You are given two reports by the government agency.  

Report 1:
U.S. foreign aid is the largest component of the international affairs budget, for decades viewed by many as an essential instrument of U.S. foreign policy. Each year, the foreign aid budget is the subject of congressional debate over the size, composition, and purpose of the program. The focus of U.S. foreign aid policy has been transformed since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Global development, a major objective of foreign aid, has been cited as a third pillar of U.S. national security, along with defense and diplomacy, in the national security strategies of the George W. Bush and Barack Obama Administrations. Although the Trump Administration's National Security Strategy does not explicitly address the status of development vis-à-vis diplomacy and defense, it does note the historic importance of aid in achieving foreign policy goals and supporting U.S. national interests. This report addresses a number of the more frequently asked questions regarding the U.S. foreign aid program; its objectives, costs, and organization; the role of Congress; and how it compares to those of other aid donors. It attempts not only to present a current snapshot of American foreign assistance, but also to illustrate the extent to which this instrument of U.S. foreign policy has evolved over time. Data presented in the report are the most current, consistent, and reliable figures available, generally updated through FY2017. Dollar amounts come from a variety of sources, including the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Foreign Aid Explorer database (Explorer) and annual State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs (SFOPS) appropriations acts. As new data are obtained or additional issues and questions arise, the report will be revised. Foreign aid abbreviations used in this report are listed in Appendix B . In its broadest sense, U.S. foreign aid is defined under the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 (FAA), the primary legislative basis of foreign aid programs, as any tangible or intangible item provided by the United States Government [including "by means of gift, loan, sale, credit, or guaranty"] to a foreign country or international organization under this or any other Act, including but not limited to any training, service, or technical advice, any item of real, personal, or mixed property, any agricultural commodity, United States dollars, and any currencies of any foreign country which are owned by the United States Government.... (§634(b)) For many decades, nearly all assistance annually requested by the executive branch and debated and authorized by Congress was ultimately encompassed in the foreign operations appropriations and the international food aid title of the agriculture appropriations. In the U.S. federal budget, these traditional foreign aid accounts have been subsumed under the 150 (international affairs) budget function. By the 1990s, however, it became increasingly apparent that the scope of U.S. foreign aid was not fully accounted for by the total of the foreign operations and international food aid appropriations. Many U.S. departments and agencies had adopted their own assistance programs, funded out of their own budgets and commonly in the form of professional exchanges with counterpart agencies abroad—the Environmental Protection Agency, for example, providing water quality expertise to other governments. These aid efforts, conducted outside the purview of the traditional foreign aid authorizing and appropriations committees, grew more substantial and varied in the mid-1990s. The Department of Defense (DOD) Nunn-Lugar effort provided billions in aid to secure and eliminate nuclear and other weapons, as did Department of Energy activities to control and protect nuclear materials—both aimed largely at the former Soviet Union. Growing participation by DOD in health and humanitarian efforts and expansion of health programs in developing countries by the National Institutes of Health and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, especially in response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic, followed. During the past 15 years, DOD-funded and implemented aid programs in Iraq and Afghanistan to train and equip foreign forces and win hearts and minds through development efforts were often considerably larger than the traditional military and development assistance programs provided under the foreign operations appropriations. The recent decline in DOD activities in these countries has sharply decreased nontraditional aid funding. In FY2011, nontraditional sources of assistance, at $17.3 billion, represented 35% of total aid obligations. By FY2017, nontraditional aid, at $9.7 billion, represented 19% of total aid, still a significant proportion. While the executive branch has continued to request and Congress to debate most foreign aid within the parameters of the foreign operations legislation, both entities have sought to ascertain a fuller picture of assistance programs through improved data collection and reporting. Significant discrepancies remain between data available for traditional versus nontraditional types of aid and, therefore, the level of analysis applied to each. (See text box , "A Note on Numbers and Sources," below.) Nevertheless, to the extent possible, this report tries to capture the broadest definition of aid throughout. Foreign assistance is predicated on several rationales and supports a great many objectives. The importance and emphasis of various rationales and objectives have changed over time. Throughout the past 70 years, there have been three key rationales for foreign assistance National Security has been the predominant theme of U.S. assistance programs. From rebuilding Europe after World War II under the Marshall Plan (1948-1951) and through the Cold War, U.S. aid programs were viewed by policymakers as a way to prevent the incursion of communist influence and secure U.S. base rights or other support in the anti-Soviet struggle. After the Cold War ended, the focus of foreign aid shifted from global anti-communism to disparate regional issues, such as Middle East peace initiatives, the transition to democracy of eastern Europe and republics of the former Soviet Union, and international illicit drug production and trafficking in the Andes. Without an overarching security rationale, foreign aid budgets decreased in the 1990s. However, since the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the United States, policymakers frequently have cast foreign assistance as a tool in U.S. counterterrorism strategy, increasing aid to partner states in counterterrorism efforts and funding the substantial reconstruction programs in Afghanistan and Iraq. As noted, global development has been featured as a key element in U.S. national security strategy in both Bush and Obama Administration policy statements. Commercial Interests. Foreign assistance has long been defended as a way to either promote U.S. exports by creating new customers for U.S. products or by improving the global economic environment in which U.S. companies compete. Humanitarian Concerns. Humanitarian concerns drive both short-term assistance in response to crisis and disaster as well as long-term development assistance aimed at reducing poverty, hunger, and other forms of human suffering brought on by more systemic problems. Providing assistance for humanitarian reasons has generally been the aid rationale most broadly supported by the American public and policymakers alike. The objectives of aid generally fit within these rationales. Aid objectives include promoting economic growth and reducing poverty, improving governance, addressing population growth, expanding access to basic education and health care, protecting the environment, promoting stability in conflictive regions, protecting human rights, promoting trade, curbing weapons proliferation, strengthening allies, and addressing drug production and trafficking. The expectation has been that, by meeting these and other aid objectives, the United States will achieve its national security goals as well as ensure a positive global economic environment for American products, and demonstrate benevolent and respectable global leadership. Different types of foreign aid typically support different objectives. But there is also considerable overlap among categories of aid. Multilateral aid serves many of the same objectives as bilateral development assistance, although through different channels. Military assistance, economic security aid—including rule of law and police training—and development assistance programs may support the same U.S. political objectives in the Middle East, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. Military assistance and alternative development programs are integrated elements of American counternarcotics efforts in Latin America and elsewhere. Depending on how they are designed, individual assistance projects can also serve multiple purposes. A health project ostensibly directed at alleviating the effects of HIV/AIDS by feeding orphan children may also stimulate grassroots democracy and civil society through support of indigenous NGOs while additionally meeting U.S. humanitarian objectives. Microcredit programs that support small business development may help develop local economies while at the same time enabling client entrepreneurs to provide food and education to their children. Water and sanitation improvements both mitigate health threats and stimulate economic growth by saving time previously devoted to water collection, raising school attendance for girls, and facilitating tourism, among other effects. In 2006, in an effort to rationalize the assistance program more clearly, the State Department developed a framework that organizes U.S. foreign aid around five strategic objectives, each of which includes a number of program elements, also known as sectors. The five objectives are Peace and Security; Investing in People; Governing Justly and Democratically; Economic Growth; and Humanitarian Assistance. Generally, these objectives and their sectors do not correspond to any one particular budget account in appropriations bills. Annually, the Department of State and USAID develop their foreign operations budget request within this framework, allowing for an objective and program-oriented viewpoint for those who seek it. An effort by the State Department to obtain reporting from all departments and agencies of the U.S. government on aid levels categorized by objective and sector is ongoing. USAID's Explorer website (explorer.usaid.gov) currently provides a more complete picture from all parts of the U.S. government (see Table 1 ). The 2006 framework introduced by the Department of State organizes assistance by foreign policy strategic objective and sector. But there are many other ways to categorize foreign aid, one of which is to sort out and classify foreign aid accounts in the U.S. budget according to the types of activities they are expected to support, using broad categories such as military, bilateral development, multilateral development, humanitarian assistance, political/strategic, and nonmilitary security activities (see Figure 1 ). This methodology reflects the organization of aid accounts within the SFOPS appropriations but can easily be applied to the international food aid title of the Agriculture appropriations as well as to the DOD and other government agency assistance programs with funding outside traditional foreign aid budget accounts. In FY2017, these many aid accounts provided $49.9 billion in obligated assistance. For FY2017, U.S. government departments and agencies obligated about $16.2 billion in bilateral development assistance, or 33% of total foreign aid, primarily through the Development Assistance (DA) and Global Health (Global Health-USAID and Global Health-State) accounts and the administrative accounts that allow USAID to operate (Operating Expenses, Capital Investment Fund, and Office of the Inspector General). Other bilateral development assistance accounts support the development efforts of distinct institutions, such as the Peace Corps, Inter-American Foundation (IAF), U.S.-African Development Foundation, Trade and Development Agency, Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), and National Endowment for Democracy (NED). Development assistance programs aim to foster sustainable broad-based economic progress and social stability in developing countries. This aid is managed largely by USAID and is used for long-term projects in a wide range of areas. Many programs share the objective in the State Department framework of "promoting economic growth and prosperity." Agriculture programs focus on reducing poverty and hunger, trade-promotion opportunities for farmers, and sound environmental practices for sustainable agriculture. Private sector development programs include support for business associations and microfinance services. Programs for managing natural resources and protecting the global environment focus on conserving biological diversity; improving the management of land, water, and forests; encouraging clean and efficient energy production and use; and reducing the threat of global climate change. Programs supporting the objective of "governing justly and democratically" include support for promoting rule of law and human rights, good governance, political competition, and civil society. Programs with the objective of "investing in people" include support for basic, secondary, and higher education; improving government ability to provide social services; water and sanitation; and health care. By far the largest portion of bilateral development assistance is devoted to global health. These programs include treatment of HIV/AIDS and other infectious diseases, maternal and child health, family planning and reproductive health programs, and strengthening the government health systems that provide care. Most funding for HIV/AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis is directed through the State Department's Office of the Global AIDS Coordinator to other agencies, including USAID and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The latter agency and the National Institutes for Health also conduct programs funded by Labor-Health and Human Services (HHS) appropriations. In addition to providing emergency food aid in crisis situations, a portion (about 25% in FY2017) of the Food for Peace (FFP) Title II international food aid program (also referred to as P.L. 480, named after the 1954 law that authorized it)—funded under the Agriculture appropriations—provides nonemergency food commodities to private voluntary organizations (PVOs) or multilateral organizations, such as the World Food Program, for development-oriented purposes. FFP funds are also used to support the "farmer-to-farmer" program, which sends hundreds of U.S. volunteers as technical advisors to train farm and food-related groups throughout the world. In addition, the McGovern-Dole International Food for Education and Child Nutrition Program, a program begun in 2002, provides commodities, technical assistance, and financing for school feeding and child nutrition programs. A share of U.S. foreign assistance—4% in FY2017 ($2.1 billion)—is combined with contributions from other donor nations to finance multilateral development projects. Multilateral aid is funded largely through the International Organizations and Programs (IO&P) account and individual accounts for each of the Multilateral Development Banks (MDBs) and global environmental funds. For FY2017, the U.S. government obligated $2.1 billion for development activities managed by international organizations and financial institutions, including contributions to the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF); the United Nations Development Program (UNDP); and MDBs, such as the World Bank. The U.S. share of donor contributions to each of the MDB concessional (subsidized) and nonconcessional (market rate) loan windows varies widely. For the largest MDB, the World Bank, the United States has contributed about 20.5% to the nonconcessional lending window (the International Development Associations [IDA]) and about 17.3% to the nonconcessional lending window (the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development [IBRD]). In determining the U.S. share of donor contributions to the various multilateral institutions, the U.S. faces the challenge of finding the right balance between the benefits of burden sharing and the constraints of sharing control when determining multilateral priorities. For FY2017, obligations for humanitarian assistance programs amounted to $8.9 billion, 18% of total assistance. Unlike development assistance programs, which are often viewed as long-term efforts that may have the effect of preventing future crises from emerging, humanitarian assistance programs are devoted largely to the immediate alleviation of human suffering in emergencies, both natural and man-made, as well as problems resulting from conflict associated with failed or failing states. The largest portion of humanitarian assistance is managed through the International Disaster Assistance (IDA) account by USAID, which provides relief and rehabilitation