two new reactors at the Vogtle plant in Georgia  DOE committed an additional $3 7 billion in loan guarantees for the Vogtle project on March 22, 2019  Another nuclear loan guarantee is being sought by NuScale Power to build a small modular reactor in Idaho  In the absence of explosive testing of nuclear weapons, the United States has adopted a science-based program to maintain and sustain confidence in the reliability of the U S  nuclear stockpile  Congress established the Stockpile Stewardship Program in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1994 ( P L  103-160 )  The goal of the program, as amended by the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010 ( P L  111-84 , §3111), is to ensure "that the nuclear weapons stockpile is safe, secure, and reliable without the use of underground nuclear weapons testing " The program is operated by NNSA, a semiautonomous agency within DOE established by the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2000 ( P L  106-65 , Title XXXII)  NNSA implements the Stockpile Stewardship Program through the activities funded by the Weapons Activities account in the NNSA budget  Most of NNSA's weapons activities take place at the nuclear weapons complex, which consists of three laboratories (Los Alamos National Laboratory, NM; Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, CA; and Sandia National Laboratories, NM and CA); four production sites (Kansas City National Security Campus, MO; Pantex Plant, TX; Savannah River Site, SC; and Y-12 National Security Complex, TN); and the Nevada National Security Site (formerly the Nevada Test Site)  NNSA manages and sets policy for the weapons complex; contractors to NNSA operate the eight sites  Radiological activities at these sites are subject to oversight and recommendations by the independent Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, funded by Title IV of the annual Energy and Water Development appropriations bill  There are three major program areas in the Weapons Activities account  Directed Stockpile Work includes the life extension programs (LEPs) on existing warheads and stockpile services programs that monitor their condition; and maintaining warheads through repairs, refurbishment, and modifications  It also includes funding for research and development in support of specific warheads, and dismantlement of warheads that have been removed from the stockpile  This last activity received more significant funding as the number of warheads in the U S  stockpile declined after the Cold War; it also provides a source for critical components for warheads remaining in the stockpile  Directed Stockpile Work also involves programs that work on the materials needed for nuclear warheads, including the plutonium pits that are the core of the weapons  Research, Development, Test, and Evaluation (RDT&E) includes five programs that focus on "efforts to develop and maintain critical capabilities, tools, and processes needed to support science based stockpile stewardship, refurbishment, and continued certification of the stockpile over the long-term in the absence of underground nuclear testing " This area includes operation of some large experimental facilities, such as the National Ignition Facility at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory  Infrastructure and Operations has, as its main funding elements, material recycle and recovery, recapitalization of facilities, and construction of facilities  The latter include two major projects that have generated congressional controversy: the Uranium Processing Facility (UPF) at the Y-12 National Security Complex and the Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Replacement (CMRR) Project, which deals with plutonium, at Los Alamos National Laboratory  Nuclear Weapons Activities also has several smaller programs, including the following: Secure Transportation Asset, providing for safe and secure transport of nuclear weapons, components, and materials; Defense Nuclear Security, providing operations, maintenance, and construction funds for protective forces, physical security systems, personnel security, and related activities; and Information Technology and Cybersecurity, whose elements include cybersecurity, secure enterprise computing, and Federal Unclassified Information Technology  For more information, see CRS Report R44442, Energy and Water Development Appropriations: Nuclear Weapons Activities , by Amy F  Woolf, and CRS Report R45306, The U S  Nuclear Weapons Complex: Overview of Department of Energy Sites , by Amy F  Woolf and James D  Werner  DOE's nonproliferation and national security programs provide technical capabilities to support U S  efforts to prevent, detect, and counter the spread of nuclear weapons worldwide  These programs are administered by NNSA's Office of Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation  The Materials Management and Minimization program conducts activities to minimize and, where possible, eliminate stockpiles of weapons-useable material around the world  