DEFENSE SPENDING MARKUP SCHEDULED: The defense budget process is steaming ahead and now we have a hearing date for the Senate’s 2019 spending bill. The Senate Appropriations Committee says it plans to hold its markup of the legislation during the last week of June. Meanwhile, the committee will take testimony from Army and Air Force leaders today and Thursday, respectively. On the other side of Capitol Hill, the House Appropriations Committee held a closed budget hearing at the end of April on its annual appropriations spending bill with testimony from Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Joseph Dunford, indicating it may also be close to finishing its work.

NDAA MOVING TOO: The authorization portion of the 2019 defense budget is also making progress. The Senate Armed Services Committee has scheduled its subcommittee markup hearings and a full committee markup of the National Defense Authorization Act next week (see the full schedule in the calendar below) following its hearings with Pentagon officials in recent weeks. That follows the House Armed Services Committee’s 14-and-a-half-hours of debate on its version of the bill last week. The committee passed the NDAA and sent it to the House floor, though no vote has been scheduled.