efforts to victims of man-made and natural disasters, such as the economic and social dislocations caused by the 2014/2015 Ebola epidemic, and the ongoing crises in Syria, South Sudan, Yemen, and Venezuela. A portion of IDA is used for food assistance through the Emergency Food Security Program. Additional humanitarian assistance goes to programs administered by the State Department and funded under the Migration and Refugee Assistance (MRA) and the Emergency Refugee and Migration Assistance (ERMA) accounts, aimed at addressing the needs of refugees and internally displaced persons. These accounts support a number of refugee relief organizations, including the U.N. High Commission for Refugees and the International Committee of the Red Cross. The Department of Defense provides disaster relief under the Overseas Humanitarian, Disaster, and Civic Assistance (OHDACA) account of the DOD appropriations. (For further information on humanitarian programs, see CRS In Focus IF10568, Overview of the Global Humanitarian and Displacement Crisis , by Rhoda Margesson.) The bulk of FFP Title II Agriculture appropriations—$1.3 billion in obligations, about 75% of total Food for Peace Act in FY2017—are used by USAID, mostly to purchase U.S. agricultural commodities, for emergency needs, supplementing both refugee and disaster programs. (For more information on food aid programs, see CRS Report R45422, U.S. International Food Assistance: An Overview , by Alyssa R. Casey.) A few accounts promote special U.S. political and strategic interests. Programs funded through the Economic Support Fund (ESF) account generally aim to promote political and economic stability, often through activities indistinguishable from those provided under regular development programs. However, ESF is also used for direct budget support to foreign governments and to support sovereign loan guarantees. For FY2017, USAID and the State Department obligated $4.8 billion, nearly 10% of total assistance, through this account. For many years, following the 1979 Camp David accords, most ESF funds went to support the Middle East Peace Process—in FY1997, for example, 87% of ESF went to Israel, Egypt, the West Bank and Jordan. Those proportions have declined significantly in recent decades. In FY2007, 22% of ESF funding went to these countries and, in FY2017, 25%. Since the September 2001 terrorist attacks, ESF has largely supported countries of importance in the U.S. global counterterrorism strategy. In FY2007, for example, activities is Afghanistan and Pakistan received 17% of ESF funding (25% in FY2017). Over the years, other accounts have been established to meet specific political or security interests and then were dissolved once the need was met. One example is the Assistance to Eastern Europe and Central Asia (AEECA) account, established in FY2009 to combine two aid programs that met particular strategic political interests arising from the demise of the Soviet empire. The SEED (Support for East European Democracy Act of 1989) and the FREEDOM Support Act (Freedom for Russia and Emerging Eurasian Democracies and Open Markets Support Act of 1992) programs were designed to help Central Europe and the newly independent states of the former Soviet Union (FSA) achieve democratic systems and free market economies. With funding decreasing as countries in the region graduated from U.S. assistance, Congress discontinued use of the AEECA account in the FY2013 appropriations. Increasing requests and appropriations for countries in the former Soviet Union threatened by Russia, however, led to its re-emergence in the FY2017 and succeeding SFOPS appropriations. In the recent past, several DOD-funded nontraditional aid programs directed at Afghanistan also supported development efforts. The Afghanistan Infrastructure Fund and the Business Task Force wound down as the U.S. military presence in that country declined; the Commander's Emergency Response Program (CERP) still exists. The latter two programs had earlier iterations as well in Iraq. Several U.S. government agencies support programs to address global concerns that are considered threats to U.S. security and well-being, such as terrorism, illicit narcotics, crime, and weapons proliferation. In the past two decades, policymakers have given greater weight to these programs. In FY2017, they amounted to $2.9 billion, 6% of total assistance Since the mid-1990s, three U.S. agencies—State, DOD, and Energy—have provided funding, technical assistance, and equipment to counter the proliferation of chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear weapons. Originally aimed at the former Soviet Union under the rubric cooperative threat reduction (CTR), these programs seek to ensure that these weapons are secured and their spread to rogue nations or terrorist groups prevented. In addition to nonproliferation efforts, the Nonproliferation, Anti-Terrorism, Demining and Related Programs (NADR) account, managed by the State Department, encompasses civilian anti-terrorism efforts such as detecting and dismantling terrorist financial networks, establishing watch-list systems at border controls, and building developing country anti-terrorism capacities. NADR also funds humanitarian demining programs. The State Department is the main implementer of counternarcotics programs. The State-managed International Narcotics Control and Law Enforcement (INCLE) account supports counternarcotics activities, most notably in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Peru, and Colombia. It also helps develop the judicial systems—assisting judges, lawyers, and legal institutions—of many developing countries, especially in Afghanistan. DOD and USAID also support counternarcotics activities, the former largely by providing training and equipment, the latter by offering alternative crop and employment programs. The United States provides military assistance to U.S. friends and allies to help them acquire U.S. military equipment and training. At $14.5 billion, military assistance accounted for about 29% of total U.S. foreign aid in FY2017. The Department of State administers three programs, with corresponding appropriations accounts that are then implemented by DOD. Foreign Military Financing (FMF) is a grant program that enables governments to receive equipment and associated training from the U.S. government or to access equipment directly through U.S. commercial channels. Most FMF grants support the security needs of Israel, Egypt, Jordan, Pakistan, and Iraq. The International Military Education and Training program (IMET) offers military training on a grant basis to foreign military officers and personnel. Peacekeeping funds (PKO) are used to support voluntary non-U.N. peacekeeping operations as well as training for an African crisis response force. Since 2002, DOD appropriations have supported FMF-like programs, training and equipping security forces in Afghanistan and Iraq. These programs and the accounts that fund them are called the Afghanistan Security Forces Fund (ASFF) and, through FY2012, the Iraq Security Forces Fund (ISFF). Beginning in FY2015, similar support was provided Iraq under the Iraq Train and Equip Fund. The DOD-funded programs in Afghanistan and Iraq accounted for more than half of total military assistance in FY2017. How and in what form assistance reaches an aid recipient can vary widely, depending on the type of aid program, the objective of the assistance, and the agency responsible for providing the aid. Federal agencies may implement foreign assistance programs using funds appropriated directly to them or funds transferred to them from another agency. For example, significant funding appropriated through State Department and Department of Agriculture accounts is used for programs implemented by USAID (see Figure 2 ). The funding data in this section reflect the agency that implemented the aid, not necessarily the agency to which funds were originally appropriated. For 50 years, USAID has implemented the bulk of the U.S. bilateral economic development and humanitarian assistance. It directly implements the Development Assistance, International Disaster Assistance, and Transition Initiatives accounts, as well as a USAID-designated portion of the Global Health account. Jointly with the State Department, USAID co-manages ESF, AEECA, and Democracy Fund programs, which frequently support development activities as a means of promoting U.S. political and strategic goals. Based on historical averages, according to USAID, the agency implements more than 90% of ESF, 70% of AEECA, 40% of the Democracy Fund, and about 60% of the Global HIV/AIDS funding appropriated to the State Department. USAID also implements all Food for Peace Act Title II food assistance funded through agriculture appropriations. USAID obligated an estimated $20.55 billion to implement foreign assistance programs and activities in FY2017. The agency's staff in 2018 totaled 9,747 , of which about 67% were working overseas, overseeing the implementation of hundreds of projects undertaken by thousands of private sector contractors, consultants, and nongovernmental organizations. DOD implements all SFOPS-funded military assistance programs—FMF, IMET, PKO, and PCCF—in conjunction with the policy guidance of the Department of State. The Defense Security Cooperation Agency is the primary DOD body responsible for these programs. DOD also carries out an array of state-building activities, funded through defense appropriations legislation, which are usually in the context of training exercises and military operations. These sorts of activities, once the exclusive jurisdiction of civilian aid agencies, include development assistance to Iraq and Afghanistan through the Commander's Emergency Response Program (CERP), the Iraq Relief and Reconstruction Fund, and the Afghanistan Infrastructure Fund, and elsewhere through the Defense Health Program, counterdrug activities, and humanitarian and disaster relief. Training and equipping of Iraqi and Afghan police and military, though similar in nature to some traditional security assistance programs, has been funded and implemented primarily through DOD appropriations, though implementing the Iraq police training program was a State Department responsibility from 2012 until it was phased out in 2013. In FY2017, the Department of Defense implemented an estimated $14.50 billion in foreign assistance programs. The Department of State manages and co-manages a wide range of assistance programs. It is the lead U.S. civilian agency on security and refugee related assistance, and has sole responsibility for implementing the International Narcotics and Law Enforcement (INCLE) and Nonproliferation, Antiterror, and Demining (NADR) accounts, the two Migration and Refugee accounts (MRA and ERMA), and the International Organizations and Programs (IO&P) account. State is also home to the Office of the Global AIDS Coordinator (OGAC), which manages the State Department's portion of Global Health funding in support of HIV/AIDS programs, though many of these funds are transferred to and implemented by USAID, the National Institutes of Health, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In conjunction with USAID, the State Department manages the Economic Support Fund, AEECA assistance to the former communist states, and Democracy Fund accounts. For these accounts, the State Department largely sets the overall policy and direction of funds, while USAID implements the preponderance of programs. In addition, the State Department, through its Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, has policy authority over the Foreign Military Financing (FMF), International Military Education and Training (IMET), and Peacekeeping Operations (PKO) accounts, and, while it was active, the Pakistan Counterinsurgency Capability Fund (PCCF). These programs are implemented by the Department of Defense. Police training programs have traditionally been the responsibility of the International Narcotics and Law Enforcement (INL) Office in the State Department, though programs in Iraq and Afghanistan were implemented and paid for by the Department of Defense for several years. State is also the organizational home to the Office of U.S. Foreign Assistance Resources (formerly the Office of the Director of Foreign Assistance), known as "F," which was created in 2006 to coordinate U.S. foreign assistance programs. The office establishes standard program structures and definitions, as well as performance indicators, and collects and reports data on State Department and USAID aid programs. The State Department implemented about $7.66 billion in foreign assistance funding in FY2017, though it has policy authority over a much broader range of assistance funds. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services implements a range of global health programs through its various component institutions. As an implementing partner in the President's Emergency Plan for Aids Relief (PEPFAR), a large portion of HHS foreign assistance activity is related to HIV prevention and treatment, including technical support and preventing mother to child transmission of HIV/AIDS. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention participates in a broad range of global disease control activity, including rapid outbreak response, global research and surveillance, information technology assistance, and field epidemiology and laboratory training. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) also conduct international health research that is reported as assistance. In FY2017, HHS institutions implemented $2.66 billion in foreign assistance activities. The Department of the Treasury's Under Secretary for International Affairs administers U.S. contributions to and participation in the World Bank and other multilateral development institutions. In this case, the agency manages the distribution of funds to the institutions, but does not implement programs. Presidentially appointed U.S. executive directors at each of the banks represent the United States' point of view. Treasury also deals with foreign debt reduction issues and programs, including U.S. participation in the Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative, and manages a technical assistance program offering temporary financial advisors to countries implementing major economic reforms and combating terrorist finance activity. For FY2017, the Department of the Treasury managed foreign assistance valued at about $1.85 billion. Created in February 2004, the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) seeks to concentrate significantly higher amounts of U.S. resources in a few low- and lower-middle-income countries that have demonstrated a strong commitment to political, economic, and social reforms relative to other developing countries. A significant feature of the MCC effort is that recipient countries formulate, propose, and implement mutually agreed multi-year U.S.-funded project plans known as compacts. Compacts in the 27 recipient countries selected to date have emphasized construction of infrastructure. The MCC is a U.S. government corporation, headed by a chief executive officer who reports to a board of directors chaired by the Secretary of State. The Corporation maintains a relatively small staff of about 300. The MCC obligated about $1.01 billion in FY2017. A number of other government agencies play a role in implementing foreign aid programs. The Peace Corps, an autonomous agency with FY2017 obligations of $445 million, supports about 7,300 volunteers in 65 countries. Peace Corps volunteers work in a wide range of educational, health, and community development projects. The Trade and Development Agency (TDA), which obligated $58 million in FY2017, finances trade missions and feasibility studies for private sector projects likely to generate U.S. exports. The Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) provides political risk insurance to U.S. companies investing in developing countries and finances projects through loans and guarantees. Its insurance activities have been self-sustaining, but credit reform rules require a relatively small appropriation to back up U.S. guarantees and for administrative expenses. The Better Utilization of Investments Leading to Development Act of 2018 (BUILD Act), signed into law in October 2018 ( P.L. 115-254 ), authorized consolidation of OPIC and USAID's Development Credit Authority into a new U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (IDFC), which is expected to become operational in fall 2019. For FY2017, as for most prior years, OPIC receipts exceeded appropriations, resulting in a net gain to the Treasury. The Inter-American Foundation and the African Development Foundation, obligating $25.8 million and $20.2 million, respectively, in FY2017, finance small-scale enterprise and grassroots self-help activities aimed at assisting poor people. Most U.S. assistance is now provided as a grant (gift) rather than a loan, so as not to increase the heavy debt burden carried by many developing countries. However, the forms a grant may take are diverse. The most common type of U.S. development aid is project-based assistance (77% in FY2017), in which aid is channeled through an implementing partner to complete a project. Aid is also provided in the form of core contribution to international organizations such as the United Nations, technical assistance, and direct budget support (cash transfer) to governments. A portion of aid money is also spent on administrative costs ( Figure 3 ). Within these categories, aid may take many forms, as described below. Although it is the exception rather than the rule, some countries receive aid in the form of a cash grant to the government. Dollars provided in this way support a government's balance-of-payments situation, enabling it to purchase more U.S. goods, service its debt, or devote more domestic revenues to developmental or other purposes. Cash transfers have been made as a reward to countries that have supported the United States' counterterrorism operations (Turkey and Jordan in FY2004), to provide political and strategic support (both Egypt and Israel annually for decades after the 1979 Camp David Peace Accord), and in exchange for undertaking difficult political and economic reforms. Assistance may be provided in the form of food commodities, weapons systems, or equipment such as generators or computers. Food aid may be provided directly to meet humanitarian needs or to encourage attendance at a maternal/child health care program. Weapons supplied under the military assistance program may include training in their use. Equipment and commodities provided under development assistance are usually integrated with other forms of aid to meet objectives in a particular social or economic sector. For instance, textbooks have been provided in both Afghanistan and Iraq as part of a broader effort to reform the educational sector and train teachers. Computers may be offered in conjunction with training and expertise to fledgling microcredit institutions. Since PEPFAR was first authorized in 2004, antiretroviral drugs (ARVs) provided to individuals living with HIV/AIDS have been a significant component of commodity-based assistance. Although once a significant portion of U.S. assistance programs, construction of economic infrastructure—roads, irrigation systems, electric power facilities, etc.