As the House is set to consider its $833.1 billion fiscal year 2025 defense spending bill this week, the lower chamber’s top defense appropriator cited concern that many amendments proposed for consideration include offsetting cuts that could “gut the [operations and maintenance] account significantly.”
Over 400 amendments to the defense appropriations bill were submitted to the House Rules Committee for floor consideration, with the panel set to decide on Tuesday evening which measures will be allowed for debate this week.
“I support an open and transparent process and I support the intent of many of the funding amendments. However, I’m concerned that the sheer volume of amendments coupled with the tight topline complicates our efforts to produce a bill that provides the resources necessary to deter and, if necessary, win a war,” Rep. Ken Calvert (R-Calif.), chair of the House Appropriations Defense Subcommittee, said in open remarks at the Rules Committee meeting.
Around 50 of the amendments submitted to the Rules Committee for consideration are measures that include cuts to an O&M account to shift funds to another priority.
HAC’s FY ‘25 defense spending bill funds $294.3 billion for operations and maintenance, a $2 billion cut to the budget request, $165.3 billion for procurement, $1.4 billion below the request, and $145.9 billion for research and development, an increase of $2.7 billion from the budget submission.
Meanwhile, the top Democrat on the Rules Committee said Tuesday he believes the inclusion of GOP-proposed ‘offensive’ policy riders will hinder the legislation from being signed into law.
Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.), the House Rules ranking member, offered the same outlook on House Republicans’ State and Foreign Operations and Homeland Security spending legislation, as the panel will consider which amendments will be allowed for debate during floor consideration of all three bills this week.
“It is shameful and it is wrong that Republicans are abusing the appropriations process to rip freedom away from Americans and [trying] to control their lives. Enough already. Stop with the culture war nonsense and let’s get to work on doing the business of the American people without all this extreme MAGA nonsense. None of these bills, none of them, will be signed into law the way they are written right now. We all know that,” McGovern said.
McGovern’s remarks follows a statement from the White House on Monday that President Biden would veto the House Appropriations Committee’s (HAC) defense spending bill, citing objections to the bill’s divisive GOP-proposed policy provisions, to include restricting access to reproductive healthcare services, blocking funds for diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts and removing $621 million for climate change-related initiatives, as well as cuts to the shipbuilding request (Defense Daily, June 24).
HAC on June 13 voted 34-25 along party lines to advance its $833.1 billion FY ‘25 defense bill out of committee, which followed debate on the lack of Ukraine aid in the legislation and Democrats’ objection to the inclusion of GOP-proposed “partisan social policy riders” (Defense Daily, June 13).
“The bill refocuses the Department of Defense on its core mission by defunding the Green New Deal budget and defunding DEI distractions. Our military should be laser-focused on prevailing in any conflict. They don’t need Washington to force them to make these woke decisions along the way,” Rep. Michael Burgess (R-Texas), the House Rules chair, said on Tuesday.
Rep. Betty McCollum (D-Minn.), the HAC-D ranking member, said the House’s defense spending bill in its current form “repeats the same mistakes” as the FY ‘24 process, where similar GOP-proposed policy riders were ultimately removed the final version of the bill.
“Once again, this bill partisan social [policy] riders that were just rejected in the FY ‘24 conference agreement. And the inclusion of those riders in the process last year led to several continuing resolutions that spanned over five months of this fiscal year. And our national security cannot afford to wait another five months as we previously did,” McCollum said. “Every member in this room knows what needs to happen for this bill to become law, the partisan riders need to come out so that the bill can get bipartisan support.”