The annual defense policy bill faces a key test Tuesday, with senators deciding whether to limit debate and clear the way for a final passage vote by the end of the week.
Senators will also take up two controversial amendments: one involving directly arming Iraqi Kurds in the North and another changing the way the military handles sex assault cases.
Democrats appear unlikely to block the bill from advancing, in spite of a White House veto threat and widespread dislike among them for a controversial plan to shift $38 billion in funding for operations and maintenance to a war account that’s not subject to mandatory spending caps. Democratic leaders, backed by the White House, have revolted against the plan, demanding instead a budget deal that would lift those caps permanently.
“It’s a lot easier to draw a line on the appropriations bills than it is on the authorization bills,” Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., told reporters Monday. “I think there’s a lot of my colleagues who want to fight this fight once rather than twice.”
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The bill sets policy for the Pentagon for fiscal 2016, including which weapons to buy and how much troops are paid. It also includes a provision that would give individual service chiefs more power over weapons-buying decisions and create other new measures to increase accountability. Reforming the acquisition process is a major concern of Armed Services Chairman John McCain, R-Ariz., who called the change “vital.”
Still there are several contentious issues yet to be resolved in the legislation, especially the two amendments. One measure is from Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, that would authorize the Obama administration to supply arms directly to Iraqi Kurds, and another from Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., that would remove the authority to prosecute sexual assaults from the military chain of command.
Ernst’s amendment, which is backed by Democrat Barbara Boxer of California, along with GOP presidential candidates Lindsey Graham and Marco Rubio, mirrors a provision in the House-passed version of the bill that would authorize a percentage of U.S. arms shipments to be sent directly to Kurdish forces, bypassing Baghdad.
Supporters of the idea say the Shiite-majority government in Baghdad is hurting the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria by shortchanging the independence-minded Kurds and Sunni Arab tribal forces from their share of U.S.-supplied weapons. But the White House and the Iraqi government oppose the move as a threat to Iraq’s unity.
The Pentagon announced last week that it would supply weapons to the Sunnis, but is doing so through the government in Baghdad.
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Gillibrand’s amendment on sex assault is a repeat of legislation that fell five votes short of the 60-vote threshold last year, over concerns that the change would weaken commanders’ authority.
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Murphy, backed by several other Democrats and Republican Rand Paul of Kentucky, also is seeking to have senators vote on his proposal to bar nearly all uses of ground combat troops in the fight against the Islamic State. That issue is a major sticking point in the stalled effort to have Congress consider a new war authorization.
“I understand that it’s going to be tough to get a vote on this amendment … but this issue isn’t going away,” Murphy said, noting that even though Obama has so far refused to commit U.S. combat troops to the fight, a future president may do so unless Congress acts.
The House passed its version of the bill on May 15. If the two chambers can resolve their differences and overcome Obama’s veto threat by the end of September, it would be the first time since 1997 that a policy bill would become law in time for the start of the new fiscal year.