—was rarely provided after the 1970s. Because of the substantial expense of these projects, they were to be found only in large assistance programs, such as that for Egypt in the 1980s and 1990s, where the United States constructed major urban water and sanitation systems. The aid programs in Iraq and Afghanistan supported the building of schools, health clinics, roads, power plants, and irrigation systems. In Iraq alone, more than $10 billion went to economic infrastructure. Economic infrastructure is now also supported by U.S. assistance in a wider range of developing countries through the Millennium Challenge Corporation. In this case, recipient countries design their own assistance programs, most of which, to date, include an infrastructure component. Transfer of knowledge and skills is a significant part of most assistance programs. The International Military Education and Training Program (IMET) provides training to officers of the military forces of allied and friendly nations. Tens of thousands of citizens of aid recipient countries receive short-term technical training or longer-term degree training annually under USAID programs. More than one-quarter of Peace Corps volunteers are English, math, and science teachers. Other aid programs provide law enforcement personnel with anti-narcotics or anti-terrorism training. Many assistance programs provide expert advice to government and private sector organizations. The Department of the Treasury, USAID, and U.S.-funded multilateral banks all place specialists in host government ministries to make recommendations on policy reforms in a wide variety of sectors. USAID has often placed experts in private sector business and civic organizations to help strengthen them in their formative years or while indigenous staff are being trained. While most of these experts are U.S. nationals, in Russia, USAID funded the development of locally staffed political and economic think tanks to offer policy options to that government. USAID, the Inter-American Foundation, and the African Development Foundation often provide aid in the form of small grants directly to local organizations to foster economic and social development and to encourage civic engagement in their communities. Grants are sometimes provided to microcredit organizations, such village-level women's savings groups, which in turn provide loans to microentrepreneurs. Small grants may also address specific community needs. Recent IAF grants, for example, have supported organizations that help resettle Salvadoran migrants deported from the United States and youth programs in Central America aimed at gang prevention. Under the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, the President may determine the terms and conditions under which most forms of assistance are provided. In general, the financial condition of a country—its ability to meet repayment obligations—has been an important criterion of the decision to provide a loan or grant. Some programs, such as humanitarian and disaster relief programs, were designed from the beginning to be entirely grant activities. During the past two decades, nearly all foreign aid—military as well as economic—has been provided in grant form. While loans represented 32% of total military and economic assistance between 1962 and 1988, this figure declined substantially beginning in the mid-1980s, until by FY2001, loans represented less than 1% of total aid appropriations. The de-emphasis on loan programs came largely in response to the debt problems of developing countries. Both Congress and the executive branch have generally supported the view that foreign aid should not add to the already existing debt burden carried by these countries. In the FY2019 budget request, the Trump Administration encouraged the use of loans over grants when providing military assistance (Foreign Military Financing), but Congress did not include language in support of that proposal in the enacted FY2019 appropriation ( P.L. 116-6 ). Although a small proportion of total current aid, there are significant USAID-managed programs that guarantee loans, meaning the U.S. government agrees to pay a portion of the amount owed in the case of a default on a loan. A Development Credit Authority (DCA) loan guarantee, in which risk is shared with a private sector bank, can be used to increase access to finance in support of any development sector. The DCA is to be transferred from USAID in 2019 to the new IDFC, established by the BUILD Act of 2018 ( P.L. 115-254 ), to enhance U.S. development finance capacity. Under the Israeli Loan Guarantee Program, the United States has guaranteed repayment of loans made by commercial sources to support the costs of immigrants settling in Israel from other countries and may issue guarantees to support economic recovery. USAID has also provided loan guarantees in recent years to improve the terms or amounts of financing from international capital markets for Ukraine and Jordan. In these cases, assistance funds representing a fraction of the guarantee amount are provided to cover possible default. Between 1946 and 2016, the United States loaned $112.7 billion in foreign economic and military aid to foreign governments, and while most foreign aid is now provided through grants, $9.18 billion in loans to foreign governments remained outstanding at the end of FY2016. For nearly three decades, Section 620q of the Foreign Assistance Act (the Brooke amendment) has prohibited new assistance to the government of any country that falls more than one year past due in servicing its debt obligations to the United States, though the President may waive application of this prohibition if he determines it is in the national interest. The United States has also forgiven debts owed by foreign governments and encouraged, with mixed success, other foreign aid donors and international financial institutions to do likewise. In some cases, the decision to forgive foreign aid debts has been based largely on economic grounds as another means to support development efforts by heavily indebted, but reform-minded, countries. The United States has been one of the strongest supporters of the Heavily Indebted Poor Country (HIPC) Initiative and the Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative (MDRI). These initiatives, which began in the late 1990s, include participation of the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, and other international financial institutions in a comprehensive debt workout framework for the world's poorest and most debt-strapped nations. The largest and most hotly debated debt forgiveness actions have been implemented for much broader foreign policy reasons with a more strategic purpose. Poland, during its transition from a communist system and centrally planned economy (1990—$2.46 billion); Egypt, for making peace with Israel and helping maintain the Arab coalition during the Persian Gulf War (1990—$7 billion); and Jordan, after signing a peace accord with Israel (1994—$700 million), are examples. Similarly, the United States forgave about $4.1 billion in outstanding Saddam Hussein-era Iraqi debt in November 2004 and helped negotiate an 80% reduction in Iraq's debt to creditor nations later that month. Most development and humanitarian assistance activities are not directly implemented by U.S. government personnel but by private sector entities, such as individual personal service contractors, consulting firms, universities, private voluntary organizations (PVOs), or public international organizations (PIOs). Generally speaking, U.S. government foreign service and civil servants determine the direction and priorities of the aid program, allocate funds while keeping within legislative requirements, ensure that appropriate projects are in place to meet aid objectives, select implementers, and monitor the implementation of those projects for effectiveness and financial accountability. Both USAID and the State Department have promoted the use of public-private partnerships, in which private entities such as corporations and foundations are contributing partners, not paid implementers, in situations where business interests and development objectives coincide. In FY2017, the United States provided some form of bilateral foreign assistance to more than 150 countries. Aid is concentrated heavily in certain countries, reflecting the priorities and interests of United States foreign policy at the time. Table 2 identifies the top 15 recipients of U.S. foreign assistance for FY1997, FY2007 and FY2017. As shown in the table above, there are both similarities and sharp differences among country aid recipients for the three periods. The most consistent thread connecting the top aid recipients over the past two decades has been continuing U.S. strategic interests in the Middle East, with large programs maintained for Israel and Egypt and, for Iraq, following the 2003 invasion. Two key countries in the U.S. counterterrorism strategy, Afghanistan and Pakistan, made their first appearances on the list in FY2002 and continued to be among the top recipients in FY2017. In FY1997, one sub-Saharan African country appeared among leading aid recipients; in FY2017, 7 of the 15 are sub-Saharan African. Many are focus countries under the PEPFAR initiative to address the HIV/AIDS epidemic; South Sudan receives support as a newly independent country with multiple humanitarian and development needs. In FY1997, three countries from Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union made the list, as many from the region had for much of the 1990s, representing the effort to transform the former communist nations to democratic societies and market-oriented economies. None of those countries appear in the FY2017 list. In FY1997, four Latin American countries make the list; no countries from the region appear in FY2017. On a regional basis, the Middle East/North Africa (MENA) region has received the largest share of U.S. foreign assistance for many decades. Although economic aid to the region's top two recipients, Israel and Egypt, began to decline in the late 1990s, the dominant share of bilateral U.S. assistance consumed by the MENA region was maintained in FY2005 by the war in Iraq. Despite the continued importance of the region, its share slipped substantially by FY2017 as the effort to train and equip Iraqi forces diminished. Since September 11, 2001, South and Central Asia has emerged as a significant target of U.S. assistance, rising from a roughly 3% share 20 years ago to 16% in FY2007 and 15% in FY2017, largely because of aid to Afghanistan and Pakistan. Similarly, the share represented by African nations has increased from 10% and 19%, respectively, in FY1997 and FY2007, to 25% in FY2017, largely due to the HIV/AIDS initiative that funnels resources mostly to African countries and to a range of other efforts to address the region's development challenges. Meanwhile, the share of aid to Europe/Eurasia, which greatly surpassed that of Africa in FY1997, has declined significantly in the past decade, to about 4% in FY2017, with the graduation of many East European aid recipients and the termination of programs in Russia. The Ukraine was responsible for about one third of aid to that region in FY2017. East Asia/Pacific has remained at a low level during the past two decades, while Latin America's share has risen and fallen based on U.S. interest in Colombia and a few Central American countries as aid has shifted to regions of more pressing strategic interest (see Figure 4 ). There are several methods commonly used for measuring the amount of federal spending on foreign assistance. Amounts can be expressed in terms of budget authority (funds appropriated by Congress), obligations (amounts contractually committed), outlays or disbursements (money actually spent). Assistance levels are also sometimes measured as a percentage of the total federal budget, as a percentage of total discretionary budget authority (excluding mandatory and entitlement programs), or as a percentage of the gross domestic product (GDP) (for an indication of the national wealth allocated to foreign aid). By nearly all of these measures, foreign aid resources fell gradually on average over several decades since the historical high levels of the late 1940s and early 1950s ( Appendix A ). This downward trend was sporadically interrupted, largely due to major foreign policy initiatives such as the Alliance for Progress for Latin America beginning in 1961, the infusion of funds to implement the Camp David Middle East Peace Accords in 1979, and an increase in military assistance to Egypt, Turkey, Greece and others in the mid-1980s. The lowest point in U.S. foreign aid spending since World War II came in 1997, when foreign assistance obligations fell to just above $20 billion (in 2017 dollar terms). ( Figure 5 ) While foreign aid consistently represented just over 1% of U.S. annual gross domestic product in the decade following World War II, it fell gradually to between 0.2% and 0.4% for most years in the past three decades. Foreign assistance spending has comprised, on average, around 3% of discretionary budget authority and just over 1% of total budget authority each year since 1977, though the percentages have sometimes varied considerably from year to year. Foreign aid dropped from 5% of discretionary budget authority in 1979 to 2.4% in 2001, before rising sharply in conjunction with U.S. activities in Afghanistan and Iraq starting in 2003. As a portion of total budget authority, foreign assistance reached 2.5% in 1979, but has hovered below 1.5% since 1987. In 2017, foreign assistance was estimated to account for 4.1% of discretionary budget authority and 1.2% of total budget authority ( Figure 6 ; Appendix A ). As previously discussed, since the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, foreign aid funding has been closely tied to U.S. counterterrorism strategy, particularly in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. Bush and Obama Administration global health initiatives, the creation of the Millennium Challenge Corporation, and growth in counter-narcotics activities have driven funding increases as well. The Budget Control Act of 2011, and the drawdown of U.S. military forces in Iraq, and to some degree Afghanistan, led to a notable dip in aid obligations in FY2013, but aid levels have risen again with efforts to address the crisis in Syria, counter-ISIL activities, and humanitarian aid. The use of the Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO, discussed below) designation has enabled this growth despite the BCA limitations. Figure 7 shows how trends in foreign aid funding in recent decades can be attributed to specific foreign policy events and presidential initiatives. The Obama Administration's FY2012 international affairs budget proposed that the overseas contingency operations (OCO) designation, which had been applied since 2009 to war-related Defense appropriations, including to DOD assistance programs such as ISFF, ASFF and CERP, be extended to include "extraordinary, but temporary, costs of the Department of State and USAID in the front line states of Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan." Congress not only adopted the OCO designation in the FY2012 