Pssssssssst! Just a reminder - ReTHUGs cut NOAA's hurricane research funds last year

[gratuitous]

14. According to the second link (Washington Post story)

Initial funding for HFIP was established in 2008 (when Democrats held the Senate) was $14 million. As a percentage of the total federal budget, pretty small potatoes. By 2015, NOAA had to cut the budget for HFIP to $4.5 million, less than a third of the allocation seven years previously.

The timing of the allocation makes me think that this was part of the "unthinkable" sequester of the federal budget, the automatic, across-the-board cutting of federal spending that was to take effect if Congress wasn't able to put together a budget bill. As a newer program, I would guess that HFIP has a smaller bureaucratic defense team than other programs under the NOAA umbrella. NOAA is trying to make as many bricks as it can, but Congress keeps limiting the available straw with automatic budget cuts. Nobody's fingerprints are on the cuts, because nobody is voting for or against budget bills.