Major activities include conversion of reactors that use highly enriched uranium (useable for weapons) to low-enriched uranium, removal and consolidation of nuclear material stockpiles, and disposition of excess nuclear materials  Global Materials Security has three major program elements  International Nuclear Security focuses on increasing the security of vulnerable stockpiles of nuclear material in other countries  Radiological Security promotes the worldwide reduction and security of radioactive sources, including the removal of surplus sources and substitution of technologies that do not use radioactive materials  Nuclear Smuggling Detection and Deterrence works to improve the capability of other countries to halt illicit trafficking of nuclear materials  Nonproliferation and Arms Control works to "to support U S  nonproliferation and arms control objectives to prevent proliferation, ensure peaceful nuclear uses, and enable verifiable nuclear reductions," according to the FY2020 DOE justification  This program conducts reviews of nuclear export applications and technology transfer authorizations, implements treaty obligations, and analyzes nonproliferation policies and proposals  Other programs under Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation include research and development and construction, which advances nuclear detection and nuclear forensics technologies  Nuclear Counterterrorism and Incident Response provides "interagency policy, contingency planning, training, and capacity building" to counter nuclear terrorism and strengthen incident response capabilities, according to the FY2020 budget justification  The development and production of nuclear weapons during half a century since the beginning of the Manhattan Project resulted in a waste and contamination legacy managed by DOE that continues to present substantial challenges today  DOE also manages legacy environmental contamination at sites used for nondefense nuclear research  In 1989, DOE established the Office of Environmental Management primarily to consolidate its responsibilities for the cleanup of former nuclear weapons production sites that had been administered under multiple offices  DOE's nuclear cleanup efforts are broad in scope and include the disposal of large quantities of radioactive and other hazardous wastes generated over decades; management and disposal of surplus nuclear materials; remediation of extensive contamination in soil and groundwater; decontamination and decommissioning of excess buildings and facilities; and safeguarding, securing, and maintaining facilities while cleanup is underway  DOE's cleanup of nuclear research sites adds a nondefense component to the EM's mission, albeit smaller in terms of the scope of their cleanup and associated funding  DOE has identified more than 100 separate sites in over 30 states that historically were involved in the production of nuclear weapons and nuclear energy research for civilian purposes  The geographic scope of these sites is substantial, collectively encompassing a land area of approximately 2 million acres  Cleanup remedies are in place and operational at the majority of these sites  Responsibility for the long-term stewardship of them has been transferred to the Office of Legacy Management and other offices within DOE for the operation and maintenance of cleanup remedies and monitoring  Some of the smaller sites for which DOE initially was responsible were transferred to the Army Corps of Engineers in 1997 under the Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program (FUSRAP)  Once USACE completes the cleanup of a FUSRAP site, it is transferred back to DOE for long-term stewardship under the Office of Legacy Management, which is separate from EM and has its own funding account  Three appropriations accounts fund the Office of Environmental Management  The Defense Environmental Cleanup account is the largest in terms of funding, and it finances the cleanup of former nuclear weapons production sites  The Non-Defense Environmental Cleanup account funds the cleanup of federal nuclear energy research sites  Title XI of the Energy Policy Act of 1992 ( P L  102-486 ) established the Uranium Enrichment Decontamination and Decommissioning Fund to pay for the cleanup of three federal facilities that enriched uranium for national defense and civilian purposes  Those facilities are located near Paducah, KY; Piketon, OH (Portsmouth plant); and Oak Ridge, TN  Title X of P L  102-486 authorized the reimbursement of uranium and thorium producers for their costs of cleaning up contamination attributable to uranium and thorium sold to the federal government  The adequacy of funding for the Office of Environmental Management to attain cleanup milestones across the entire site inventory has been a recurring issue  Cleanup milestones are enforceable measures incorporated into compliance agreements negotiated among DOE, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the states  These milestones establish time frames for the completion