SFOPS appropriations legislation, but expanded it to include funding for additional accounts and countries. In every fiscal year since, a portion of certain foreign assistance accounts—primarily ESF, FMF, IDA, MRA and INCLE—has been appropriated with the OCO designation. The OCO designation is significant because the Budget Control Act of 2011 (BCA), which set annual caps on discretionary funding from FY2013 through FY2021, specified that funds designated as OCO do not count toward the discretionary spending limits established by the act. OCO designation makes it possible to prevent war-related funding from crowding out core international affairs activities within the budget allocation. The OCO approach is reminiscent of the use of supplemental international affairs appropriations for the first decade after the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Congress appropriated significant emergency supplemental funds for foreign operations and Defense assistance programs every year from FY2002 through FY2010 for activities in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere, which were not counted toward subcommittee budget allocations. Since the OCO designation was first applied to foreign operations in FY2012, supplemental appropriations for foreign aid have declined significantly. In the FY2019 and FY2020 budget requests, the Trump Administration did not request OCO funding within the international affairs budget, but did request OCO funding for the Department of Defense, including for DOD aid accounts. Congress used the OCO designation for both DOD and State/USAID accounts in the FY2019 appropriation, P.L. 116-6 , but a smaller portion of aid was designated as OCO compared to FY2018. It remains to be seen whether this is the beginning of a downward trend in OCO use for foreign aid. Congress historically sought to enhance the domestic benefits of foreign aid by requiring that most U.S. foreign aid be used to procure U.S. goods and services. The conditioning of aid on the procurement of goods and services from the donor-country is sometimes called "tied aid," and while quite common for much of the history of modern foreign assistance, has become increasingly disfavored in the international community. Studies have shown that tying aid increases the costs of goods and services by 15%-30% on average, and up to 40% for food aid, reducing the overall effectiveness of aid flows. The United States joined other donor nations in committing to reduce tied aid in the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness in March 2005, and the portion of tied aid from all donors fell from 70% of total bilateral development assistance in 1985 to an average of 12% in 2016. However, an estimated 32% of U.S. bilateral development assistance was tied in 2016, the highest percentage among major donors, perhaps reflecting the perception of policymakers that maintaining public and political support for foreign aid programs requires ensuring direct economic benefit to the United States. About 67% of U.S. foreign assistance funds in FY2017 were obligated to U.S.-based entities. A considerable amount of U.S. foreign assistance funds remain in the United States, through domestic procurement or the use of U.S. implementers, but the portion differs by program and is hard to identify with any accuracy. For some types of aid, the legislative requirements or program design make it relatively easy to determine how much aid is spent on U.S. goods or services, while for others, this is more difficult to determine. USAID. Most USAID funding (Development Assistance, Global Health, Economic Support Fund) is implemented through contracts, grants, and cooperative agreements with implementing partners. While many implementing partner organizations are based in the United States and employ U.S. citizens, there is little information available about what portion of the funds used for program implementation are used for goods and services provided by American firms. Procurement reform efforts initiated by USAID in 2010 have aimed to increase procurement and implementation by host country entities as a means to enhance country ownership, build local capacity, and improve sustainability of aid programs. Food assistance commodities, until recently, were purchased wholly in the United States, and generally required by law to be shipped by U.S. carriers, suggesting that the vast majority of food aid expenditures are made in the United States. Starting in FY2009, a small portion of food assistance was authorized to be purchased locally and regionally to meet urgent food needs more quickly. Successive Administrations and several Members of Congress have proposed greater flexibility in the food aid program, potentially increasing aid efficiency but reducing the portion of funds flowing to U.S. farmers and shippers. To date, these proposals have been largely unsuccessful. Foreign Military Financing , with the exception of certain assistance allocated to Israel, is used exclusively to procure U.S. military equipment and training. Millennium Challenge Corporation. The MCC bases its procurement regulations on those established by the World Bank, which calls for an open and competitive process, with no preference given to donor country suppliers. Between FY2011 and FY2017, the MCC awarded roughly 15% of the value of compact contracts to U.S. firms. Multilateral development aid. Multilateral aid funds are mixed with funds from other nations and the bulk of the program is financed with borrowed funds rather than direct government contributions. Information on the U.S. share of procurement financed by MDBs is unavailable. In addition to the direct benefits derived from aid dollars used for American goods and services, many argue that the foreign aid program brings significant indirect financial benefits to the United States. For example, analysts maintain that provision of military equipment through the military assistance program and food commodities through the Food for Peace program helps to develop future, strictly commercial, markets for those products. More broadly, as countries develop economically, they are in a position to purchase more goods from abroad and the United States benefits as a trade partner. Since an increasing majority of global consumers are outside of the United States, some business leaders assert that establishing strong economic and trade ties in the developing world, using foreign assistance as a tool, is key to U.S. economic and job growth. Since World War II, with the exception of several years between 1989 and 2001, during which Japan ranked first among aid donors, the United States has led the developed countries in net disbursements of economic aid, or "Official Development Assistance (ODA)" as defined by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development's (OECD) Development Assistance Committee (DAC). In 2017, the most recent year for which data are available, the United States disbursed $34.12 billion in ODA, or about 24% of the $144.71 billion in total net ODA disbursements by DAC donors that year. Germany ranked second at $24.16 billion, the United Kingdom followed at $18.59 billion, Japan ranked fourth at $11.85 billion, and France rounded out the top donors with $11.03 billion in 2017 (see Figure 8 ). While the top five donors have not varied for more than a decade, there have been shifts lower down the ranking. For example, Turkey has become a much more prominent ODA donor in recent years (ranked 6 th in 2017, with $9.08 billion in ODA, compared to 21 st in 2006), reflecting large amounts of humanitarian aid to assist Syrian refugees. Even as it leads in dollar amounts of aid flows to developing countries, the United States often ranks low when aid is calculated as a percentage of gross national income (GNI). This calculation is often cited in the context of international donor forums, as a level of 0.7% GNI was established as a target for donors in the 2000 U.N. Millennium Development Goals. In 2017, the United States ranked at the bottom among major donors at 0.18% of GNI, slightly lower than Portugal and Spain (0.18% and 0.19%, respectively). The United Arab Emirates, which has significantly increased its reported ODA in recent years, ranked first among top donors at 1.03% of GNI, followed by Sweden at 1.02% and Luxembourg at 1.00%. There has also been an increase in ODA from non-DAC countries. Between 2000 and 2014, China spent $81.1 billion in ODA, more than tripling its ODA commitments during this period. While reported Chinese ODA is still relatively small compared to that of major donor countries, policymakers are paying increasing attention to growing Chinese investments in developing countries that do not meet the ODA definition. China has touted its "Belt and Road" initiative as an effort to boost development and connectivity across as many as 125 countries to create "strategic propellers" for its own development. However, China has provided little official aggregate information on the initiative, including on the number of projects, countries involved, the terms of financing, and metrics for success. Numerous congressional authorizing committees and appropriations subcommittees maintain responsibility for U.S. foreign assistance. Several committees have responsibility for authorizing legislation establishing programs and policy and for conducting oversight of foreign aid programs. In the Senate, the Committee on Foreign Relations, and in the House, the Committee on Foreign Affairs, have primary jurisdiction over bilateral development assistance, political/strategic and other economic security assistance, military assistance, and international organizations. Food aid, primarily the responsibility of the Agriculture Committees in both bodies, is periodically shared with the Foreign Affairs Committee in the House. U.S. contributions to multilateral development banks are within the jurisdiction of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the House Financial Services Committee. The large nontraditional aid programs funded by DOD, such as Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction programs and the military aid programs in Afghanistan and Iraq, come under the jurisdiction of the Armed Services Committees. Some global health assistance, such as research and other activities done by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, may fall under the jurisdiction of the House Energy and Commerce and Senate HELP committees. Traditionally, most foreign aid appropriations fall under the jurisdiction of the SFOPS Subcommittees, with food assistance appropriated by the Agriculture Subcommittees. As noted earlier, however, certain military, global health, and other activities that have been reported as foreign aid have been appropriated through other subcommittees in recent years, including the Defense and the Labor, Health and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies subcommittees. (For current information on SFOPS Appropriations legislation, see CRS Report R45168, Department of State, Foreign Operations and Related Programs: FY2019 Budget and Appropriations , by Susan B. Epstein, Marian L. Lawson, and Cory R. Gill.) The most significant permanent foreign aid authorization laws are the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, covering most bilateral economic and security assistance programs (P.L. 87-195; 22 U.S.C. 2151); the Arms Export Control Act (1976), authorizing military sales and financing (P.L. 90-629; 22 U.S.C. 2751); the Agricultural Trade Development and Assistance Act of 1954 (P.L. 480), covering food aid (P.L. 83-480; 7 U.S.C. 1691); and the Bretton Woods Agreement Act (1945), authorizing U.S. participation in multilateral development banks (P.L. 79-171; 22 U.S.C. 286). In the past, Congress usually scheduled debates every two years on omnibus foreign aid legislation that amended these permanent authorization measures. Congress has not enacted into law a comprehensive foreign assistance authorization measure since 1985, although foreign aid authorizing bills have passed the House or Senate, or both, on numerous occasions. Foreign aid bills have frequently stalled at some point in the debate because of controversial issues, a tight legislative calendar, or executive-legislative foreign policy disputes. In contrast, DOD assistance is authorized in annual National Defense Authorization legislation. In lieu of approving a broad State Department/USAID authorization bill, Congress has on occasion authorized major foreign assistance initiatives for specific regions, countries, or aid sectors in stand-alone legislation or within an appropriation bill. Among these are the SEED Act of 1989 ( P.L. 101-179 ; 22 U.S.C. 5401); the FREEDOM Support Act of 1992 ( P.L. 102-511 ; 22 U.S.C. 5801); the United States Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria Act of 2003 ( P.L. 108-25 ; 22 U.S.C. 7601); the Tom Lantos and Henry J. Hyde United States Global Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria Reauthorization Act of 2008 ( P.L. 110-293 ); the Millennium Challenge Act of 2003 (Division D, Title VI of P.L. 108-199 ); the Enhanced Partnership With Pakistan Act of 2009 ( P.L. 111-73 ; 22 U.S.C. 8401); the Global Food Security Act of 2016 ( P.L. 114-195 ; 22 U.S.C. 9306), and the BUILD Act ( P.L. 115-254 ). In the absence of regular enactment of foreign aid authorization bills, appropriation measures considered annually within the SFOPS spending bill have assumed greater significance for Congress in influencing U.S. foreign aid policy. Not only do appropriations bills set spending levels each year for nearly every foreign assistance account, SFOPS appropriations also incorporate new policy initiatives that would otherwise be debated and enacted as part of authorizing legislation. Appendix A. Data Table Appendix B. Common Foreign Assistance Abbreviations

 

 Report 2:
Since its founding in 2006, the National Popular Vote (NPV) initiative has promoted an agreement among the states, an interstate compact that would effectively establish direct popular election of the President and Vice President without a constitutional amendment, while retaining the structure of the electoral college system. The United States is unique among "presidential" republics by providing an indirect election to choose its chief executive. The President and Vice President of the United States are selected not by registered voters, but by the electoral college, electors appointed in the states "in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct.... " Alexander Hamilton, who was "present at the creation" of the Constitution in 1787, commented favorably on the electoral college system in The Federalist : The mode of appointment of the Chief Magistrate of the United States is almost the only part of the system, of any consequence, which has escaped without severe censure, or which has received the slightest mark of approbation from its opponents.... I venture somewhat further, and hesitate not to affirm that if the manner of it be not perfect, it is at least excellent. It unites in an eminent degree all the advantages the union of which was to be wished for. Notwithstanding Hamilton's endorsement, the first proposal to change the electoral college system by constitutional amendment was introduced as early as 1800, and since that time more than 700 proposals to reform or eliminate the college have been introduced in Congress. Reform advocates have long focused on the fact that it does not provide for direct democratic election, that less-populous states are afforded an arithmetical advantage due to the assignment of two electors to each state, regardless of population, and that the winner-take-all system makes it possible for candidates to win an electoral college majority and the presidency, while gaining fewer votes than their principal opponents in the popular election. Between 1949 and 1979, Congress considered amendments to reform the electoral college, or replace it with direct popular election, in committee and on the floor of both chambers. Proposed amendments must, however, meet the requirements of the Constitution's Article V, which calls for two-thirds approval by both houses of Congress, and ratification by three-fourths of the states; to date, no electoral college reform proposal has met these requirements. Proponents of the National Popular Vote initiative contend that their plan will achieve direct popular election while circumventing the requirements of Article V, and will guarantee that the popular vote winners will always be elected President and Vice President. The fundamentals of the electoral college system were established by Article II, Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution, and subsequently revised by the Twelfth Amendment. The Constitution's minimal provisions have been complemented over the past two centuries by a range of federal and state laws, political party procedures, and enduring political traditions, leading to the system as it exists today. The salient features of the contemporary system are detailed below. The electors are collectively known as the electoral college; although this phrase does not appear in the Constitution, it gained currency in the early days of the republic, and was recognized in federal law in 1845. The electoral college has no continuing existence; its sole purpose is to elect the President and Vice President. Each state is allocated a number of electors equal to the combined total of its U.S. Senate and House of Representatives delegations. The District of Columbia is also allocated three electors. At present, the total is 538, reflecting the combined size of the Senate (100 Members), the House (435 Members), and the District of Columbia electors. Any person may serve as an elector, except Senators and Representatives, or any other person holding an office of "trust or profit" under the United States. Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution empowers the states to "appoint [electors], in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct.... " This grant of authority provides the constitutional basis claimed for the NPV initiative. In practice, all states currently provide for popular election of their electoral college delegations. Candidates for the office of elector are nominated by political parties and other groups on the presidential ballot in each state. In most cases, the candidates for the office of elector are nominated by the state party committee or the party's statewide convention. The winning presidential nominees must gain a national majority of 270 or more electoral votes, out of the 538 total, in order to be elected. If no ticket of candidates attains a majority, then the House of Representatives elects the President, and the Senate the Vice President, in a procedure known as contingent election. Candidates for the office of elector are selected by their respective political parties. They are expected to vote for the presidential and vice presidential candidates to whom they are pledged. Some states seek to require them to so vote by law or other means, but most constitutional scholars hold that the electors remain free agents under the Constitution, and that they may vote for any person they choose. On rare occasions, an elector will vote for a different candidate, or abstain from casting a vote for any candidate; he or she is known as a "faithless elector." The goal of presidential campaigns under the existing system is to win by carrying states that collectively cast a majority of electoral votes. Political parties and presidential campaigns tend to focus on states that are closely contested (widely referred to as "battleground" states), or that have large delegations of electoral votes, or both. Winning a majority of the more populous and/or battleground states is considered crucial to obtaining the necessary electoral vote majority. In 48 states and the District of Columbia, the presidential/vice presidential ticket winning the most popular votes (a plurality or more) in that state is awarded all its electoral votes. That is to say, the winning party's entire ticket of electors is elected. This is referred to as the "winner-take-all" or "general ticket" system. Presidential Election Day is set by law for Tuesday after the first Monday in November every fourth year succeeding the election of President and Vice President. On Presidential Election Day, voters cast one vote for the candidates they support. They are, however, actually voting for the state political party "ticket" of electors supporting those presidential and vice presidential candidates. Presidential electors assemble on the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December following the general election. They meet in their respective states, not collectively, and cast separate votes by ballot for the President and Vice President. After the electors vote, the results are sent by the states to Congress and various other federal authorities. On January 6 of the year following a presidential election, Congress meets in a joint session to count the electoral votes and make a formal declaration of which candidates have been elected President and Vice President. A range of factors contributed to the emergence of the National Popular Vote initiative in the first decade of the 21 st century. A major source was frustration by reform advocates after three decades of failed attempts to secure congressional approval for a direct popular election amendment. A more immediate spur was the contentious and disputed presidential election of 2000, which is regarded as having been a major factor contributing to the development of the NPV proposal. One of the factors cited for the emergence of the NPV initiative has been the exacting requirements set by the Constitution for amendments, in this case, a direct popular election constitutional amendment. As noted previously, approval by two-thirds of Members present and voting is required in both houses when Congress proposes an amendment, followed by ratification by three-fourths of the states, 38 at present, usually within a seven-year period specified by Congress. Between 1948 and 1979, Congress debated electoral college reform at length; throughout this time, hundreds of reform proposals were introduced in both chambers. They generally centered on one of two courses: "end it" by eliminating the entire electoral college system and establishing direct popular election, or "mend it" by reforming its more controversial provisions. Between 1948 and 1979, proposed amendments were the subject of hearings in the Senate and House Judiciary Committees on 17 different occasions, while electoral college reform was debated in the Senate on five occasions and twice in the House during this period. Proposals were approved by the necessary two-thirds majority twice in the Senate and once in the House, but never in the same Congress. Following the 1979 defeat of a direct popular election amendment on the Senate floor, and the retirement or defeat of prominent congressional advocates, the question of electoral college reform largely disappeared from public attention and Congress's legislative agenda. Although Senators and Representatives continued to introduce reform proposals, few received action beyond routine committee referral, and in time, the number of measures introduced dropped to zero. Even after the presidential elections of 2000 and 2016, in which the winner of the electoral vote won fewer popular votes than his opponent (a so-called "misfire") , there was little evidence that Congress was prepared to consider an electoral college reform amendment. Proposals to replace the electoral college system with direct popular election continued to be introduced, but in dwindling numbers as the years passed. No proposal for direct popular election was introduced in the 113 th Congress. By comparison, 41 direct popular election or electoral college reform amendments were proposed in the 95 th Congress (1977-1978). Following the 2016 election, however, four constitutional amendments introduced late in the 114 th Congress proposed eliminating the electoral college and replacing it with direct election. To date in the 116 th Congress, three amendments to establish direct popular election by constitutional amendment have been introduced, but no action beyond committee referral has been taken on them. Until recently, survey research findings showed public support for presidential election reform through direct popular election by sizable margins. As early as 1967, the Gallup Poll reported that 58% of respondents supported direct election, compared with 22% who favored retaining the electoral college. More recently, Gallup's 2013 survey recorded that 63% of respondents favored an amendment providing for direct election, while 29% favored retention of the electoral college. Following the 2016 election, however, overall support for direct election was measured at 49% in favor to 47% opposed. It is arguable that the change in public attitudes was influenced by the 2016 election results, in which the Republican nominees won the election with a majority of electoral votes, but fewer popular votes than their Democratic opponents. For instance, Gallup reported a shift to greater support for the electoral college system by respondents who identified themselves as "Republican" or "Lean Republican." Conversely, already high levels of support for direct popular election among respondents who identified themselves as "Democratic" or "Lean Democratic" rose still further in the post-2016 election Gallup Poll. To date, CRS has identified one survey that was specifically designed to measure public commitment to the NPV initiative. A March 27, 2019, Politico/Morning Consult poll posed relevant questions on the presidential election process and the NPV compact. The first question, which presented a general outline of the existing electoral college system and the generic alternative of direct popular election, reported that respondents preferred direct election by 50% to 34% for retaining the electoral college, and 16% reporting "Don't know/No opinion." The next question explained the proposed NPV compact and asked respondents' preference for NPV or the electoral college method. Although the level of support for NPV was lower than that measured for generic direct popular election, a plurality of respondents to this question favored the "National Popular Vote Interstate Compact" by a plurality of 43% in favor, to 33% opposed and 23% who reported "Don't know/No opinion." The disputed presidential election of 2000 was arguably a catalyst for new thinking on electoral college reform . Following a closely contested campaign, Republican candidates George W. Bush and Richard Cheney were elected over Democratic nominees Al Gore Jr. and Joseph Lieberman following a bitter dispute over election results in Florida tha t was ultimately decided by the Supreme Court . The high court's decision left Bush and Cheney with a narrow plurality in Florida of 537 popular votes and a similarly narrow electoral college majority of 30 states with 271 electoral votes, while their Democratic opponents took 20 states and the District of Columbia with 266 electoral votes (one District of Columbia elector cast a blank ballot in protest against the outcome) . It was the first election since 1888 in which the candidates elected uncontestably won fewer popular votes than their principal opponents : the Gore / Lieberman Democratic ticket gained 50,992,335 popular votes to 50,455,156 for Bush / Cheney. The se election results generated considerable discontent with the system. Some critics argued for a constitutional amendment, but the 107 th Congress faced a heavy legislative workload throughout this period, which initially included enactment of President George W. Bush's legislative program and was later expanded to urgent responses to the terrorist attacks of September 1 1, 2001 . Rather than focus on the lengthy process associated with consideration of a constitutional amendment, Congress focused on legislati ve remedies. The Help America Vote Act of 2002, passed in response to the numerous irregularities in voting systems and procedures revealed by the 2000 election, mandated election administration reforms and v oting system technology enhancements (funded in part by federal grants to the states) intended to ensure accurate and timely voting and vote tabulation in future elections. In 2016, the presidential election was again won by nominees who gained a majority of electoral votes but fewer popular votes than their major party opponents. Although proposals to amend the Constitution to provide direct popular election were introduced in response to this occurrence late in the 114 th Congress , and again in the 115 th Congress, the 2016 results did not result in the degree of c ontroversy a nd activism that followed the electoral college "misfire " of 2000. T he following factor may have contributed to this situation : i n 2000, a shift in Florida's electoral votes from Bush/Cheney to Gore/Lieberman would have changed the election result; by comparison, in 2016, a shift in the state with the closest vote margin, Michigan , would not have altered the election. While the 2000 election's "misfire" did not result in consideration of a constitutional amendment, it did prompt considerable study and investigation into new approaches to electoral reform among scholars of the presidential election process and political activists. Law professors Robert W. Bennett of Northwestern University, Vikram Amar of the University of California-Davis, and Akhil Amar of Yale University School of Law are generally credited as the intellectual godparents of the concept that ultimately evolved into the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, which relies on the Constitution's broad grant of power to each state to "appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct [emphasis added], a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress." Project FairVote, an issue advocacy group self-described as a nonprofit, nonpartisan "501(c)(4)" organization, appears to have been an incubator of the NPV concept. FairVote has supported NPV for "over a decade," and was an early supporter of National Popular Vote Inc., the plan's official advocacy group; moreover, longtime FairVote board members Robert Richie and the late Representative John B. Anderson were early supporters of the National Popular Vote initiative and contributors to its manifesto, Every Vote Equal . As noted previously, the NPV initiative was the ultimate result of the various studies and proposals offered following the presidential election of 2000. The NPV initiative seeks to establish direct popular election of the President and Vice President through an interstate compact, rather than by constitutional amendment. Ideally, under the compact's provisions, legislatures of the 50 states and the District of Columbia would pass legislation binding the signatories to appoint presidential electors committed to the presidential/vice presidential ticket that gained the most votes nationwide . If all 50 states and the District of Columbia were compact members, this would deliver a unanimous electoral college decision for the candidates winning a plurality of the popular vote. Specifically, the plan calls for an agreement among the states, an interstate compact effected through state legislation, in which the legislature in each of the participating states agrees to appoint electors pledged to the candidates who won the nationwide popular vote . State election authorities would count and certify the popular vote in each state, which would be aggregated and certified as the "nationwide popular vote." The participating state legislatures would then choose the slate of electors pledged to the "nationwide popular vote winner," notwithstanding the results within their particular state s . To ensure success, the initiative would come into effect only if states whose total electoral votes equal or exceed the constitutional majority of 270 were to approve the plan. If the nationwide popular vote were effectively tied, the states would be released from their commitment under the compact, and could choose electors who represented the presidential ticket that gained the most votes in each particular state. One novel NPV provision would enable the presidential candidate who won the national popular vote to fill any vacancies in the electoral college with electors of his or her own choice. States would retain the right to withdraw from the compact, but if a state chose to withdraw within six months of the end of a presidential term, the withdrawal would not be effective until after the succeeding President and Vice President had been elected. The NPV advocacy effort is managed by National Popular Vote Inc., a "501(c)(4)" nonprofit corporation established in California in 2006 by Barry Fadem, an attorney specializing in initiative and referendum law, and John R. Koza, Ph.D., an automated systems scientist and entrepreneur. As a 501(c)(4) entity, it is permitted to engage in political activity in furtherance of its goal, without forfeiting its tax-exempt status, so long as this is not its primary activity. NPV states on its website that its "specific purpose is to study, analyze and educate the public regarding its proposal to implement a nationwide popular election of the President of the United States." Dr. Koza serves as chairman of NPV Inc., and Mr. Fadem serves as president. NPV's advisory board includes former Senators and Representatives of both major political parties. In 2006, National Popular Vote Inc. published a detailed handbook, Every Vote Equal: A State-Based Plan for Electing the President by National Popular Vote . This publication, in its fourth edition at the time of this writing, provides a detailed account of various issues related to the NPV initiative, including the electoral college, earlier reform efforts, interstate compacts, the text of the proposed compact, a strategy for advancing the initiative, and a 340-page section addressing "myths about the National Popular Vote Compact." National Popular Vote Inc. maintains an office in Mountain View, CA. Supporters in various state legislatures began to introduce measures to adopt the interstate compact shortly after NPV's inaugural press conference on February 23, 2006. The NPV Compact has been introduced at various sessions in the legislatures of all 50 states and the Council of the District of Columbia, which performs the functions of a state legislature in the nation's capital, and has received some form of active consideration