Marc Selinger
Defense Daily
A key House member expressed confidence Sept. 26 that Congress will finish its work on the fiscal year 2018 defense authorization bill despite Capitol Hill gridlock on many issues.
The optimism from Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), chairman of the House Armed Services Committee’s (HASC’s) strategic forces panel, came eight days after the Senate approved its version of the bill Sept. 18. The legislation now heads to a conference with the House, which passed its bill in July.
“I do think that we’re going to get a good conference report,” Rogers said at an Air Force Association breakfast. “When we don’t get anything else done, we still find a way to get our [defense authorization bill] passed.”
Rogers also said he expects the House will vote on whether to prevent the return of across-the-budget cuts required by the Budget Control Act of 2011. Without such a vote, defense spending will be tens of billions of dollars less than what the Trump administration requested and lawmakers have proposed.
“We were assured earlier this year that we would get a vote, an up-or-down vote, on eliminating the caps on defense sequester later this year, and I believe that’s going to happen,” Rogers said. “I hope it’s going to be successful. There is nothing that is more concerning to the HASC members than those caps and what it has done to us.”
The bill the Senate approved last week would authorize appropriations of about $14.5 billion for the National Nuclear Security Association (NNSA) in 2018. That is roughly $500 million more than the Donald Trump administration requested. Authorization bills do not actually fund agencies. Instead, they are viewed as guidelines for congressional appropriators who cut the checks in separate bills.
Though it authorizes more funding than requested for the NNSA, the bill also would approve a number of things the Trump administration opposes, including:
- Authorization to continue building the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility at the Energy Department’s Savannah River Site near Aiken, S.C.
- Authorization for $65 million to start research and development for a dual-capable, road-mobile, ground-launched missile system within the range prohibited by the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty of 1987.
- A requirement that the NNSA administrator report annually to Congress on the agency’s unfunded priorities. The report would be due 10 days after the White House submits its yearly federal funding request to Congress. That is supposed to happen in early February, though it routinely takes longer.
The National Defense Authorization Act also would authorize just under $175 million to upgrade the stockpile steward’s Albuquerque Complex. That facility is on the Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico.
The House version of the bill also includes language on developing an INF-range missile and sustaining the MOX project.
