Press Releases

Washington, DC – U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (FL-25) secured more than $1 billion in Fiscal Year 2026 federal funding in a critical appropriations package which passed the House yesterday, including millions in funds for cancer research, local road and public safety projects, drowning prevention programs, as well as delivering vital funding for medical and defense research efforts taking place at South Florida hospital and university campuses. The combined bill now moves to the Senate. 

"I’m so proud to help retore this critical bipartisan, bicameral funding that curbs the Trump Administration’s cruel push to gut public services and helps restore our legislative purse strings, while also vital funding the medial research, national defense and education programs that make life healthier and more secure in South Florida,” said Wasserman Schultz, Ranking Member on the Military Construction and Veterans Affairs Appropriations Subcommittee. “The reason I fight so hard in Washington is so I can deliver cancer screenings, mammograms, drowning prevention programs and vital road, port and university research back home, and help keep our community safer, stronger and economically thriving.”   

In the Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies Bill, Wasserman Schultz helped secure:

• $236.5 million for the National Breast and Cervical Cancer Early Detection program for lower-income women, which provides thousands in Florida with mammograms, MRIs, pap tests, and HPV tests;
• $10 million for the Alcee. L. Hastings Program for Advanced Cancer Screening to reach residents in underserved, rural, and remote communities.
• $7 million for the EARLY Act, which Wasserman Schultz authored, to support recently diagnosed young women with breast cancer, and urges those at high risk to get screened.
• $725,000 for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Cancer Survivorship Resource Center to help over 1 million in Florida navigate life after active cancer treatment.
• $200 million for the CDC’s Office of Smoking and Health, defeating Republican efforts to eliminate the office. In 2024, Florida received $3 million through the Office of Smoking and Health to help individuals quit tobacco use.
• $2 million for drowning prevention, the leading cause of death for children between the ages of 1 and 4. Florida has the nation’s highest child drowning death rate.

• $1.25 million for Town of Davie ($250,000) and City of Miramar-Pembroke Pines ($1,050,000) for vital, local road expansion projects.
• $1 million for Broward College’s Aviation Training Center expansion.
• $1 million for the Fort Lauderdale Public Safety Complex project to train fire and police first responders.
• $2 million to protect historically significant land in Rosewood, site of a 1923 racial massacre in this African American community. 
• National funds and agency directives that will aid Florida by: pushing the Federal Aviation Administration to adopt routing measures in Jacksonville to reduce air congestion; expanded renovation loan options for condominium associations; pushing for the release of withheld electrical vehicle infrastructure grants; $10 million for scenic byways; successfully increased funding for tanker security at our ports, and maintained funding to help affordable housing, financial counseling and neighborhood reinvestment.

• $9 million to support research at Nova Southeastern University for U.S. Navy testing into ocean hydrodynamics and maintaining coastal seabed stealth;
• $10 million to support Florida International University’s research into rapid advanced deposition. 
• $15 million for rare cancer microtissue research with 3D modeling.
• $1.3 billion for medical research projects to develop treatments for cancer, disease, and service-related injuries, $702.5 million for collaborative defense projects with Israel in emerging technologies and missile defense projects.