Lawmakers’ $923.3 billion defense authorization bill will wait for a floor vote until after the July 4 recess, the chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee said this week.
Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) told reporters after the body’s weekly policy lunches that she and other Democrats will not agree to a defense increase while other domestic needs remain unmet. Murray wants increases for those programs too.
The Senate Armed Services Committee passed its version of the fiscal 2025 defense authorization bill on June 13 on a vote of 22 to 3, with Chairman Jack Reed (D-R.I.) voting “no” because the bill violated the Fiscal Responsibility Act’s cap of a one percent spending increase.
The bill authorizes $878.4 for the Pentagon, $33.4 billion for Department of Energy nuclear weapon programs, and $11.5 billion for defense-related programs outside of the defense authorizers’ jurisdiction.
That $25 billion topline increase is $30 billion less than Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), the SASC ranking member, had proposed. Wicker wants to build three attack submarines per year, a 357-ship Navy by 2035, and increase defense spending from 3% of gross domestic product to 5%.
Republican Whip John Thune (R-S.D.) is calling for a floor vote on the bill the Armed Services Committee passed last week. Asked Wednesday what led to the $25 billion increase, rather than the $55 billion advocated by Wicker, Thune replied, “I’m guessing it was the art of the doable.”
Exchange Monitor affiliate publication Defense Daily originally posted this story.
