Mikulski looking for ‘bonus money’ for NIH, appropriations for federal pay raise

The longest-serving woman in Congress promised during her last year in office that she would work to find “new money” and “bonus money” for the National Institutes of Health to help meet its mission, as well as continue to work on a proposed 5.3 percent pay raise for all federal employees.

Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) said she would “work my earrings off that the last appropriations for the NIH under Barbara Mikulski’s watch is going to be the best damn appropriations you’ve ever seen.”

“Do no harm. What do I mean by that? No sequester, no shutdown, no slamdown, let’s get our job done. You do your job, we need to do our job,” Mikulski said during a speech at NIH in Bethesda, Maryland. “Capitalize existing programs. You’re all doing great work. We need to make sure what you’re doing gets funded. You need something that’s realizable, undeniable, sustainable; don’t screw around, keep going, and that’s exactly what we’re going to do. We’re also going to see if we can find new money for our new ideas and some of the ideas that are already on the books: the [Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies] Initiative, precision medicine. Let’s not forget our young investigators. But let’s look at where we can find bonus money, called mandatory funding, to make sure you even get a bigger shot at the [Cancer] Moonshot, or all the other great things that you’re working on.”

Mikulski announced her retirement in March 2015. Her fifth term in office ends January 2017. She was elected to the House of Representatives in 1976 and took office in the Senate in 1987.

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