Committee Hearings – Week of 7-24-22

With the House and Senate in session but preparing to leave on their Summer Recess at the end of the week, there is a relatively light hearing schedule. There is one cybersecurity hearing scheduled in the House.

Cybersecurity Hearing

On Thursday the Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics of House Space, Science, and Technology Committee will hold a meeting on “Exploring Cyber Space: Cybersecurity Issues for Civil and Commercial Space Systems”. The witness list includes:

• Theresa Suloway,The MITRE Corporation,

• Matthew Scholl, NIST, and

• Brandon Bailey, The Aerospace Corporation

This discussion could get technical, it will be interesting to see how well the Staff prepares technical questions, and how well the congresscritters understand the answers.

On the Floor in the House

The last week in July is always jam packed with stuff and this week will certainly be interesting. The House is planning on taking up 27 bills under the suspension of the rules process which will mean some late-night votes on Tuesday. Those bills include:

HR 7569 – Energy Cybersecurity University Leadership Act of 2022, and

HR 4551 – RANSOMWARE Act (not covered here)

There are five bills to be considered under rules, but nothing major. They will take up legislative time while the House waits on Senate actions (see below) on HR 4346, and possible  “Consideration of Legislation Related to Public Safety”.

On the Floor in the Senate

The Senate is scheduled to take the final cloture vote on HR 4346 this morning. This would set the bill up for a final vote tomorrow or Wednesday. There was some Republican support on the first cloture vote, but the final vote may be held ransom to some last-minute Republican amendment. We will just have to wait and see.