of specific actions to satisfy applicable requirements at individual sites  DOE's four Power Marketing Administrations were established to sell the power generated by the dams operated by the Bureau of Reclamation and the Army Corps of Engineers  Preference in the sale of power is given to publicly owned and cooperatively owned utilities  The PMAs operate in 34 states; their assets consist primarily of transmission infrastructure in the form of more than 33,000 miles of high voltage transmission lines and 587 substations  PMA customers are responsible for repaying all power program expenses, plus the interest on capital projects  Since FY2011, power revenues associated with the PMAs have been classified as discretionary offsetting receipts (i e , receipts that are available for spending by the PMAs), thus the agencies are sometimes noted as having a "net-zero" spending authority  Only the capital expenses of WAPA and SWPA require appropriations from Congress  For more information, see CRS Report R45548, The Power Marketing Administrations: Background and Current Issues , by Richard J  Campbell  Independent agencies that receive funding in Title IV of the Energy and Water Development bill include the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), the Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC), and the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board  NRC is by far the largest of the independent agencies, with a total budget of more than $900 million  However, as noted in the description of NRC below, about 90% of NRC's budget is offset by fees, so that the agency's net appropriation is less than half of the total funding in Title IV  The recent appropriations history for all the Title IV agencies is shown in Table 7   Established in 1965, the Appalachian Regional Commission (ARC) is a regional economic development agency  It awards grants and contracts to state and local governments and nonprofit organizations to foster economic opportunities, improve workforce skills, build critical infrastructure, strengthen natural and cultural assets, and improve leadership skills and capacity in the region  ARC's authorizing statute defines the Appalachian Region as including all of West Virginia and parts of Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky, Maryland, Mississippi, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia  More than 25 million people currently live in the region as defined  ARC provides funding to several hundred projects each year, with particular focus on the region's most economically distressed counties  Major areas of infrastructure support broadband communication systems, transportation, and water and wastewater systems  ARC has supported development of the Appalachian Development Highway System (ADHS), a planned 3,000-mile system of highways that connect with the U S  Interstate Highway System  According to ARC, 90 5% of ADHS is currently "complete, open to traffic, or under construction " NRC is an independent agency that establishes and enforces safety and security standards for nuclear power plants and users of nuclear materials  Major appropriations categories for NRC are shown in Table 8   Nuclear Reactor Safety is NRC's largest program and is responsible for licensing and regulating the U S  fleet of 98 power reactors, plus two under construction  NRC is also responsible for licensing and regulating nuclear waste facilities, such as the proposed underground nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain, NV  NRC is required by law to offset about 90% of its total budget, excluding specified items, through fees charged to nuclear reactor owners and other holders of NRC licenses  As a result, NRC's net appropriation can be as low as 10% of its total funding level, depending on the activities that Congress excludes from fee recovery  For example, excluded items in NRC's FY2019 enacted appropriation are prior-year balances, development of advanced reactor regulations, and international activities  The following hearings have been held by the Energy and Water Development subcommittees of the House and Senate Appropriations Committees on the FY2020 budget request  Testimony and opening statements are posted on most of the web pages cited for each hearing, along with webcasts in many cases  Department of Energy , March 26, 2019, https://appropriations house gov/legislation/hearings/budget-department-of-energy   Corps of Engineers (Civil Works) and the Bureau of Reclamation , March 27, 2019, https://appropriations house gov/legislation/hearings/budget-us-army-corps-of-engineers-and-bureau-of-reclamation   National Nuclear Security Administration , April 2, 2019, https://appropriations house gov/legislation/hearings/budget-department-of-energy-national-nuclear-security-administration  DOE Science, Energy, and Environmental Management Programs , April 3, 2019, https://appropriations house gov/legislation/hearings/budget-science-energy-and-environmental-management-programs  Department of Energy , March 27, 2019, https://www appropriations senate gov/hearings/review-of-the-fy2020-budget-request-for-the-us-department-of-energy   National Nuclear Security Administration , April 3, 2019, https://www appropriations senate gov/hearings/review-of-the-fy2020-budget-request-for-the-national-nuclear-security-administration   U S  Army Corps of Engineers and the Bureau of Reclamation , April 10, 2019, https://www appropriations senate gov/hearings/review-of-the-fy2020-budget-requests-for-army-corps-of-engineers-and-bureau-of-reclamation  

