Amid Cries of Bias, FBI Funding to Be Trimmed

Congressional leaders said this week that they plan to lower annual funding for the FBI in the newest spending bill, which the House and Senate are expected to vote on before Friday in order to avoid a partial government shutdown.

The FBI's 6% funding decrease came out to $654 million and results in its budget coming in at $10.7 billion, the Washington Examiner reported.

Republicans said that the bill "utilizes the power of the purse to address the weaponization of the growing bureaucracy within the FBI."

The appropriations bill, known as "minibus" legislation, consists of six of 12 appropriations bills, and would fund the Justice Department, the FBI, and several other agencies through Sept. 30.

The FBI said in a statement Monday that the fiscal 2024 plan "does not allow the FBI to sustain current operations needed to protect the American people," saying that "budget cuts will reduce the FBI's ability to counter threats of terrorism to the homeland; keep pace with firearm background checks; and operations combating violent crime, drugs, gangs, and transnational organized crime."

The FBI added that the bill also will reduce counterintelligence activity, and called the budget cut a "win for China."

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