in 38 states and the D.C. Council. Among other activities, NPV maintains a regular communications program of email newsletters announcing activities and soliciting readers to petition governors and state legislators to support the compact. At the time of this writing, NPV claims that 3,112 state legislators have either sponsored or cast a recorded vote in their respective legislatures for the compact. NPV also claims endorsements from legislators and endorsements by the New York Times , Los Angeles Times , Chicago Sun-Times , Minneapolis Star Tribune , Boston Globe , Miami Herald , and other newspapers. NPV also advocates use of the citizen initiative process where available to enact state adherence to the compact; it asserts that when Article II, Section 1, clause 2 grants authority to the states to appoint "in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct," the authority extends to the states' entire lawmaking process, which in some states includes the proposal and passage of legislation and constitutional amendments through citizen initiative. The citizen initiative approach to the interstate compact, however, has yet to be used at the time of this writing. At the time of this writing, in May 2019, the following 14 states and the District of Columbia have adopted the National Popular Vote Compact. Collectively, they are assigned a total of 189 electoral votes. The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact has been introduced since its inception in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. States that have adopted NPV at the time of this writing are listed in chronological order, by year of adoption, as follows: Hawaii (4 electoral votes), 2008; Illinois (20 electoral votes), 2008; Maryland (10 electoral votes), 2008; New Jersey (14 electoral votes), 2008; Washington (12 electoral votes), 2009; Massachusetts (11 electoral votes), 2010; District of Columbia (3 electoral votes), 2010; Vermont (3 electoral votes), 2011; California (55 electoral votes), 2011; Rhode Island (4 electoral votes), 2013; New York (29 electoral votes), 2014; Connecticut (7 electoral votes), 2018; Colorado (9 electoral votes), 2019; Delaware (3 electoral votes), 2019; and New Mexico (5 electoral votes), 2019. After initial momentum in 2008, when four states joined the compact in one year, NPV made slower progress toward its goal of approval by states accounting for 270 electoral votes. Highlights were California's approval in 2011, which added 55 electoral votes to the tally, and New York's accession to the compact in 2014. Beginning with Connecticut's approval in 2018, followed in 2019 by Colorado, Delaware, and New Mexico, 24 additional electoral votes were added to the NVP count, bringing the total to 189, 70% of the 270 votes needed for NPV to go into effect. By early May 2019, legislation to join the NPV had been introduced in the current session of at least one chamber of the legislature in 14 states that controlled a combined total of 150 electoral votes. As of April 17, the compact had been approved in Nevada by the Assembly (lower chamber of the legislature) and in Oregon by the Senate. Accession by these two states would raise the NPV member total to 202 electoral votes. Conversely, proposals to rescind approval of the NPV Interstate Compact have been introduced in the legislatures of Connecticut, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Washington, to date; none has been approved. Some observers note that, despite NPV's assertion of bipartisan support, all the jurisdictions that have joined the compact to date could be identified as "leaning" Democratic or "solid" Democratic in their support of the Democratic Party, as classified by a recent Gallup survey. For instance, 11 of the 14, including California, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, Rhode Island, and Vermont, were found by Gallup to be among the "most solidly Democratic states in 2017." Alluding to this fact, one commentator observed that [a]ll the states to have joined so far are very blue. Until some purple states and red states sign on, the compact has little in the way of territory to conquer.... The seven states where President Obama won [in 2012] by the widest margins, along with D.C., have joined. So have three others—New Jersey, Illinois and Washington—where Obama won by at least 15 percentage points. But none below that threshold have done so. The 2016 presidential election results in Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, and New Mexico, the most recent adherents to the NPV compact, arguably confirm this observation—the Democratic candidates won the popular vote in all four states, by margins of between 4.9% in Colorado to 13.7% in Connecticut. On the other hand, several states where the NPV remained under active consideration in 2019—Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, North Carolina, Ohio, and South Carolina—were carried by the Republican presidential ticket in 2016. As the NPV campaign developed momentum in the states, particularly between 2008 and 2011, defenders of the existing arrangements and the electoral college announced measures to promote retention of the electoral college system. In October 2011, the Heritage Foundation, a conservative public policy institute, released a report opposing the NPV compact. That same month, Roll Call reported that the State Government Leadership Foundation, a project of the Republican State Leadership Committee, would begin a campaign to defend the electoral college and counter recent NPV gains. Further activity, however, does not appear to have been undertaken by these groups by the time of this writing. Arguments in support of and opposed to the National Popular Vote proposal resemble those advanced in favor of and against direct popular election of the President. The central issue turns on the question of the asserted simplicity and democratic attractiveness of the direct election idea as compared to a more complex array of factors cited by supporters of the electoral college system. Proponents of the NPV initiative arguably share the philosophical criticism voiced by proponents of direct popular election, who maintain that the electoral college system is intrinsically undemocratic—it provides for "indirect" election of the President and Vice President. This, they assert, is an 18 th century anachronism, dating from a time when communications were poor, the literacy rate was much lower, and the nation had yet to develop the durable, sophisticated, and inclusive democratic political system it now enjoys. They maintain that only direct popular election of the President and Vice President is consistent with modern democratic values and practice. Beyond this fundamental challenge, critics cite what they identify as a wide range of technical failings of the electoral college arrangement. Perhaps the most prominent of these is that the electoral college system can result in the election of a President and Vice President who have won the electoral vote, but gained fewer popular votes than their major opponent. This condition results at least in part from the nearly universal reliance on the "winner-take-all" or general ticket system of awarding electoral votes in the states, which is also criticized by NPV advocates. Under the general ticket system, the candidates winning the most popular votes in a state (a plurality is sufficient) are awarded all that state's electors and electoral votes; under these circumstances, a presidential ticket can gain all of a state's electoral votes on even a slim margin of popular votes. Presidents were elected in 1876, 1888, 2000, and 2016 who received fewer popular votes than their major party opponents, while the runner-up in both popular and electoral votes was elected by the House of Representatives when four candidates split the vote in the presidential election of 1824. NPV supporters advocate the compact on the grounds of fairness and respect for the voters' choice. At the core of their arguments, they assert that the process would be simple, national, and democratic; the NPV interstate compact would provide de facto for a single, democratic choice, allowing all the nation's voters to choose the President and Vice President directly, with no intermediaries. The "people's choice," they assert, would win in every election, and every vote would carry the same weight in the election, no matter where in the nation it was cast. No state would be advantaged, nor would any be disadvantaged. According to NPV, the central argument in favor is that the compact "would guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes [or at least a plurality] in all 50 states (and the District of Columbia)." According to NPV, there would never again be a presidential election "misfire" or another "wrong winner." Other elements of the electoral college system criticized by NPV advocates (and other electoral college reformers) would arguably disappear or be rendered irrelevant. These include the faithless elector phenomenon, the general ticket system's asserted "disfranchisement" of voters who backed the losing candidates, and various asserted "voting power" advantages attributed to large (populous) states, small states, states with large populations of noncitizens, states with low rates of voter participation, and populous states with concentrations of minority-group voters. In addition, the NPV compact would almost certainly eliminate the need for contingent election of the President and Vice President under the Twelfth Amendment. NPV advocates also assert the compact would provide a practical benefit to states that tend to be noncompetitive in presidential elections and which therefore receive fewer campaign visits by major party candidates. With "every vote equal," NPV maintains that presidential and vice presidential nominees and their organizations would need to spread their presence and resources more evenly as they campaigned for every vote nationwide, rather than concentrate on winning key "battleground" states. They assert that, under the present system candidates have no reason to poll, visit, organize, campaign, or worry about the concerns of voters of states that they cannot possibly win or lose. This means that voters in two thirds of the states are effectively disenfranchised in presidential elections because candidates concentrate their attention on a small handful of "battleground" states. In 2004, candidates concentrated over two-thirds of their money and campaign visits in just five states; over 80% in nine states, and over 99% of their money in just 16 states. For instance, NPV notes that California voters seldom see the presidential or vice presidential nominees or benefit from campaign spending because the Golden State, having voted Democratic since 1988, is considered to be reliably "blue," and Democratic Party candidates are said to take its 55 electoral votes for granted. They also note that Republican candidates make few California appearances, but, NPV asserts, for the opposite reason: why spend time and resources in support of an apparently hopeless cause? Similar arguments made by NPV on the Republican side apply to Texas, a state that has voted for Republican presidential nominees since 1980. In 2016 for instance, NPV claims that no Democratic nominee participated in a general election campaign event in California or Texas, while a Republican nominee appeared in only one campaign event in each of those states. By comparison, according to their calculations, the hotly contested battleground states of Florida, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania received, respectively, 71, 55, and 54 candidate appearances. According to NPV's analysis of campaign appearances, the 2016 major party candidates for President and Vice President appeared at a total of 375 campaign events during the general election campaign, but they visited only 12 states; by NPV's calculation, 38 states and the District of Columbia were bypassed during the campaign. NPV advocates also maintain that the concentration of campaign resources, advertising, and candidate appearances in battleground states depresses turnout in "flyover" states, where candidates make few campaign appearances. The U.S. Elections Project report, America Goes to the Polls, 2016 , appears to offer statistics consistent with this assertion, finding that the participation rate of the population eligible to vote in 14 battleground states was 65% in the 2016 presidential election, as opposed to comparable nationwide turnout of 60%. It also reports findings similar to those advanced by NPV: 95% of campaign visits during the 2016 campaign were made in battleground states, as was 99% of "ad spending." The NPV manifesto also cites a Brookings Institution study of the 2004 presidential election in support of its argument, stating, "Because the electoral college has effectively narrowed elections like the last one to a quadrennial contest for the votes of a relatively small number of states, people elsewhere are likely to feel that their votes don't matter." It should be noted, however, that a range of other political, social, cultural, and economic factors may also contribute to the disparity in turnout between battleground and non-battleground states. NPV further suggests that the disparity in participation may ultimately damage the ability to govern on the state and local levels and could have a negative impact on the legitimacy of public institutions: Diminished voter turnout in presidential races in non-battleground states weakens down-ballot candidates, thereby making the state even less competitive in the future. Governance—not just electioneering—is affected by the winner-take-all rule. National Popular Vote opponents oppose the compact on various grounds. Some argue that it is unconstitutional or "anticonstitutional," that is, contrary to the Founders' intentions and the spirit of the nation's fundamental charter. It is also asserted that NPV would solve few of the electoral college system's alleged problem issues and would create some of its own. Finally, some observers note that the NPV compact is an interstate compact as defined in Article I, Section 10, clause 3 of the Constitution, and as such would be subject to congressional approval. This issue is examined in greater detail in a separate section of this report. On the most fundamental philosophical basis, opponents might argue that the NPV compact violates one of the basic principles of majoritarian democracy: it does not require that candidates win a majority of the popular vote in order to gain the presidency. Rather, it would anoint as winner the ticket that gains more popular votes than any other. A majoritarian democracy, it may be argued, should require a majority in order to elect; it may be further noted that the existing system, by comparison, requires a majority in the electoral college. As one commentary noted only the strictest of majoritarians desire a purely majoritarian presidential election system, and those individuals should be deeply troubled by the prospect of plurality presidencies, which the NPVC [sic] expressly countenances. Indeed, the NPVC promises to create more difficulties and "misfires" in its own way than the Electoral College system its proponents so earnestly seek to replace. Further, opponents might ask how the NPV compact would function in the event of a multicandidate election, a phenomenon that recurs from time to time in U.S. presidential elections. One commentator posited the following problematic scenario under such circumstances: Under the compact, one can easily imagine a multi-candidate race in which a candidate would win, say, a thirty-four percent plurality of the popular vote nationwide while losing in every state and D.C. If all of the states and D.C. were signatories to the compact, all the electoral votes in such a hypothetical race would be awarded contrary to the will of voters choosing electors (still not voting directly for President under this plan). Would the United States accept a President who wasn't the choice of sixty-six percent of those voting, nor even the choice of a single state? The existing electoral college system, NPV skeptics might also assert, is a fundamental element in the federal constitutional arrangements established by the Constitution. Fearing "the tyranny of the majority," the Founders established a system of government that provides checks and balances designed to restrain the majority and secure minority rights. These principles are also embedded in the structure of federal elections: the Senate, the House of Representatives, and the presidency were deliberately provided with different terms of office and different electorates, and the states were given an important role in the federal election process. In particular, through the electoral college the United States elects its national Presidents and Vice Presidents in a state-based federal election. Successful nominees are compelled under this system to present a broad political vision that commands nation-spanning "concurrent majorities" and appeals to the great variety of Americans. As in the case of the Senate, less populous states are accorded a small numerical advantage by assignment of two at-large electors reflecting the Constitution's equal apportionment of Senators to each state regardless