Congressional negotiators on Thursday finalized a $675 billion bill to fund the Pentagon for the coming fiscal year and boosts purchases of ships and aircraft beyond the Defense Department’s request.
The approval by a joint House-Senate conference committee moves the crucial defense appropriations closer to a final vote in both chambers as the end of the fiscal year looms.
The bill includes funding for military aircraft, warships and troop levels. Text was not immediately released but the compromise legislation calls for three Navy littoral combat ships and 93 of the advanced F-35 joint strike fighters, according to Senate Appropriations Committee staff.
The administration had requested one LCS and 77 Lockheed Martin F-35s.
It will still be a dash to send the legislation to President Trump’s desk in time with a major hurricane bearing down and just days left on each chamber’s legislative calendar before Oct. 1, the start of the new fiscal year.
The defense funding is part of a minibus appropriations package that includes spending bills dealing with funding for the departments of Labor, Health and Human Services and Education.
Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen, R-N.J., the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, said finalizing the funding bill was a “tremendous step forward” in returning Congress to a regular budget process.
The Pentagon has been hamstrung for a decade with stopgap continuing resolutions nearly every year. The defense bill must pass by the end of the month or the military could face another stopgap budget.
“The cycle of continuing resolutions stops here and it stops today,” said Rep. Kay Granger, R-Texas, who chairs the House Appropriations defense subcommittee.
