The first on-time annual funding for the Pentagon in a decade cleared the last congressional hurdle Wednesday with a House vote and now heads to President Trump’s desk.
The president has four days to sign the $674 billion appropriations bill before the end of the fiscal year and avoid another one of the gaps in funding that have plagued Pentagon planners and military forces for years.
Trump has indicated he will sign the legislation, which includes a nearly $20 billion spending increase and is part of a minibus funding three other federal departments — Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education.
Trump last week called the spending bill “ridiculous” because it lacks funding for his border wall, which raised worries Trump might reject the bill. But Republicans say they’re confident Trump will accept it.
“Yes, I am confident he will sign it,” House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., said. “This funds our military, this funds opioids, this does a lot of the things we all want to accomplish together and we’ve had very good conversations with the president.”
House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, also said Tuesday he believes the president will sign the bill.
“I don’t think the president will veto it. He’s frustrated about the wall but a central thrust that he has been completely consistent on from the beginning of his presidency has been to rebuild the military, and this is the biggest step yet toward that goal,” Thornberry said.
The Senate passed the minibus bill 93-7 last week while today’s vote in the House was 361-61.
Partisan political wrangling on Capitol Hill caused fiscal 2018 defense funding to be delayed until six months after the start of the fiscal year. It was part of the omnibus bill that Trump backed, threatened to veto, and then finally reluctantly signed in March because it included a hike for the Pentagon.
Late spending bills and multiple stopgap continuing resolutions have become the norm for the military in recent years and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and other Pentagon leaders have repeatedly warned Congress that budget instability is a central challenge.
“The most important thing is it is the first time in 10 years we get defense bill funding on time,” said Rep. Kay Granger, R-Texas, who chairs the House Appropriations defense subcommittee. “Working with Secretary Mattis, he said the money’s important but giving it to us on time, where we have the time to plan and to build is really the most important thing and that’s what we’re going to do.”
The bill funds the purchase of 93 F-35 fighters and provides $24 billion to buy 13 new battle-force ships, including three littoral combat ships, despite the Navy’s insistence that it needs just one.
The military’s troop levels would increase by 16,400 under the legislation, and those service members would get a 2.6 percent pay raise, which is the largest in nearly a decade.
“This bill we are going to pass today, it shows really major investments in our air superiority, our shipbuilding, our ground forces, the things they need and the things they deserve,” Granger said.