of its population. The NPV initiative, they could claim, would discard the Founders' intentions in favor of what they consider to be a flawed "majoritarian" presidency that would ill-serve a continent-spanning and profoundly diverse republic. Another criticism centers on the use of the NPV compact to effect a fundamental change in the presidential election process and a de facto amendment to the Constitution, but without following the procedures set out in Article V. Critics may note that NPV's founders admit their plan is an "end run" around the Constitution. Proponents might counter with the argument that Article V presents too high a hurdle for what they consider a necessary reform of the system. Opponents, however, could respond that the Founders intended the various supermajority requirements in Congress and the states to ensure that successful constitutional amendments enjoy broad national support. The bare majority of electoral votes required to implement NPV, they might note, meets none of these supermajority requirements. As one study critical of the NPV initiative concluded, because the use of an interstate compact "does not conform to the constitutional means of changing the original decisions of the Framers, NPV could not [therefore] be a legitimate innovation." A final argument on this line might be that one "end run" around the amendment process might lead to others, setting a dangerous precedent for similar efforts in the future. Opponents might note that the NPV would eliminate the electoral college system's multiplier effect generated by the winner-take-all or general ticket system used in 48 states and the District of Columbia, which tends to magnify the winning ticket's margin of victory, and is said to confer greater legitimacy to the victors. For instance, in 2016, Republican nominee Donald Trump's clear electoral vote majority of 304 votes (56.5% of the total), compared with Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton's 227 (42.2% of the total) could be said to reinforce and confirm his victory, notwithstanding Clinton's plurality of the popular vote (48.2%), compared with Trump's 46.1%. From a practical standpoint, NPV opponents might argue that the NPV would actually lead to an increase in contested election results and legal challenges in the states, as the political parties maneuver to claim every possible vote. They assert that the existing tabulation of popular votes within each state reduces contested results and recounts. Under NPV, the incentive to gain every vote would arguably lead to far broader disputes and widespread recounts at every level of election administration. As a Heritage Foundation study concluded Under the NPV … any suspicions necessitating a recount in even a single district would be an incentive for a national recount.... The prospect of a candidate challenging "every precinct, in every county, in every state of the Union" should be abhorrent to anyone who witnessed the drama, cost, delay, and undue litigation sparked by the Florida recount of 2000. Opponents might also assert that the increased incidence of recounts would be further complicated by wide-ranging disparities in state procedures, potentially leading to prolonged periods of uncertainty following close presidential elections. Critics may also note that the NPV plan contains no "statute of limitations," unlike proposed constitutional amendments, for which Congress typically sets a seven-year ratification period. Where, critics may ask, is a similar time limit that would "sunset" the NPV compact, after which it would expire or return to "square one"? According to its website, NPV was launched on February 23, 2006; if it were a constitutional amendment proposed by Congress, it would have expired on February 23, 2013, since by the end of the customary seven-year deadline it was "ratified" by only eight states and the District of Columbia. By what reasoning, they might ask, should the NPV be exempt from the standards of timeliness and contemporaneity Congress customarily sets for constitutional amendments? Opponents might reject claims that, under NPV, campaign spending and candidate appearances would be spread and scheduled more widely, beyond the current concentration of time and resources in battleground states. They might argue that spreading campaign resources and candidate events in non-battleground states is a questionable argument to justify a fundamental change in the presidential election process. Campaign appearances and spending, they could assert, should not be considered to be a local economic stimulus package, nor are the amounts in question sufficient to make much of a difference in the economic condition of most states. As one critical analysis notes, "... the nation does not hold presidential elections to foster local economic development." Moreover, they might continue, it is equally dubious to assert that nominees will slight the concerns of citizens of the non-battleground states from which they draw their greatest support, or that concentrated campaigning in the battleground states somehow "disenfranchises" voters in others. In the modern era, a small percentage of voters actually attends an in-person presidential or vice presidential candidate appearance. Television (especially broadcast and cable TV news networks), social media, the internet, and newspapers—not the traditional rallies, torchlight parades, and handbills—dominate presidential election campaigns in the 21 st century. In addition to policy issues discussed previously, some observers have also raised questions related to the NPV initiative based on the fact that it is an interstate compact as defined in the Constitution. Others have questioned whether NPV might conflict with some provisions of the Voting Rights Act. The NPV initiative has been described by its supporters variously as a bill, a state-level statute, and an interstate compact. The latter reference necessitates an analysis of whether the initiative complies with the Compact Clause of the Constitution. An interstate compact—under the broadest understanding—is a contract between two or more consenting states. The Supreme Court has further suggested that an interstate compact often requires reciprocal commitments between the governments of two or more states, such that one state's commitment is conditioned on the action of another state and no state can unilaterally repeal its commitment. The use of interstate compacts predates the Constitution, as the Articles of Confederation contained a similar Compact Clause that provided a qualified prohibition on states entering into any agreements between them without the consent of Congress. The chaos resulting from the disunity created by the Articles of Confederation prompted the Framers of the Constitution generally to "impose more uniformity" among the states, resulting in a Constitution that wholly prohibits states from entering into any treaties, alliances, and federations. Nonetheless, the Constitution maintained the Articles of Confederation's qualified prohibition on interstate compacts and agreements, allowing states to enter into an interstate compact so long as the participating states seek the consent of Congress. Specifically, the Compact Clause provides that "No State shall, without the Consent of Congress ... enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State.... " While the historical rationale for Article I's qualified prohibition on interstate compacts is unclear, the Compact Clause generally reflects the view of the Framers that states should be able to work cooperatively together, as well as the concern that unchecked interstate alliances might threaten the harmony of the Union or the authority vested by the Constitution in the federal government. As the Supreme Court noted in Cuyler v. Adams , "By vesting in Congress the power to grant or withhold consent, or to condition consent on the states' compliance with specified conditions, the Framers sought to ensure that Congress would maintain ultimate supervisory power over cooperative state action that might otherwise interfere with the full and free exercise of federal authority." The Compact Clause places no limits on what might be done through an interstate compact other than the requirement of congressional consent. In the early years of government under the Constitution, compacts were used almost exclusively to settle boundary disputes. Beginning with the establishment of the Port of New York Authority in 1921, however, compacts began to be used to address more complex, regional issues requiring intergovernmental cooperation. Some compacts are merely advisory in form, but others may be regulatory, with significant powers granted to multistate commissions. More recently, compacts have addressed such wide-ranging concerns as mental health treatment, law enforcement and crime control, education, driver licensing and enforcement, environmental conservation, energy, nuclear waste control, facilities operations, transportation, economic development, insurance regulation, placement of children and juveniles, disaster assistance, and pollution control. Approximately 200 interstate compacts are in effect today. Accordingly, the central legal issue with respect to the Compact Clause is whether a given interstate compact requires the consent of Congress. While a "literal" reading of the Compact Clause "would require the States to obtain congressional approval before entering into any agreement among themselves, irrespective of form, subject, duration, or interest to the United States [emphasis added]," the Supreme Court has repeatedly rejected such a reading. In 1893, in Virginia v. Tenness e e , Justice Stephen Field, writing for the Court, contended that a broad reading of the Compact Clause would "embrace all forms of stipulation, written or verbal, and relating to all kinds of subjects[,]" requiring congressional consent to agreements "which the United States can have no possible objection or have any interest in interfering with," as well as those that "may tend to increase ... the political influence of the contracting states, so as to encroach upon or impair the supremacy of the United States.... " Surmising that the Compact Clause could not have been intended to have such a broad reach, Justice Field concluded that the Clause prohibits states from entering into compacts without congressional consent only when the underlying compact is "directed to the formation of any combination tending to the increase of political power in the States, which may encroach upon or interfere with the just supremacy of the United States." The Supreme Court has subsequently reaffirmed Justice Field's "functional view of the Compact Clause," and, accordingly, generally where an agreement does not fall within the scope of the Compact Clause as envisioned by the Court in Virginia v. Tennessee , the agreement "will not be invalidated for lack of congressional consent." Whether the NPV initiative requires congressional consent under the Compact Clause first requires a determination as to whether NPV even constitutes an interstate compact. At times, its supporters have resisted framing the initiative as an interstate compact, arguably out of concern for running afoul of the Compact Clause's provisions. For example, Professor Akhil Amar has argued that because the initiative does not create a "new interstate governmental apparatus," the NPV should not be considered an interstate compact, as NPV compact signatory states are merely exercising power collectively that each state could exercise on its own. It is unclear, however, whether the creation of a new interstate governmental entity formed out of an agreement between two or more states is necessary, as opposed to sufficient, in order to deem an agreement as being an interstate compact subject to the Compact Clause. While the Supreme Court, in Northeast Bancorp , suggested that a "joint organization or body" formed out of an interstate agreement is a "classic indic[ium] of a compact," the Court has never adopted a definition of an interstate compact that solely rests on the existence of an interstate governmental body. Instead, the Court appears to have adopted a broader definition of what an interstate compact can entail. For example, in Virginia v. Tennessee , the Court noted that the words "compacts" and "agreements" are synonymous and "cover all stipulations affecting the conduct or claims of the parties." In other words, when two or more states enter into a stipulated agreement whereby one state agrees to perform an act in consideration for a reciprocal act by the other state(s), that agreement can be considered an interstate compact. This broad definition of a compact appears to encompass the NPV compact, as the initiative requires signatory states to agree mutually to appoint their electors to the winner of the national popular vote. Moreover, NPV binds each assenting state, as no member state can withdraw from it within six months or less of the end of a President's term. Because NPV prohibits states from freely "modify[ing] or repeal[ing] [the agreement] unilaterally" and requires "reciprocation" of mutual obligations, it appears that the initiative can be described as an interstate compact. Assuming the NPV initiative is an interstate compact, the question remains whether it is one that implicates the Compact Clause. The answer to that question primarily depends on whether NPV is "directed to the formation of any combination tending to the increase of political power in the States, which may encroach upon or interfere with the just supremacy of the United States ." In other words, the "test" for whether a particular interstate compact requires congressional consent is centrally concerned with vertical balances of power between the federal government and the states; namely, "whether the Compact enhances state power quoad the National Government." While the NPV arguably increases the political power of the states that have consented to it by ensuring that those states' desired outcome for the presidential election—the awarding of the majority of electoral votes to the presidential candidate supported by the majority of the voting populace—it is unclear how that increase in political power would be at the expense of the power of the federal government. After all, the Constitution provides the federal government with no role in determining the members of the electoral college. One scholar has suggested that the NPV initiative would lead to a vertical alteration of power by eliminating the possibility that the House of Representatives would resolve a presidential election in the absence of an electoral majority for a single candidate because it is premised on a majority of electoral votes going to a single candidate. The House of Representatives, however, has decided only two presidential elections in American history, and whether such an arguably hypothetical and de minimis diminishment of federal power through the NPV would be sufficient to require congressional consent under the Compact Clause is simply unresolved by the relevant case law. While the Supreme Court's case law interpreting the Compact Clause is centrally concerned with vertical federalism concerns (i.e., the balance of power between the state and federal governments), the Court has recognized a potential secondary rationale suggested for the Compact Clause: to preserve the horizontal balance of powers among the various states. And horizontal federalism concerns could very well be implicated by the Compact Clause, as the provision appears to have been included in the Constitution out of concern both for the supremacy of the federal government and unity among the various states. Whether the NPV compact threatens the powers of nonconsenting states has been the subject of much debate among academics. Those in support of the initiative have contended that the nonconsenting states do not lose any power as a result of the NPV. According to this line of argumentation, even under the NPV, all states would retain their right to select the electors of their choosing, as nonmember state electors would still be counted in the electoral vote. Others, however, have pointed to the underlying premise of the NPV—to enhance the political power of more populous states in presidential elections—as evidence that the initiative diminishes the power of nonconsenting states. In other words, while non-compacting states would still retain the power to appoint electors, the influence that comes with that power would arguably be diminished because a state's role in the national election would be defined by its percentage of the popular vote and not by its percentage of electors, warranting congressional interest in approving a compact that effectuated such a change in national elections. Ultimately, however, whether the NPV actually threatens the power of nonconsenting states is a debate that remains active within academia but would likely be the source of considerable litigation if the initiative ever became effective. If congressional consent is needed for the NPV, that consent can take various forms. Usually congressional consent to an interstate compact takes the form of a joint resolution or act of Congress specifying its approval of the text of the compact and adding any conditions or provisions it deems