Bipartisan congressional negotiators unveiled a funding package that rejects the White House’s proposed deep cuts to the Education Department and seeks to keep key student supports intact. The minibus proposal would maintain roughly $79 billion in discretionary Education Department funding and preserve programs such as Pell, TRIO, FSEOG and GEAR UP at near‑current levels, according to committee summaries and reporting. The move represents a congressional rebuke to the administration’s plan to shutter or sharply shrink federal education programs and follows separate appropriations language keeping NIH and other research funding largely steady. College leaders and advocates had warned that steep cuts would destabilize financial aid and research commitments; the bipartisan package aims to avert those disruptions as FY26 spending negotiations continue.