5 NDAA topics causing a stir as defense bill heads toward final vote
Republicans have agreed to strip several partisan culture war provisions from the annual defense spending bill, but there are still a handful of fights on the horizon as negotiations near the finish line.
Congressional negotiators last week came to a compromise on the behemoth National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), an $886 billion measure for fiscal 2024 that includes a 5.2 percent pay raise for troops, $11.5 billion to help deter China, $800 million to support Ukraine and tens of billions of dollars for new ships and aircraft.
Though the House and Senate this week are expected to pass the legislation with bipartisan support, the bill was subject to intense scrutiny after White House officials raised alarms on the numerous social issues House Republicans inserted into their draft bill, which passed in July.
Many of those provisions were eventually pulled out in the final compromise — including a change to the Pentagon’s abortion policy and a ban on the coverage of transition surgeries and other treatments for transgender troops.
The White House released a statement Tuesday in support of the NDAA, urging “swift passage” of the bill.
Still, other contentious language made its way in, setting the stage for potential clashes in Congress. Here are five NDAA provisions that could come up for debate as the House and Senate race to finish the bill by Friday.
Extending Section 702
Lawmakers want to extend Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) through April 19.
The section allows the U.S. government to conduct warrantless surveillance of foreigners outside the country, but it’s controversial because Americans may be spied upon by extension.
Congress first enacted FISA Section 702 in 2008; it must be reauthorized every five years.
Activists and some lawmakers have decried the section as unlawful and government overreach, and the amendment to temporarily extend it will certainly draw some protests when the NDAA is debated in Congress.
More conservative Republicans have joined some liberal Democrats in pushing against the FISA amendment, including Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), who in July highlighted how in 2022 alone, the FBI used Section 702 databases to spy on some 204,000 U.S. citizens.
“You can’t make this stuff up,” he said during an Oversight hearing on the FBI. “There are 204,000 reasons why Republicans will oppose FISA reauthorization in its current form.”
And Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), in an opinion piece released Monday, claimed the FBI has abused FISA, using it as a backdoor to spy on Americans. He cautioned Congress not to extend it without reform.
“Do not rubber-stamp this continued FISA abuse as part of the NDAA,” he wrote. “Like general warrants, backdoor searches under FISA 702 are carried out without any of the safeguards created to protect life, liberty, and property from the kind of harm that an unrestrained government is uniquely capable of inflicting.”
But the Biden administration has defended the act, with Pentagon press secretary Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder on Tuesday asserting that extending FISA is critical to defending U.S. national security.
The “authorization enables intelligence reports, which contributes to protecting U.S. service members,” Ryder said, saying that failing to extend it would also endanger assistance to allies such as Ukraine.
“Our service members will be at greater risk and our country will be more vulnerable due to our inability to determine or assess emerging threats,” he said.
Culture war battles
While the most contentious amendments on abortion, diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) and other social battles failed to make it into the NDAA draft, some sticky issues survived.
A major GOP win included a ban on endorsing critical race theory (CRT) in the military’s academies or in military service training. CRT asserts that race is a social construct and racism is widely embedded across institutions.
Republicans also succeeded in creating a salary cap and a hiring freeze on the DEI committee until the Government Accountability Office completes an audit of the department. The GOP has criticized DEI initiatives as needlessly distracting from military readiness.
“Our military’s focus should be to maintain peak readiness and lethality, rather than foster woke politics,” Rep. Pat Fallon (R-Texas), wrote on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. “The FY24 NDAA is a win for American national security.”
Far-right lawmakers, however, including Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), have said the NDAA does not go far enough in stopping “woke” policies at the Pentagon.
Another rider includes a bill of rights for the parents of students at the Pentagon’s military academies and schools, allowing them to review the curriculum being taught and the books handed out in classrooms.
A final provision prohibits the display of “unapproved flags” at military installations, which Republicans have explicitly said would ban LGBTQ flags.
Some of these amendments may draw objections from Democrats when it reaches the House and Senate floor for debate.
COVID-19 troop reinstatement
In last year’s NDAA, lawmakers succeeded in removing a COVID-19 vaccine mandate for U.S. troops.
This year, they want to order the Pentagon to review the reinstatement of service members who were dismissed or discharged for refusing the vaccine.
The amendment directs the Pentagon to consider reinstatement at the request of a service member who was discharged and, if reinstated, should define the period of the individual’s time away from service as a period of inactivation. Defense officials will also be required to communicate on the reinstatement process with discharged troops.
Service members seeking reinstatement must have submitted a request for a religious, administrative or medical exemption for the vaccine.
The NDAA will also force the Defense Department to establish a review board to investigate COVID-19 vaccine discharges and authorize a study of potential health consequences to service members who got the vaccine.
It’s not clear if any lawmakers are opposed to the amendments.
Space Command headquarters fight
One strong point of contention between some House Republicans and the Biden administration is a provision that centers around the final resting place for the U.S. Space Command headquarters, a fight that has been brewing since before former President Trump left office.
Trump, in a last-minute move ahead of Biden’s inauguration, chose Huntsville, Ala., as the new location for the command, despite Colorado Springs, Colo., already housing the installation.
After a thorny fight, with Colorado lawmakers imploring the administration to reconsider, Biden overturned Trump’s decision in July, arguing a move to Huntsville would take years and impact military readiness.
But House Armed Services Committee Chair Mike Rogers (R-Ala.) vowed to fight that choice, introducing language in the House’s NDAA that temporarily blocks any spending to build out the command headquarters in Colorado Springs until the end of next July.
That date is when reports are due from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) and the Air Force Inspector General on how Biden made his decision.
The inspector general and GAO have not yet opened a review on the issue.
Rogers and other Alabama Republicans have accused Biden of playing politics in refusing to relocate the headquarters to Huntsville. At a hearing in the fall, Republicans from states across the country joined in to accuse the president of politicizing the headquarters process.
While the Space Command amendment is unlikely to draw any resistance in Congress — and the White House has not publicly said it was opposed to the provision — the topic is sure to rear its head again next year.
Climate and environment
Other amendments causing strife among lawmakers are several seeking to rein in the Pentagon’s ability to transition to greener energy.
One provision prevents the Department of Defense from forcing small-business contractors to disclose their greenhouse gas emissions as a condition for winning a contract.
Another measure orders a Pentagon review of electric vehicles, including an assessment of how many critical materials are sourced from China and “potential vulnerabilities” of an electric fleet in the military.
Lawmakers also included a rider to require sufficient charging stations before deploying nontactical electric vehicles at a military installation.
The Army released a plan in 2022 to create an all-electric light-duty nontactical fleet by 2027 and an all-electric nontactical fleet by 2035. Nontactical vehicles are typically trucks and support vehicles.
Additionally, the NDAA leaves out the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, a move drawing fierce protest from Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.).
Hawley is vowing to derail passage of the NDAA because the bill fails to compensate victims of nuclear radiation in his state.
“BILLIONS for Ukraine – but NOTHING for the thousands of Missourians poisoned by the federal government’s nuclear waste,” Hawley wrote on X, referring to Biden’s $61 billion request for Kyiv in a separate bill.
Hawley added in another post: “It’s wrong.”
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