necessary, often embodying the compact document. As with most congressional actions, consent to an interstate compact must occur with the approval of both houses and must be signed by the President before it becomes law. Rarely has the President vetoed or threatened to veto consent legislation by Congress. While congressional consent to an interstate compact is most often explicit, consent by Congress may also be implied by subsequent acts of Congress as "[a]n inference clear and satisfactory that Congress ... intended to consent" to a compact may be sufficient. Congress may also delegate its power to approve a compact to a federal official so long as an "intelligible principle" against which approval can be measured is apparent. Ultimately, if congressional consent is truly needed for NPV to be effective, the initiative might have difficulty ever being enacted because the approval of both houses of Congress and the President would likely necessitate additional hurdles beyond the already challenging task of amassing support at the state level for the NPV. Beyond the legal issues raised with respect to the Compact Clause, the NPV initiative also potentially raises other broader constitutional concerns, including whether the states can functionally obviate the role of the electoral college through the NPV. Article II of the Constitution establishes that the election of the President should occur indirectly through the election by the electoral college. The choice of an indirect election for the President was a deliberate one by the Framers of the Constitution, because, while noting the importance that the "sense of the people" should influence the choice for President, they found it "equally desirable" for the "immediate election" of the President to be made by a body representative of distinct state interests and removed from the threat of unchecked majoritarianism. The result was that the Constitution established a presidential election process that was "manifestly nonmajoritarian," with the electoral college, a body established to represent the distinct views of each state, as the centerpiece of the election process. The central constitutional issue presented by the NPV, therefore, is whether the states, through an interstate compact, can functionally transform the presidential election system enshrined in the Constitution into a more majoritarian process. Supporters of the NPV argue that the Constitution provides the legal means for states to transform the presidential election system into one where the President is elected based solely on the result of the national popular vote. Specifically, clause 2 of Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution provides the states with the power to "appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct," the electors who represent the state in the electoral college. Facially, the Constitution's primary limitation on the power of a state to select its electors is the final number of electors awarded to each state. While perhaps an argument can be made that the structure, logic, and history of the Constitution place limits on the manner or method in which a state chooses its electors, the text of the Constitution simply does not impose any such limits. Supreme Court case law also supports reading Article II of the Constitution to broadly provide states with wide discretion as to the manner in which its electors are selected. Specifically, in 1892 in McPherson v. Blacker, a unanimous Supreme Court upheld a Michigan law providing for the election by individual congressional district of presidential electors against a challenge that the law violated Article II of the Constitution. In so holding, the Court placed great emphasis on a number of state laws that existed shortly after the ratification that provided a variety of "modes of choosing the electors," including selection by the legislature itself, by a "vote of the people for a general ticket," "by vote of the people in districts," or by some permutation of those methods. Viewing this evidence together with the text of Article II and the historical evidence from the Constitutional Convention led the Court to broadly conclude state legislatures have "conceded plenary power ... in the matter of the appointment of electors," allowing the Michigan law to stand. Applying McPherson to the case of the NPV, the argument can and has been made that if the states have plenary power with respect to the manner of how electors are appointed, the power necessarily allows states to select electors in line with the results of the national popular vote. More recently, supporters of the NPV have relied on the Supreme Court's 2015 ruling in Arizona Legislature v. Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission (AIRC) —which held that the State of Arizona had wide discretion under the Elections Clause of the Constitution to select the method by which the state provided for redistricting —to argue that the states retain broad discretion in selecting electors under Article II, which uses similar language to the provision interpreted in AIRC. Others have argued that the structure of the Constitution and historical evidence suggest that the states do not have such vast discretion in appointing electors as to functionally transform the election for President into a national popular referendum. As noted elsewhere in this report, the electoral college was created by the Framers to ensure that states with the least population retained power in the selection of the President, providing a check against domination by the most populous states. The electoral college, being a product of the choices of individual state legislatures, was envisioned by the Framers as a body that would represent the specific interests of a given state, as opposed to the undifferentiated nation at large. Accordingly, it may be argued that allowing the most populous states to collude to ensure that the national popular vote, as opposed to the wishes of an individual state, dictates the results of a state's slate of electors, could arguably be irreconcilable with the Framers' intentions with respect to the electoral college. As such, for those who find the NPV compact constitutionally suspect under Article II, McPherson 's broad pronouncements about the nature of a state's power to appoint electors should be viewed in the context of that particular case, where the state of Michigan was attempting to appoint its electors based on the votes of an individual district in the state, as opposed to the state as a whole. In contrast to the law at issue in McPherson , with NPV, there appears to be no evidence contemporaneous with the ratification of the Constitution of a state selecting its electors in accordance with the results of the national popular vote. Unlike the State of Michigan in McPherson , an NPV state's electors might not be a product of the views of the state at the time of the election, but instead would reflect national popular sentiment about who should be the President. Moreover, the Supreme Court, in interpreting arguably analogous language from Article I of the Constitution allowing states to regulate the manner of the selection of the Members of the House of Representatives and Senate, concluded that the states cannot exercise their delegated authority in a way that would "effect a fundamental change in the constitutional structure." The question that remains is whether the Court in a future case challenging the NPV compact would interpret the states' authority under Article II to appoint electors to be broad enough to allow the President to be selected as a result of the national popular vote, a question that, given the lack of any precise precedent respecting the constitutionality of the NPV compact under Article II, will likely remain unresolved until such time. Other critics claim the NPV compact might violate Sections 2 and 5 of the Voting Rights Act (VRA). Writing in Columbia Law Review , David Gringer invokes the voting power theory. He argues that the plan conflicts with Section 2 of the VRA because moving from "a state-based [vote] to a national popular vote dilutes the voting strength of a given state's minority population by reducing its ability [voting power] to influence the outcome of presidential elections." Gringer also asserts that the NPV compact may violate Section 5 of the act. In 2013, however, the U.S. Supreme Court invalidated Section 4(b) of the VRA, which contained a formula prescribing which states and jurisdictions with a history of discrimination were required to obtain prior approval or "preclearance" under Section 5 before changing any voting standard, practice, or procedure. Although the Court invalidated only the coverage formula in Section 4, by extension, Section 5 has been rendered currently inoperable. Prior to the Supreme Court ruling, Gringer argued that the NPV compact would qualify as a covered practice under Section 5, and that the legislatures of all the "covered" states would have been required to obtain preclearance before implementing the compact. Responding to this point, National Popular Vote Inc. noted the following: The National Popular Vote bill manifestly would make every person's vote for President equal throughout the United States in an election to fill a single office (the Presidency). It is entirely consistent with the goal of the Voting Rights Act. There have been court cases under the Voting Rights Act concerning contemplated changes in voting methods for various representative legislative bodies.... However, these cases do not bear on elections to fill a single office (i.e., the Presidency). In 2012, the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division specifically declined to challenge California's accession to the NPV compact on VRA grounds. The states' authority to appoint electors by any method their legislatures choose is not absolute. Federal court decisions have struck down state laws concerning appointment of electors that were found to be in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment's guarantee of equal protection: Although Clause 2 (of Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution) seemingly vests complete discretion in the states, certain older cases had recognized a federal interest in protecting the integrity of the process. Thus, the Court upheld the power of Congress to protect the right of all citizens who are entitled to vote to lend aid and support in any legal manner to the election of any legally qualified person as a presidential elector.... [I]n Oregon v. Mitchell (42 U.S. 112 (1970)), the Court upheld the power of Congress to reduce the voting age in presidential elections and to set a thirty-day durational residency period as a qualification for voting in presidential elections. Although the Justices were divided on the reasons, the rationale emerging from this case, considered with Williams v. Rhodes , (393 U.S. 20 1968)) is that the Fourteenth Amendment limits state discretion in prescribing the manner of selecting electors and that Congress in enforcing the Fourteenth Amendment may override state practices that violate that Amendment and may substitute standards of its own. Critics of the electoral college system have sought direct election of the President and Vice President without success for more than two centuries. The NPV initiative represents a novel effort to achieve this goal by use of an interstate compact that would circumvent the stringent requirements necessary for the proposal and ratification of constitutional amendments. Since its inception in 2006, NPV has achieved a degree of success: 14 states and the District of Columbia, controlling a total of 189 electoral votes, have joined the compact since 2008. Progress has arguably been sporadic, however, notwithstanding active campaigning by National Popular Vote Inc. Over the course of more than a decade, NPV has heretofore failed to develop a sustained momentum toward its stated goal of states controlling 270 electoral votes. The action of three states in joining NPV to date in 2019 marks the most activity in a single year since 2008; it remains to be seen whether this trend will continue. To date, certain Democratic-leaning states have joined the compact. The arguable lack of support in Republican-controlled state legislatures raises questions about further accessions to the compact in the immediate future, particularly given the fact that the GOP controlled both legislative chambers in 30 states following the 2018 elections. To date, while the NPV initiative has generated interest among supporters of direct popular election of the President, it does not appear to have gained widespread awareness among the public at large. The findings of the March 27, 2019, Politico/Morning Consult survey cited earlier in this report arguably suggest that greater public knowledge of NPV might spur popular support for the compact. This might then contribute to further momentum if additional states were to join, particularly populous ones like Florida (29 electoral votes), Georgia (16 electoral votes), and Ohio (18 electoral votes) where the compact was under active consideration in 2019. Under these circumstances, proponents might be energized and encouraged by a sense of progress for the initiative. At the same time, NPV opponents could be expected to coalesce around the issues identified earlier in this report, and renew and increase their efforts in defense of the electoral college system. The activities of both might ultimately bring the NPV initiative to the more immediate attention of Congress.

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

Answer: Foreign assistance is the largest component of the international affairs budget and is viewed by many as an essential instrument of U.S. foreign policy. On the basis of national security, commercial, and humanitarian rationales, U.S. assistance flows through many federal agencies and supports myriad objectives. These include promoting economic growth, reducing poverty, improving governance, expanding access to health care and education, promoting stability in conflict regions, countering terrorism, promoting human rights, strengthening allies, and curbing illicit drug production and trafficking. Since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, foreign aid has increasingly been associated with national security policy. At the same time, many Americans and some Members of Congress view foreign aid as an expense that the United States cannot afford given current budget deficits. In FY2017, U.S. foreign assistance, defined broadly, totaled an estimated $49.87 billion, or 1.2% of total federal budget authority. About 44% of this assistance was for bilateral economic development programs, including political/strategic economic assistance; 35% for military aid and nonmilitary security assistance; 18% for humanitarian activities; and 4% to support the work of multilateral institutions. Assistance can take the form of cash transfers, equipment and commodities, infrastructure, or technical assistance, and, in recent decades, is provided almost exclusively on a grant rather than loan basis. Most U.S. aid is implemented by nongovernmental organizations rather than foreign governments. The United States is the largest foreign aid donor in the world, accounting for about 24% of total official development assistance from major donor governments in 2017 (the latest year for which these data are available). Key foreign assistance trends in the past decade include growth in development aid, particularly global health programs; increased security assistance directed toward U.S. allies in the anti-terrorism effort; and high levels of humanitarian assistance to address a range of crises. Adjusted for inflation, annual foreign assistance funding over the past decade was the highest it has been since the Marshall Plan in the years immediately following World War II. In FY2017, Afghanistan, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, and Egypt received the largest amounts of U.S. aid, reflecting long-standing aid commitments to Israel and Egypt, the strategic significance of Afghanistan and Iraq, and the strategic and humanitarian importance of Jordan as the crisis in neighboring Syria continues. The Near East region received 27% of aid allocated by country or region in FY2017, followed by Africa, at 25%, and South and Central Asia, at 15%. This was a significant shift from a decade prior, when Africa received 19% of aid and the Near East 34%, reflecting significant increases in HIV/AIDS-related programs concentrated in Africa between FY2007 and FY2017 and the drawdown of U.S. military forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. Military assistance to Iraq began to decline starting in FY2011, but growing concern about the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) has reversed this trend. This report provides an overview of the U.S. foreign assistance program by answering frequently asked questions on the subject. It is intended to provide a broad view of foreign assistance over time, and will be updated periodically. For more current information on foreign aid funding levels, see CRS Report R45168, Department of State, Foreign Operations and Related Programs: FY2019 Budget and Appropriations, by Susan B. Epstein, Marian L. Lawson, and Cory R. Gill.