But I’m not worrying about that—at least, not yet.

The reason why is that the House appropriations subcommittee has proven itself to be a great defender of planetary science, and they have yet to weigh in. In particular, subcommittee chairman John Culberson (R-TX) is a proven champion of a mission to explore Europa while also supporting Mars exploration and a balanced program of smaller planetary missions.

Even though the Senate and House write their NASA funding bills separately, they eventually need to reconcile their differences in order to pass a final bill into law. So you can read these draft bills as staking out initial negotiating positions in that process. The House’s strong support for Planetary Science means the Senate can lowball their number as a strategic negotiating move, knowing that the House will want to bring that back up. The House can do the same with priorities they know the Senate supports.

Recent history has shown this to be the case. Over the past few years, the Senate has consistently proposed lower numbers for planetary science than the House, yet the House’s higher number has made it into the final budget bill each year.

Of course, if the House chooses to continue to grow the NASA budget with inflation, as we urged Congress to do earlier this year, many of these problems would disappear.

That’s why I’m not worrying yet. Of course, the House still needs to move forward with its own NASA budget bill while managing the deep divisions within the Republican party during an election year.

Should the House release its own draft, there would still be a long road before Congress can pass an agreement to fund the government before October 1st, the start of the next fiscal year, and a mere five weeks before the Presidential election. But they can once again step up and demonstrate their continued support for planetary exploration during that period. If they don't, then I would start to become more concerned about the Senate being the only congressional action on planetary science this year.