ground_truth: The Energy and Water Development appropriations bill provides funding for civil works projects of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE); the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation) and Central Utah Project (CUP); the Department of Energy (DOE); the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC); and several other independent agencies. DOE typically accounts for about 80% of the bill's funding. President Trump submitted his FY2020 detailed budget proposal to Congress on March 18, 2019 (after submitting a general budget overview on March 11). The budget requests for agencies included in the Energy and Water Development appropriations bill total $38.02 billion—$6.64 billion (15%) below the FY2019 appropriation. The largest exception to the overall decrease proposed for energy and water programs is a $1.309 billion increase (12%) for DOE nuclear weapons activities. For FY2019, the conference agreement on H.R. 5895 (H.Rept. 115-929) provided total Energy and Water Development appropriations of $44.66 billion—3% above the FY2018 level, excluding supplemental funding, and 23% above the FY2019 request. It was signed by the President on September 21, 2018 (P.L. 115-244). Emergency supplemental appropriations totaling $17.419 billion were provided to USACE and DOE for hurricane response by the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2018 (P.L. 115-123), signed February 9, 2018. Major Energy and Water Development funding issues for FY2020 are listed below. They were selected based on the total funding involved, the percentage of proposed increases or decreases, and potential impact on broader public policy considerations. Water Agency Funding Reductions. The Trump Administration requested reductions of 31% for USACE and 29% for Reclamation for FY2020 from the FY2019 enacted levels. The largest reductions would be from USACE Operation and Maintenance (-48%) and Reclamation's Water and Related Resources account (-31%). Similar reductions proposed by the Administration for FY2019 were not enacted. Power Marketing Administration (PMA) Reforms. DOE's FY2020 budget request includes mandatory proposals to sell PMA electricity transmission lines and other assets, repeal certain PMA borrowing authority, and eliminate cost-based limits on the electricity rates charged by the PMAs. The proposals would need to be enacted in authorizing legislation. Termination of Energy Efficiency Grants. DOE's Weatherization Assistance Program and State Energy Program would be terminated under the FY2020 budget request. The Administration had proposed to eliminate the grants in FY2018 and FY2019, but Congress continued funding. Reductions in Energy Research and Development. Under the FY2020 budget request, DOE research and development appropriations would be reduced for energy efficiency and renewable energy (EERE) by 83%, nuclear energy by 38%, and fossil energy by 24%. Similar reductions proposed by the Administration for FY2019 were not enacted. Nuclear Waste Repository. The Administration's budget request would provide new funding for the first time since FY2010 for a proposed nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain, NV. DOE would receive $116 million to seek an NRC license for the repository and develop interim waste storage capacity. NRC would receive $38.5 million to consider DOE's repository license application. Similar Administration funding requests for FY2018 and FY2019 were not enacted. Elimination of Advanced Research Projects Agency—Energy (ARPA-E). The Trump Administration proposes no new appropriations for ARPA-E in FY2020 and to cancel $287 million in unobligated balances from previous appropriations. Similar proposals to terminate ARPA-E in FY2018 and FY2019 were not enacted. Loan Programs Termination. The FY2020 budget request would terminate DOE's Title 17 Innovative Technology Loan Guarantee Program, the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program, and the Tribal Energy Loan Guarantee Program. Administration proposals to eliminate the programs were not included in the enacted appropriations measures for FY2018 and FY2019. Weapons Activities. The FY2020 budget request for DOE Weapons Activities is 12% greater than it was in FY2019 ($12.4 billion vs. $11.1 billion), in contrast to a proposed 10% reduction in DOE's total funding. Notable proposed increases would be used for warhead life extension programs and preparations for increase production of plutonium pits (warhead cores).